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Artifacts (I think) at bootup

C

Compnewbie01

Senior member
Okay, about a week ago I started having problems while playing games. All of a sudden the screen would get what appeared to be artifacts (screwed up screen) and the computer would freeze up while the sound also froze and would loop a choppy noise. So I would restart the computer and it worked fine until I tried to run games. However, yesterday I had the first major problem in that after it crashed in a game and I restarted the computer, it was doing the same thing during the bootup. The screen is not legible in most cases and it basically breaks it up into a 30x30 grid with multiple colors and lines. I did modify my 6800GT about 7 months ago (Zalman cooler) and OCed it ONLY during gaming about 6 months ago until I stopped (only for about two weeks). Everything has been fine since then until now. The real problem that I have is that I cannot test the parts with my other computers since the mobo sockets, hard drive, and graphics card are all different (socket 939, SATA, PCI Express X16, etc). My question is why is it doing this all of a sudden after SEVERAL MONTHS of nothing strange? Also, the card never overheated. It worked fine in a game for about 3 minutes at which point I checked the temperature and it was at the normal 60 degrees. One minute after that it crashed. I would say it is the graphics card, but I still do not understand why it worked so well then began having problems in game, then three days later started having problems with the bootup screen. Also, why is the sound getting stuck in a loop? I wonder if it is the motherboard. So please post if you have any ideas or suggestions to test what works and what doesn't. I have a AMD 3500+ with the epox 9NPA+ mobo, SATA HD, 6800GT with zalman cooler, 1gig RAM. My other two computers have AGP cards so there is no way for me to test anything. Please post anything that may help me.

Once again, I understand that it sounds like a graphics card problem with how I put a zalman cooler and AS5 on it, but it doesn't explain why the sound got stuck in a loop.

EDIT: Okay I just tried it again and nothing has changed. I get to a screen that I THINK is the windows error screen when you turn the computer off wrong and it gives you the choice to boot in safemode and stuff. Now, I clicked enter (just to try it) and it changed the screen a bit so something was happening. From that point, whenever I hit a key, it would make the screen flash for a second or do some other weird thing to the screen. Also, ctrl alt del just sent me back to the boot screen. I really need to know what to do. I honestly do not think it is the HD or windows because disconnecting the hard drive still causes it to boot up into the BIOS with a scrambled screen. I took one of each RAM out to see if that was doing it, but still same thing. My only guesses at this point are that it is the CPU, mobo, or video card. So what are all the POSSIBLE things that could cause massive screen distortion?
 
I really need help on this as soon as possible. I need to know if there are any other possibilities that could be causing the screen to wig out. I also do not know if windows is not loading or if it is and I just can't tell, but would that be signs of a bad mobo?
 
bump

Is there anything other than video card that can cause screen to messup and not be legible in any way? I'll go ahead and order a new video card, but I have to know before I do anything if there is a reason that the screen would be messed up.
 
It is certainly possible that there is a problem with the video card. It could be the RAM or the GPU on the card that is causing the problem.

However, it is equally possible that the problem is with your power supply not giving enough power to the video card. It could be that the 4-pin Molex connector came loose from the card and all you need to do is plug it back in, so I would certainly check that first. If that doesn't work, try taking the power supply from your working computer (disconnect all hard drives, optical drives, etc. to avoid overloading the second PSU while testing) and plug it in to this one to see what happens. If it works, then you just need to replace the power supply. If not, then maybe start looking at the video card as the cause of the problem.
 
I have checked many times and the card is plugged in. I have an Antec Neopower. Is it possible that the wire simply went bad? Also, would just disconnecting all the drives and trying to boot it up work? The most important thing is I need to know if I can rule out the CPU, mobo, and RAM. I am better off if I can narrow it down to something with the graphics card or the PSU (because I actually do have a good PSU lying around).
 
It is completely possible that the power supply went bad. It happens all the time, even with very high quality units. (The high quality ones just do it less often than the cheap, low quality units.)

If the power supply is still working but has degraded to the point where it can't quite supply enough power for all of the components in your system, then disconnecting power to your drives might let the system boot with a working display. However, since you have a known good power supply available, plugging it in to the system would tell you for sure if the PSU is the problem or not.

The only real way to tell if an individual component has failed is to either test that component in another system, or to replace each component one at a time with known working alternates until the problem is resolved. In this case, since you don't have another system to test your parts in, and don't have spare parts that match this system, the easiest thing to check is the power supply. The fact that the PSU is the most likely cause of the problem is just a coincidence but it does make things easier to narrow down since if you get the same result with a working PSU then the next likely cause is the video card itself.

If you want to eliminate the video card as the cause of the problem but don't have a spare PCI-E card available, try booting with a simple PCI video card (even a cheap 1MB VGA card will work) to see what happens. If you still get the corruption with a VGA card, then you know that your PCI-E card and the PCI-E slot on the motherboard are not the culprit.

If you can eliminate the PSU and the video card as the causes, then you'll need to look at the CPU or RAM, or motherboard. But go with the easier items first (the PSU and video card), particularly since they are also the most likely causes of the problem.
 
Okay, I will try test the PSU. Sounds like a video card problem though (and I kind of hope since I have no way of testing mobo/CPU). I could also test the RAM in another one of my systems. It is just that I already took one RAM chip out at a time and still had same problems so it is either both RAM chips or something else.
 
Put in a new graphics card and the BIOS works fine now and it begins booting up. However, while it is loading windows, the computer restarts and I cannot get it to book windows. Is a power problem a sure bet now? I have an 480W 18A per rail PSU now and it turns the computer on alright, but cannot boot windows. Is this insufficient for a x1800XT? It worked fine with my 6800GT for a LONG time before crapping out.
 
I would check with a clean copy of Windows before hitting on the PSU. Do you have a spare hard drive? Maybe the drivers from your nVidia is conflicting with your ATi board, who knows?
 
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