Games crash to screen with coloured vertical lines. Graphics card?

Aja on 17/10/2012 at 07:52

What's happening here is I'll be playing a game -- it doesn't seem to matter which one -- and at some point, sometimes very soon, sometimes after an hour or so, the game will freeze, and about ten seconds later it'll crash on a screen that looks like these:

(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/27953022/lines1.jpg)
(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/27953022/lines2.jpg)

Here are my system specs:

ATI Radeon HD6870 (HIS brand, Catalyst 12.8)
Gigabyte GA-HM57 USB-3 motherboard
Intel Core i5 760
8 GB of DDR3-1333
2 SATA 7500RPM hard disk drives
Antec 750W Truepower PSU
Windows 7 Pro

Nothing is overclocked, although I did replace the stock Intel heatsink and fan with a larger aftermarket cooler, mainly because the stock cooler rattled all the time.

For a while, my ATI drivers were broken. I couldn't access the Catalyst Control Center and for some reason the graphics card fan wouldn't spin up (it stayed at about 25 per cent). To fix this I installed Speedfan and manually set the graphics card fan to keep the temperatures down. It seemed to work for a while, but I got sick of the noise of the fan constantly running full-tilt. So today I spent some time, cleaned out the old ATI drivers and did a fresh install. Now the CCC is back and the drivers seem to be functioning. But the games still crash. I'm still running Speedfan, and it looks like the GPU temp is never getting much over 75 degrees Celsius (and for the most part it's lower than that, closer to 60). CPU temps hover between 40 and 50 under load.

I don't have a spare graphics card or PC to do swapping tests with. Can I assume that the graphics card is the culprit? The only other thing i can think of would be the fact that I'm using a MiniATX case and the components are packed in pretty tight. But in spite of that, I've still managed to keep good airflow, and the Speedfan temps reflect that. Time for a new GPU?

Sulphur on 17/10/2012 at 09:20

Looks like what happens to me with Trine 2, which pushes my GPU temps to amazing values... your GPU's core temps seem fine, though. Have you tried rolling back to older drivers/or installing the 12.9 beta?

Aja on 17/10/2012 at 16:33

No I haven't. the problem has been happening for a long time now, so I'm not sure which drivers I should revert to. Maybe something from a few years back...

Aja on 17/10/2012 at 18:13

Tried Catalyst 11.1, which came out a few months after I bought the card. Same crash as always.

Sulphur on 17/10/2012 at 21:18

'fraid it's probably the GPU then, short of a potential PSU problem, which I doubt is the case if you haven't had any other weirdness happening.

You could try sticking the GPU in another computer and see if you can replicate the error, which would single it out for sure, but that's of course only if you have a PC to spare or a friend who doesn't mind minor technology troubleshooting projects bundling into their home.

Aja on 18/10/2012 at 05:00

Hey this is funny. Turns out there's a 2-year manufacturer's warranty, and I bought the card on October 31st, 2010. I have a week and a bit to do an RMA.

Although I don't really want to wait a month while they try and replicate the problem, so I might just buy another card anyway, and if I get a new 6870, well, I don't know what I'll do with it. Now for some minimal research. Need a comparable card for a good price...

voodoo47 on 18/10/2012 at 13:42

currently, hd7850 2GB/gtx6600 2GB are the cards with the best performance/price ratio.

Aja on 18/10/2012 at 15:30

I decided to spend a few dollars extra and get a 7870. I'll let you know how it goes!

Aja on 20/10/2012 at 16:29

Well, this card is nice, isn't it. I got the Gigabyte OC version, and after running Metro 2033 (possibly the most graphically intensive game I own) the card didn't reach 60 degrees C. At idle it's closer to 30.:thumb: