Help please :) Lines and coloured dots on screen (artifacts)

Zenoxx

Zenoxx

Zenoxx

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Joined
2 Jan 2003
Posts
208
Hi all,

Been trying to work out what is wrong with one of my family's pcs that I built and need your expertise!

For the last couple of months the machine has been experiencing vertical lines accross the screen and coloured dots (artifacts). But it only happens randomly. Sometimes it can go for a week without doing it and then it will happen and you can not get rid of them by restarting, shutting down, psu off etc. Quite often the machine will hang shortly after the lines appear but sometimes you can continue to use machine.

I have tried swapping the graphics card over, did not fix it, and I have just swapped the ram. When I did swap the ram it was still showing the exact same lines, I went into safe mode, was still showing them, did a restart and then they dissapeared and I am now here on the machine typing this.....

Its not driver related as it does it when it first turns on with bios info etc.


Could it be a faulty motherboard? The cpu does not seem to be overheating, all cores sit at about 40-42C idle. And I have changed the graphics card over in the past so im sure its not that...
Or can the processor just go dodgy?

The machine has been running fine for a year or so previously to this problem.


The machine specs are:

Intel i7 920 (Bloomfield)
Gigabyte EX58-UD3R
6GB OCZ PC3 12800 (Now has 4GB of my much higher spec ram in)
ATI Radeon 4870 X2 (Have tried my old 4850 and still had prob)


Here are two images:

20111014091625.jpg

20111014091737.jpg





Thanks in advance guys!
 
Faulty cable?

Edit: Seen you reply above, might not be the cable then if your using 2 different cables on 2 different monitors!!
 
Sorry forgot to add I dont have another good quality PSU around.... Is it more likely to be the PSU than processor or motherboard?
 
Most likely GPU if you ask me :/ I know you've tried two but it does look a lot like a graphics card issue. Does your board have another pcie slot free?
 
It's possible but I haven't come across faulty slots since the AGP days

It looks like corrupted video memory tbh, its unlikely but possible that both cards are borked. It may be worth buying a really cheap 4350 or similar, you can send it back if you don't consider that a little dishonest...

I have an old card or two about if you want a lend of one for the price of postage
 
Hey, sorry for the delay in responding. Still been trying to diagnose this problem :(

I tried moving the video card to the 2nd 16x slot. Still had the problem so moved it back to original slot. The problem seems to be getting more frequent now. Infact I cant get it to load up without the problem.

I changed the motherboard last night to a new one. Exactly the same problem on first boot up.

I am kind of thinking it must be the PSU now....what you reckon? Tried pretty much everything else, different graphics card, different ram, different motherboard. Only thing there is left is the processor or PSU lol. Oh also tried the machine at my house with my power cable, monitor and monitor cable. Same thing..
 
If you have a multimeter you can unplug one of the graphics card connectors and run the machine, check the voltage output at the graphics cable. Have the CPU at full load.

Sounds like PSU to me although I thought graphics ram at first.
 
I have just reserved a new PSU and will pickup tonight. hopefully that will resolve the problem.

I will try checking the voltage before swapping :) Thank you.

One thing I did notice was it went to blue screen on a couple of occasions with something to do with the ati driver. Could this be still to do with the power going to the graphics card?
 
Zenoxx said:
I have just reserved a new PSU and will pickup tonight. hopefully that will resolve the problem.

I will try checking the voltage before swapping :) Thank you.

One thing I did notice was it went to blue screen on a couple of occasions with something to do with the ati driver. Could this be still to do with the power going to the graphics card?
Click to expand...

Just read the thread. Common factors are graphics driver and psu. Have you tried a complete uninstall and install of latest graphics drivers?
 
I seem to have resolved the issue. It was not the PSU. Changed it still had same problem.

Changed the graphics card again and now its working fine. Which is very strange as the problem did occur when I put this other graphics card in last time.... Sometimes these things baffle me...
 
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