6850 hard locking after little usage?

[randomlinh]

So I ended up just grabbing a vanilla Sapphire 6850. I did the software uninstall of my 8800GT, driver sweeper, driver sweeper in safe mode (not sure why it was recommended to do both, figure safemode would take care of it), boot up with new hardware, 11.3 catalyst drivers installed.

After 5-10 minutes, my system will hard lock. No BSOD, just a black screen, and possibly stuck audio. The only error I can find is a kernel power error about not having a clean shutdown.

I have a gigabyte P35-DS3L w/ a Q6600, all stock. OCZ Stealth Xstreme 600 for the power. Tried updating to the latest bios, along w/ updating chipset related drivers. I mention this because there was a theory gigabyte had issues.

Temps are around 48C from what I can tell (started to run GPU-Z to see if it spiked). GPU seemingly bouncing between 100-300mhz -> 775 (FF4 seemed to use it more, but it wasn't the cause). I can get into a game as well (tested w/ bioshock, yeah, old. world of goo died too, heh). and just barely after starting a new game, it goes.

From what I've gathered... I either have a faulty card or the power supply rails aren't holding up.

I've been suggested HWMonitor to watch the rails, but is there anything that else that is accurate?

I have not tried underclocking the memory. ATI's utilities won't let me go down despite what I've read in searching. I can underclock my GPU (does nothing to help), but RAM won't let me go below 1000.

Is there anything else anyone could suggest I try? Besides test it in another computer... that's not an option I have right now unfortunately. I've tried 11.4 preview drivers to the same result, will try 11.2 later. I've also reseated and reconnected power (tho, I haven't tried the 2nd PCI-E power connector).

Mostly trying to get opinions on what to try and have a checklist for a 2nd go around tonight. Appreciate the feedback.

 

[randomlinh]

After more testing, I can only conclude if the GPU starts getting pegged, it will kill the system. I tried a solo driver install, no openCL, and windows didn't crash in the time it did prior. Loaded up a game, and it crashed in the exact same spot.

I'm guessing no suggestions? heh. the power supply has 4x12v rails, the PCIe 1/2 rail is listed at 18A, so I gather I should be fine power wise with a single card.

 

[bryanW1995]

if it's dying in the same spot every time it's the new gpu.

 

[raasco]

I was having issues with games crashing on the 11.3 drivers. I would fire up a game and it would crash in the same spot almost every time. Installed 11.2 and everything is fine.

 

[randomlinh]

yeah, i went back to 11.2, but didn't go back further. Though, I'm finding my power supply might not be as good as I thought it to be. I may actually have another system I can test, but I might pull their power supply.. they are a nvidia system so I don't want to mess w/ drivers on that too much, heh.

 

[Elixer]

If by 'black screen', you mean you have no video input anymore, and a soft reset don't bring back a picture, then yes, it is a faulty card.

If you have a 'black screen' followed by a amdkmdap error (where the drivers detect a issue and tries to restart, and locks up your desktop) then yes, it is a faulty card.

Things to try is get something like CPUID HWMontior (set it to log the data!), and run that, then run furmark and see if it locks up.
Then on reboot, you can check the logs, and look at the power levels (+12v & +5) and see if they are within spec. If not, then you know you got a PSU issue of some kind.

 

[Campy]

I'd say it's very likely a faulty card. It might be the psu but the timing would be quite astounding and i very much doubt that any 600W PSU would have trouble powering that card(unless PSU is faulty/dying)