GForce 6800 LE - Problems

[jesterc]

Card been working fine for over a year - installed a new game and the video when to pot - now all my games are totally screwy and all video playback as got tiny pixelated green/red dots.

The non-moving images on the PC are fine. I have totally reinstalled XP on a new hard drive - installed the latest drivers for the card but no luck

Is my card damaged and not a software error as I first thought?

 

[LeeJend]

Random pixels (they're called artifacts) usually indicate a video card problem (overheating, or GPU/memory dieing).

Before panicking you need to load the drivers that came with the card. Or the ones you were using before the problems started. One of the guys had a problem when he updated his drivers and the vendor tech support told him the generic Nvidia drivers did not support his card. I think it was one of the "reduced performance cards" like an LE.

If rolling back to the original drivers doesn't fix it -
If you have the card overclocked the new game may have pushed it too hard and damaged it. First thing to try is setting the speed back to stock. Overclcoking video cards is not a good idea. They run hotter and are not as tolerant as CPUs and SYstem RAM.

Make sure the video card fan is turning and not covered with dust. If dirty get some "canned air" and blow the dust off. DO the CPU, case grills and power supply at the same time. Unplug the computer before sparying the power supply. Do this outside. Canned air is not air it is toxic chemicals and the dust cloud may be very nasty.

If none of the above works-
It is unlikely a one year old 6800LE with a working fan and not overclocked would start dieing. Check with the manufacturer tech support. They might honor the warantee depending on the brand.

 

[jesterc]

Thanks, tried an older card in the slot and that works fine. From what I can see the fan is working ok on the card - I have contacted MESH (where I bought the PC) to see if they can help with the warranty on it - maybe time to look for a new card (AGP) £150 any thoughts?