Damn Aopen 6600GT AGP!!!

[kmmatney]

I bought an Aopen 6600GT AGP card, recieved on Tuesday, and it has been hell ever since. I have an older ASUS A7N-266 motherboard (NForce 1).

My first mistake was downloading the latest "released" drivers from NVidia. With those drivers, the card crashes after about 15 minutes in Windows. Figured it was the power supply, so I borrowed a 550 Watt Enermax from work - the system still crashed IN WINDOWS, NO GAMES!

I've tried using my son's computer, swapping power supplies in both machines, trying various drivers, BIOS tweaks. On my son's computer (VIA KM266 chipset), the card runs in Windows all day, but crashes after a few minutes in 3DMark2001 and 2003. On my computer, I haven't even gotten that far yet.

My old GeForce Ti4200 works great on both systems


Looks like I need to RMA. What a frusterating ordeal...

 

[Nocturnal]

Try reformatting your computer.

 

[quattro1]

Uninstall the current drivers through the control panel. Then reinstall 66.93 and see what happens. Have you cleaned out your old drivers?

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: Nocturnal
Try reformatting your computer.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

The cooler may have detached from the core as the Anandtech reviewer experienced with more than 1 brand, and you are experiencing heat related failure. Have you checked the reported temp in windows, and if so what was it?

 

[SneakyStuff]

I've heard stories about the AOPEN 6600GT. Mabye you should try another brand like Leadtek or evga.

 

[kmmatney]

The heatsink appears OK, and the temps are fine. However if I unplug the Molex power connector, I get a warning message saying the card will operate at reduced performance. It then runs more stable! (but still crashes quickly while playing games.)

I used detonator-RIP to remove all traces of old drivers, and I tried almost every driver from 66.1X to 71.24. With most drivers, windows will crash as soon as I increase the screen resolution up to 1280 x 1024. Version 66.93 was the only version that let me run windows at high resolution for any length of time, but was still unacceptable. This is a defective card.

I can't be asked to reformat my own system, but for due dliligence, I reformatted my son's computer, fresh Win2K install, and I still ran into the same issues - could not make it through a single 3D application for more than a few minutes, although each driver seemed to behave a little differently. Some had terrible artifacts, while others didn't.

The whole NVidia driver situation is an absolute mess, at least with the AGP high end cards.

I've already got an RMA from NewEgg. I might see about getting a Radeon 9800 Pro instead of just replacing this one. At least the 9800 Pro has proven long term reliabilty in AGP systems. I think there are a lot of bad 6600GT boards out there at the moment.


Edit: The Leadtek card was sold out (and still is), and so is the Gigabyte card. I'd like to get a card where the heatsink covers the RAM as well as the GPU.

 

[kmmatney]

The MSI card was also sold out, but it looks pretty sweet and is back in stock. For $10 more you get VIVO, which is hard to believe. My old Ti4200 is an MSI card - I should have stuck with the same brand. Anyone have any experience with the MSI card?

MSI 6600GT

The memory looks like it covered by a separate heat sink.

 

[Rock Hydra]

Originally posted by: kmmatney
Anyone have any experience with the MSI card?

Yep. I love my MSI card. I probably will buy another card from MSI, whether it be a Radeon or a GeForce.

 

[kmmatney]

NewEgg let me get the MSI AGP 6600GT as a replacement for my RMAd Aopen card. I hope I have better luck. If that one has trouble then I'm gonna just get a 9800 Pro, or a used 9700 Pro.

 

[keeleysam]

The MSI 6600GT AGP is the best card I ahve ever owned. Good luck with it.

 

[jojiboy]

Originally posted by: keeleysam
The MSI 6600GT AGP is the best card I ahve ever owned. Good luck with it.

I agree. Two of our rigs have that card installed and didn't have one problem when we upgraded from the Radeon 9600XT.

 

[AristoV300]

I haven't had any problems with my AOpen AGP card. AOpen drivers from there homepage are very good as well. Just might have been unfortunate with a bad card. I got 2 crap 9800 pro's from Sapphire in the past, but others have sworn by their cards.