Graphics radeon sucks ?! or whats the prob.

ok whenever i use any 3d applications, like halflife (heheee halflife i play it, sometimes) or battlefield or something, it takes a while for the vid card to reset its VPU and sometimes the monitor goes black...could the problem be OVERHEATING?!


Radeon 9800 pro w/ 256MB by sapphire

OVERHEATS TOO MUCH - dont buy it dont buy any radeons

even though i have underclocked it just a bit, tinytinytiny
amounts it still overheats



i have changed video card 2 times, first i had some other R98Pro and i changed it to same manufacturers product, same problems so i changed it to sapphire and it just keeps doing it


as far as i've read without overclocking i wouldnt need to buy new fan (default should do the job?), but maybe its about my room tempature, well, the rule of physics goes hot @ top and cold @ down, so i keep my window open all time (and my legs up, toes will freeze otherwise ) and keep the pc on the floor, but the sucker still overheats, so i've added old fan to blow cooler air to the pc and it can stay up for 5mins longer (its gotta be overheating problem)

so,

1) anyone ever had same problem

2) is there a way to reset vpu manually (bind it to a button or stuff)

thanks in advance

the geeky lady

crappy RADEON 9800 PRO W/ 256MB by Sapphire 'technologies'
AMD xp +2600
1GHZ - 400mhz
EPoX 8KRA2+
dull case
300W power

 

Which drivers are you using? Cat 3.8's and above seems to cause heat issues, where as 3.7 eveyrthing is much more stable.

 

Well I'm not sure what the problem is but it could be casued by these things:

You only have a 300 watt PSU. If its a generic one that came with your case then its quite likely that it isnt giving out enoguh power for the video card. I would suggest getting a higher rated PSU like an Antec Truepower or similar.

Also it could be caused by overclocking the CPU too high. If i set the fsb too high on my mobo it will crash all 3d gamesd after a few minutes and the screen will just go black.


I'm pretty certain it is the power supply that just isnt powerful enough.

 

Dont go saying "All Radeons are crap" just cause you have 1 problem with one card. A lot of people dont experience ANY problems, or worse problems so maybe its your setup?

You have a steel (generic?) case with 300W PSU. Is it a branded PSU? That maybe your problem.

Drivers, also the OS could play a problem - if its a bit rough round the edges (fragmentation, registry not clean, removal of excess aplications, old drivers still present in bits etc) that could cause probs. Also other programs could cause it if they are desktop based they could request use of the VPU when it comes out of games etc Could it be a bios setting?

How many fans do you have in your case? Stagnent air causes more problems that hot rooms.

 

Firstly, welcome to Bit.

Now then, I'm gonna agree that the psu could be the problem. Even if the 300watt power supply is a brand name, if it came with the case, chances are it still might be generic. Case in point...some of the cheaper Enermax cases come with Enermax power supplies. But they are generic enermax psu's....you can tell as they don't even have cable braid on the atx connector. And their voltages aren't nearly as stable as normal enermax.

Also, how old is that power supply? Did you get it at the same time as the rest of the machine, or build a new machine into an old case? If it's an older psu, the rails could be fluctuating more than usual causing problems.

 

I'm not sure whether or not it is the case, but it seems like some Sapphire Radeons might have overheating issues. At least their forums mentioned a few such cases, and I believe that's what killed my Sapphire Atlantis 9700 Pro. In my case, the output was sometimes full of glitches, both in Windows and in the BIOS screen, on my computer and my dad's, and with a 360W and a 420W PSU. I sent it back to the store and never got any more info from them about what it was, they just replaced it with a new card (from a different manufacturer I might add), so it seems like there migth be some known issue.

-- zenzelezz

 

well ok, i have tried different omega drivers, some other drivers, drivers which were shipped with the radeon, no difference

also tried my friends GeForce Ti4200 64MB with 8xAGP and it ran pretty good (didnt even drop my frames more than 10), and it was stable all the time (by that i mean for 6 hours of battlefielding =)) , no crashing, no booting, no problems

yet, we tried radeon on his pc, and whooppiie, crash after 3 mins (after 3mins usage of 3d applicatiosn) , 300W power "generic" but reliable, so its gotta be overheating?

--- (edit) ---

does radeon 9800 PRO W/ 256MB have "heat monitoring diode" (or something but ya know what i mean) so i could check my tempatures, i did the google but never found any good programs

thanks boys

 

I still say however reliable the power supply is, a generic 300 watt aupply just doesnt have enoguh juice to power something like that.

Try nabbing your friends power supply and see if it makes a difference.

 

Tried lots of drivers, but you still not said which versions. Check out www.rage3d.com forums, there are loads of people with this issue.... However power/temps could be another problem. Also the Rad 9800 does not have a temp probe built in.

 

With your setup, get a new psu

But if the problem is overheating then invest in a new heat sink for it. Maybe get one of the zalman passive coolers would cut noise levels for you aswell!

 

try changing it to 4x agp if you have set on 8x in both the bios and smartgart, this has happened to a few 4x/8x radeons

 

switch off agp fastwrites, common issue, had a similar problem, allthough it took hours normally, not minutes for me.

 

How about testig the card in a different system?

Why dont you test that card in a different system? It could be a problem in your system. Have u thought about that?

 

Dont start off with the whole never ever buy a radeon deal. Just work your way through the problem. I'm running my system (specs in sig) off of a 450w PSU. I have some large capcitors on the +5/+12v lines going to my graphics card to help it even out the fluctuations in the power. i have also done ahrdware modification to the card and have been able to overclock it to 485hz stable. These cards do run hot, even the DDR2 RAM that it uses runs hotter than regular DDR. Get a nice big and quiet 120mm fan to blow onto your card from a whole in the side of your case. That should solve your overheating issues. If not, then look into a better heatsink for it and some new RAM sinks. Or send your card in for a replacement. You may have had the misfortune of getting a faulty card.


also a highly doubt a card with 1/4 the RAM and raw processing power can keep up with one of these puppies. youll be very glad that you bought this card when HL2 comes out. I know I will be.

 

This is a problem you face with any card you buy that wasn't BUILT by ATI or Nvidia.

 

Stop with the radeon-bashing. I have an AiW 9700 and I love it.

I'm almost certain its your PSU.
The Ti4200 you were using was only 64MB. A 256MB card will always use more power.


Also, like Melov said, you should buy directly from ATI. Personally, I have had better experiences with cards directly from them, rather than gettting ones made by different manufacturers.

 

Thats great but in Europe getting hold of a 'built by ATI' card is like finding a rocking horse poo L(...its pretty much third party manufacturers only here (Connect 3d, Sapphire, Hercules, Powercolour etc) which share the reference designs (apart from Hercules which sometimes changes them slightly) exactly.