Dead GeForce3 or stupid user?

LostToys

Member
Apr 15, 2003
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I recently plopped in a new hardrive the other day and when I turned on my PC I was getting no video. I thought maybe the new HD was sucking too much power [depsite my Antec 400 watt PSU] so I disconnected it and turned the PC on again. Still nothing.

I checked all my connections, reseated the GF3/RAM, and tried again with the case off. Still no video, and this time I noticed that the GF3 fan wasnt spinning and there was no heat coming off of the GF3. I tried booting several times to see if the fan would come back on, and it never did.

I pulled the card out of myPC and tried it in a nearby PC, and it too didnt show any video. Interestingly, the fan was spinning [but there was still no heat coming off of the GF3].

Both systems are using a K7T Turbo 133a. When looking at the diagnostics lights, 1/4 where red while 2/3 where green, meaning it was halting on the bios. I cleared the CMOS and tried again several times, and still no video on both systems.

I tried disconnecting all of my devices and only booting off of the Motherboard/CPU/Video card and there still was no video.

So my question: is the GF3 dead, or is there something I am overlooking?

Thanks for any advice you all can give me.

EDIT: forgot my system specs

1300gighz AMD Athlong@ 13x109 [1417]
MSI K7T Turbo 133a [Via chipset]
512 megs Corsair PC133 RAM
Leadtek Winfast GeForce 3 TD
2 Western Digital 80gig SE HDs
Sound Blaster Live! Platinum
Lite-On 24x CDRW
Hitachi 16x DVD-Rom
Viewsonic G773 CRT monitor.
 

bandana163

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2003
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In your rig, 400W is more than enough. My guesses: 1 - faulty PSU (of all sudden?) 2 - Suddenly died GF3 3 - Damaged MB/AGP slot? Try it with anoher Vcard if possible.
 

LostToys

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Apr 15, 2003
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Vaerilis -

Thanks, you totally reminded me of something I forgot to mention in my original post. The other PC had a TNT2 Ultra [AGP] in it. I pulled that out and put it into my PC and it worked fine [fan and all].

One thing that intrigues me is why the GF3's fan works in one machine and not in the other.
 

bandana163

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2003
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Then you probably have a dead GF3. In case no heat comes at all, the card doesn't even initialize. Maybe the fan stopped at work and the card was damaged because of the heat? Mine's fan stopped for hours and nothing happened, but who knows? Was the card overclocked?
 

LostToys

Member
Apr 15, 2003
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Vaerilis -

I used to run it slightly OCed, but I formated last week so I didnt have the chance to reset my settings. It is odd that it was running fine all afternoon, only to die on me after a shutdown.

I took off the heatsink this morning and didnt notice any burn out [broken chip, "liquid", etc] but since there is no heat coming off of the card, I have to assume the chip is dead.

A shame really, since I was hoping to get a new video card later this fall [to save money].
 

Wyldkat

Junior Member
Jul 24, 2003
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Take a look at the capacitors on the card. I had a capacitor leak on me. Thought mine was dead also. Took me a week to notice a slight brown coloring under one of the caps. Quick trip to radioshack for a new one and a soldering iron and it works fine again.
 

LostToys

Member
Apr 15, 2003
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Wyldkat -

Didnt see anything leaking, then again I wasnt really looking for it. I will have to check it out when I have access to the video card again [left it at home when I moved into my apartment this morning].

Thanks for the advise. Hopefully it is a simple as that and I dont have to spend my hard earned cash on a new video card.