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Graphics Card Problem HD4870

mediaman

mediaman

mediaman

Associate
Joined
6 Sep 2008
Posts
137
Hi.

I am in need of some advice. I am 90% certain this is a graphics related issue.

Basically I am having system crashes, no BSOD, just the graphics card fans go to full throttle and the monitor goes into standby. This is a completely random event.

I know it isn't driver related as it happens when in bios and also during POST. It happens also in windows including safe mode. I have tried diagnostic boots and have disable all services other than those required and it has not rectified the problem.

As I said, this appears to be completely random. One day can go by and I don't have any issues. Other days it can take me 20 minutes to get the system to boot into windows. Sometimes as soon as I press the power button the graphics card fans go to 100% and the monitor doesn't come out of standby.

On some occasions, the system almost boots into windows but the graphics cards fans will turn on 100% and the monitor will go into standby but I can still hear the widows logging on tune through the speakers, which would indicate that the system itself hadn't crashed, just the graphics card resulting in a blank standby screen.

Any ideas would be a massive help. I have tried re'seating the graphics card to no avail. I have a 1000w corsair PSU with both the PCIe connectors plugged into the card.

System specs.

Graphics Card - Powercolor HD4870 1GB GDDR5
CPU - Q6600 at stock
RAM - 8GB DDR2
Motherboard - Gigabyte EP45-DQ6
OS - Vista SP2

If any more info is needed please ask as I am desperate to get this sorted.

Thanks.
 
Just to add, temperatures in catalyst control panel indicate temps to be around 50 to 55c with the fan set to 30%. This crashing happens regardless if I set manual fan control or automatic. Also on top of the CPU is a tuniq tower and my CPU temps are 30c and below. My case is a gigantic lian li case with 5 internal fans, so I have very good cooling, which inclines me to rule out a heat issue?
 
mediaman said:
Just to add, temperatures in catalyst control panel indicate temps to be around 50 to 55c with the fan set to 30%. This crashing happens regardless if I set manual fan control or automatic. Also on top of the CPU is a tuniq tower and my CPU temps are 30c and below. My case is a gigantic lian li case with 5 internal fans, so I have very good cooling, which inclines me to rule out a heat issue?
Click to expand...

Thats exactly what happened to a one month old sapphire 512 4870 card I had. It was only a month old so I managed to RMA it.
 
Have you removed the Graphics card and re-seated it ? also i had a fault like this one

" On some occasions, the system almost boots into windows but the graphics cards fans will turn on 100% and the monitor will go into standby but I can still hear the widows logging on tune through the speakers, which would indicate that the system itself hadn't crashed, just the graphics card resulting in a blank standby screen. "

and it turned out to be a faulty memory module.

Best of luck.
 
I have taken the card out, dusted it off and looked for any signs of their being something wrong and couldn't find anything obvious. Im going to strip the whole lot down and put it all back together just to check for the silly things but am not holding out much hope because I know everything is seated properly as I built it and im the OCD king when it comes to my cables etc.

Not sure if its worth going down the repair path if indeed it is the card, any experiences? Short of that can someone recommend a replacement card, preferably ati. I don't want to spend silly money, the cheaper the better. I just want something reliable that isnt going to be an embarrassment when once in a blue moon I might play a game.
 
If it's definitely your card that's at fault (i'd definitely make sure before spending any money) i'd recommend the 5770 from experience. The price they're at now is a steal.
 
Just thought I would post an update to this in case anybody else out there has had a similar issue.

Basically I have resolved this problem. It appears the back plate on my tuniq tower fan controller was lose at the back of the case and was in very close proximity to the graphics card, possibly touching and therefore shorting out the contacts on top of the graphics card.

I have moved the fan control plate to a different slot on the back of the case and my machine has been stable since. Like a puzzle, it all makes sense now. The system was stable when it was built and was stable up until I moved house. When transporting the system the backing plate must have loosened and hence my problem which is why the problems arose months after the build.

Thanks to everyone who posted to try and figure this out. I had lost count the amount of times I had taken the card out, re-seated it, checked ram, checked bios etc etc and yet failed to notice the fan control backing plate being loose. Just goes to show that you can't rule out even the most basic of things. :cool:
 
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