My New AIW9800Pro keeps crashing

[BigglesTheMild]

I keep getting random crashes ever since I installed my ATI AIW9800Pro. They occur totally at random, sometimes after 30seconds, sometimes several hours. If I am playing a game, then the system will either lock up or reset, and if I am on the desktop, it will crash and the VPU recovery will switch over to software mode and mail an error report. When the card is running, it runs perfectly normally.
I have tried new and old drivers for everything, and I am at a total loss. I think it may be a bad card.

 

[HermDogg]

Could be heat-related or power related as well. Whats yer PSU?

 

[blodhi74]

Originally posted by: HermDogg
Whats yer PSU?

 

[BigglesTheMild]

It's a generic 475W PSU.
the voltages are 12.18V steady and between 4.68 and 4.72 on the 5V rail. Running my old 4200 the computer never crashed


It's not heat. I eliminated that possibility by installing a VGA silencer, and also underclocking the card. The weird thing is, it actually seems MORE stable when in a game or benchmarking, just on the desktop seems to crash a little bit faster.
Ick It just crashed again while writing that. Once it crashes and the VPU recovery switches to software mode, then it's rock solid stable.

 

[HermDogg]

Probably a bad card then.

 

[rbV5]

I "doubt" its the card itself since its a random occurance..Sounds alot like powersupply to me. 475 watt "generic" sounds flakey, and AIW cards require a quality powersupply (mine runs on a 350 watt enermax just fine in my ASUS MB)

 

[HermDogg]

Well normally yes, but he says it seems to more likely to happen during idleness or doing NOTHING, not when playing a game, which would require the most load.

 

[BigglesTheMild]

HermDoggg wins this one. I bought an Antec Truepower 430 and the problem is still there.
I have a problem now though. I replaced the GPU heatsink thinking it was a heat problem, and when removing the old heatsink, I broke the plastic clips, so now, I can't return the board.

Why are warranties voided for going to a better cooling solution on video cards, when processors are fine to play around with?