I think my graphics card took a poop on me.

[Peelback79]

I gave my old gamer to my dad so he can play Civ IV on it. Recently he turned it on, and everthing turned on, but he said it beeped 8 times and there was no video. I turned it off and on several times, same result, 8 beeps, no video.

It's an old Athalon 2.0
Can't remember the mobo.
In Win 300 Watt PSU
GeForce FX5950 'Ultra'
Windows XP sp2

Anyways, I don't want to redo everthing, and it only has to play Civ IV. So my questions are:
-is it the graphics card that's dead?
-good cheapo AGP recommendation?

Something that draws low power would be nice. I don't want to stress the 300 Watt PSU any more than I have to as it is pushing into it's 5th or 6th year of service.

Thanks all.

 

[Arkaign]

Do you have a spare PSU to try? It really might be a failing PSU. Often, not all rails in the PSU will fail simultaneously, causing odd issues like this.

Other than that, you should be able to find a 6600 vanilla AGP or better for dirt cheap, if the card is kaput.

 

[zerogear]

Originally posted by: Peelback79
I gave my old gamer to my dad so he can play Civ IV on it. Recently he turned it on, and everthing turned on, but he said it beeped 8 times and there was no video. I turned it off and on several times, same result, 8 beeps, no video.

It's an old Athalon 2.0
Can't remember the mobo.
In Win 300 Watt PSU
GeForce FX5950 'Ultra'
Windows XP sp2

Anyways, I don't want to redo everthing, and it only has to play Civ IV. So my questions are:
-is it the graphics card that's dead?
-good cheapo AGP recommendation?

Something that draws low power would be nice. I don't want to stress the 300 Watt PSU any more than I have to as it is pushing into it's 5th or 6th year of service.

Thanks all.

Do you have the motherboard manual? They usually indicate what the beeps mean.

 

[badnewcastle]

Originally posted by: zerogear

Do you have the motherboard manual? They usually indicate what the beeps mean.

That or you could call tech support at the mobo manufacturer and ask them what 8 beeps means.

 

[Scottae]

my money is on Power supply

 

[Zap]

8 beeps is the AMI BIOS video error code. Typically this would indicate a bad video card. However, if the video card isn't getting sufficient power, it will also generate the error. You should try a spare power supply, plus also reseat the card in the slot. If that doesn't help, then chances are it is a dead card.

 

[Peelback79]

Antec 350W Only 16 bucks.

XFX 6200 45 bucks.

So for around 65 dollars that should add some life to the old system. Thanks for the advice all.

 

[AzN]

Why 6200? For the same amount of money you can get 3450.