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Messed up text on Radeon 8500

S

spamsk8r

Golden Member
I just got a Radeon 8500 in a deal on the FS forum, and I put it in my computer, boot it up, and the text on the screen is all garbled. I can see what the screen is supposed to say, but it also has lots of lines and random characters all over the place too. I am also confused by the product number on the card. The ATI website says that all cards built by ATI have product numbers starting with 102, but mine is clearly made by ATI and starts with a 109, can anyone clear up this discrepancy for me? If it is broken, I would like to find out who I could send it to, since ATI seems to only take the 102 cards as RMAs.

Any help would be appreciated,
Geoff
 
this is a compatibility problem with the BIOS. I'm assuming once you get into the OS, everything works?

I know that this particular card has lots of issues...but try flashing your BIOS. It should be okay afterwards.

 
I haven't let it go into the OS yet because I don't want to have to install the driver for it yet, since if it doesn't work I would have to uninstall its driver then reinstall the drivers for my Geforce2...I have let it go through up to the Win2k startup screen, and it too is messed up, I guess I'll have to try letting it go into win2k
 
dude ati cards are not i repeat not going to work unless you uninstall all previous drivers and revert it back to a standard agp card in windows then load the ati drivers also i personally find a reformat and reinstall of the operating system is a best bet when upgrading to an ati video card i use ati predominatly and i have found this method to work the best also ati has a graphics card # search but you may find yours is not listed on their website and a call may be in order if you can't get it to work as they do answer their phone😉

hope this helps
 
I don't know what board you're using, but mine would cut off half the text after leaving the BIOS screen. Tyan posted a BIOS revision that fixed the problem. This only occured in DOS, windows was never affected. So, boot into your OS and see if the problem persists. Look for an updated BIOS for your board.
 
Still doesn't work, i just updated the BIOS and uninstalled all other drivers, still broken, does anyone know how I can get an RMA with my Product Number? Oh, I also tried to boot into windows, but its all messed up there too, i'm pretty sure im gonna have to send it in 🙁
 
see a similiar sort of thing once with a matrox card. apparently the card's bios was the cause & was corrected by reflashing the card's bios!
 
I have a Creative Annihilator GeForce256 DDR that does something similar, random characters at boot up are wrong. Works fine in Win2k/XP, etc.. And it STILL did it after I flashed the BIOS on the video card. The card may be manufactured by Sapphire Tech
 

That sounds pretty messed up. I have an 8500, and have never seen anything like that.

If you are having text problems BEFORE you even get into windows, I would just think the card is bad.

But, before you try to RMA it, you might want to go to "RAGE3D.com", and ask your question there, since it is a forum that deals with ATI cards.

Personally, it sounds like a bad card, but....you never know. Maybe someone on that forum has had that problem before, and can help you out.
 
spam,

If you bought it on the FS forum, it sounds like you were ripped off...

Until recently, I used an oem Radeon 8500 like yours. Over the course of several months, I tried swapping several heatsinks...I had attached these heatsinks to the 8500 chip using thermal epoxy (and thus I had to pry the heatsinks off with a knife...they didn't always come off easy). The last time I removed a heatsink something happened...and the 8500 exhibited just the behavior you describe. I assume that prying the heatsink off that last time hsomehow damaged the chip. After that, I could never get it to work correctly (everything was always garbled), so I threw it out, as the oem cards aren't covered under warranty by ATI.
 
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