Pinkscreen of death!!!!!!!!!

mast3r

mast3r

mast3r

Soldato
Joined
28 Jan 2007
Posts
2,558
Location
Wilmslow, Cheshire
Hi all,

I am looking for a bit of advice and/or help on my head tapping issue.
For months I have had problems with my main gaming PC, it would “PINK” Screen at high graphic demand, (see below images). I changed drivers and then the problem was gone for a good while so I thought. But just recently I have been having nothing but trouble with it. Pink Screen, Blue screens, major lag and apps not responding, having done numerous reloads with diff OS’s.


Spec,
Asus Striker Extreme
Intel QX6700@ 3.20GHz
4x 1GB OCZ Flex
2x BFG 8800GTX Ultras
1x Velocity Raptor – 300gb
4x WD Green 500gb
1x WD Green 750GB
Creative X-Fi Elite
BeQuiet 1200 Watt PSU

CPU + both GPU are on a PA120.3 water cooled loop. Dtek CPU block and EK Clear top GPU blocks, Laing D5 Pump, Thermo Chill PA120.3 rad.


OS's:
Vista 64bit
XP Pro
Win 7.


Problems had gotten worse when it took 30 mins for my rig to post and I was too stubborn to admit there was a fault  when I had the time to check it over, one stick of ram was faulty. OCZ want me to send back as a pair so I went down to 2 GB. I then added some cheap 2 GB sticks to make up to 6 GB.


The Heat pipes on the striker are extremely hot to touch, and have been for a very long time. Too long and it will make your skin white. (Images Below). Was going to add my NB to the WC Loop but then decided against it, Adding a hell of a lot of heat into the loop and rather than sorting the problem (if it is a problem) I will be masking it. During a re-iamge (not reload) temps were taken @ 56c, 67c, 79c.

CPU temps are never above Ambient Unless 100% load for a long period. GPU temps never really above 55c.

I have just removed my master GPU (obv no sli) and I don’t seem to be getting any issues with the pink screens but my FPS in COD has dropped from the norm (6months ago) by 200 FPS or more.

HELP TIME:
Anyone have any ideas on the above, what is causing the issues?

Would the heat from my Chipset be causing any damage?

Is it likely that ONE of my GPU’s is faulty and only being a problem when under load, I would accept that if my cards were overheating but figures show they are not?

I am thinking of Changing my Ram, but then it leaves me thinking, is it worth getting decent stuff when DDR3 is here, which takes me on to this question.
Do I bother changing my Board (Solves the Hot NB) will be fairly silly to go with another high end 775, so would have to go down the i7 route. But then my QX6700 is redundant.


I think I need to open a new thread for that question really.


Many thanks


Martin.

Please also see:
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=15139491

Enough to send you dizzzzzzy.


Inside my PC


Problems on CoD4.



Temp Probe in bottom Heatsink.

 
Last edited:
I had something very similar to this which would happen when gaming although i got a fuzz of green,-turned out that it was poor heatsink fitment on one of my 8800's (on the memory modules). Took me ages to suss it out and initially i was going to just bin one.Glad i did'nt. I refitted the heatsinks using thermal epoxy and it worked a treat.
 
hummm, that is interesting. as i were taking those images i noticed the ramsink cooler pads where all buldging out the sides (may have over tightend my waterblock)
Will give this ago tomoz. what Epoxy did you use, ill have to order some up, only have AC5 Paste.
 
That isnt silly atall, the answer is no, but the card is not plugged in, i removed the main GPU and used the slave GPU to eliminate the problem being with one card etc so i removed the power since it had no PCI-e power need etc.
 
It couldn't be an issue with your psu could it. would a lack of power to the gpu's cause the additional stress on the cpu causing things to overheat?
 
i get a gray screen randomly when i use 2 monitors and playing a game on main monitor. but i sorted that issue with a bios update
 
Got the same thing going on with my 280GTX, swapped it with an 8800GT and it's all fine now. Need to do further testing to say it's definitely the graphics card and RMA it but I'm 95% sure right now.
For me the machine will pink screen as soon as I start a game, then gradually the pink screen will happen later and later, and then the machine will just run fine, suggesting that it doesn't like running cold but as it warms up the problem lessens.


If you are overclocking your graphics cards, I would start with setting it back to factory settings.
If you still get the issue try removing one of the cards.
You should be able to figure it out from there.

My concern with my testing so far is that it doesn't remove the possibility of the PSU being at fault, and I don't really want to give BFG any chance of saying it's not the card.
But having someone with an entirely different machine have the same issue reassures me.
 
I could be totally wrong as I've not used it (only going by the install pics) but is that chipset fan on the right way around??

The picture on mine suggests fitting it the other way around so it exhausts via the back fan - yours looks to be the opposite way around to the way mine says to fit....unless of course your back fan is an intake not an exhaust.
 
Check everything on the graphics card is cooled (ram and anything else that gets hot). If you still ahve it check the oem heatsink and see where the thermal pads are, that should show you what bits need cooling.

If there's anything that the waterblock doesn't touch (and make sure it's good contact if it is) then you can get ram sinks and fix a big fan to blow over the whole slot(s).
 
Many thanks for all the replys.

PSU - I had a feeling it was the PSU, i HAD a 750 watt silverstone prior to my 1200w BeQuiet, same issue with the 750w. So i drew a line through that question, i will do some more testing on it though.

Chipset fan, its on the wrong way according to my book aswell, the fan on the back of my case is an exhaust, the only one infact, its like a hair dryer at times :D. the Chipset fan is blowing the air out towards the rear fan.

I only run on one screen, Dell 24".

Reading over all the replys, heat seems to be the key word. as i say, according to Ntune, Rivatuner, SpeedFran, Everest, Sandra and the AItool, my CPU - never much more than Ambient, the GPU Cores (cores being the key word here) never really raise above 50c at full load etc. SO, it leaves me wondering... have i coverd all the ram chips right. - i will remove the water blocks and reseat them, As they are Full Card blocks, they cover the ram etc, what is the best stuff to use. will AC5 work on the ram chips? Or do i need to find some of them funky pads.

Thanks again.
 
Can anyone suggest what to use to apply to my ram mods on my GPU's?

I cant see AC5 doing the trick. Linkage to some pads?
 
I'd make sure the ram chips are touching the waterblock - unless the block was designed specifically for that card it may not be making contact (say if the block is flat and the gpu sits higher than the ram chips).

You can use thermal pads, they're the easiest, or arctic silver. If there is an air gap I'd imagine arctic silver and copper shims would be better than pads, very hard to get right though.
 
you could have trimmed down the pics, they are huge in size and mb, i was looking at them on a laptop, took forever to download :D

the pink is most definately artifacts on a large scale.
 
Aye. i am sorry about the piccies! i thought they were going to auto re-size. meh!

I did forget to add, when the full screen invasion of pinkness attacks. My comp is completly locked up, after a few mins the Video output is lost and a futher few mins the comp will reboot.
So in short, the pink screen = blue screen / reset button.
 
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