Corruption / Artifact Problem with Radeon 9800 Pro... :(

[linkinkampf19]

Hi everyone... I gloated about the Radeon 9800 Pro that I bought on Ebay for $120, and well, I got my just desserts. The seller said everything was fine with it, and it was his first auction (he had a score of 13, all from sellers). Well, now I have lines on my screen. In particular, purple/pink lines on the start menu, yellow lines on the display window, and small blue speck on the Windows loading screen... I believe that the card is corrupt in some way, as I have already tried the lastest drivers (and uninstalling the previous Nvidia drivers, uninstalling the new ATI drivers, and just going stock w/o liscenced drivers). I had a power outage earlier today, but when I got home, the computer seemed fine with my previous card, a Nvidia Geforce FX5200 (no artifacts). I also tried different resolutions and refresh rates, and that didn't work either. The seller says he played KOTOR three weeks ago just fine, and then put it in the ES bag afterwards, and no problems there... but he thinks the card *might* have been damaged somehow... and Uncle Evil and Dserge have already helped... if it makes any difference, I have Nvidia sound drivers built in to the motherboard, but that shouldn't be a problem... and the artifacts also show up in 3DMark2003, Swat4, and Morrowind... badly. I'm just wondering if there is anyway to possibly replace the card or something, cause the seller specifically said no returns because his friends had problems with scammers and such... Also... I just put in a question for replacement to ATI, so hopefully I might even be able to replace the card... possibly... not only is this card refurbed from Dell apparently but also bought off of a person on Ebay.. so I'm a bit skeptical of that happening... any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[D]

My friend had exactly the same problem with his Hercules 9800SE. Try underclocking the card a bit and see if the artifacts remain.
They are a bit tempremental, look on eBay for the amount of broken 9800s there are.

[linkinkampf19]

Thanks Dave... but that hasn't helped... and it's a true ATI card too...
I used ATItool last night and actually right now... tried to find the max core memory.. and it comes up very quickly with insane artifacts and an error message: "Init of findMax: Subsequent images are different. Please report this bug." After that the Core memory keeps clocking down. I tried to find the max main memory as well, no errors, but the same thing. It was at 290.25 Mhz, and it clocked itself all teh way down to 237 Mhz, and that's when I stopped it. I think it would've eventually either frozen my system or reached zero. I have already put in a ticket/report on ATI's website to see what can be done, and from the looks of it, the only two things that might happen are either they will have me send it back to get repaired or replaced (for every Radeon card apparently has a three year warranty, and the seller had it for much less than a month even. Just wonder if its carries over), or they wil decline and wonder where I actually bought this at (I registered saying Dell, becuase that's where he got the original one that died on him, and the refurbed one that I am now in possession of). The most positive thing is that I might only have to send it a short distance if they follow through. Apparently according to one of my co-workers who also works at Circuit City, the second largest ATI manufacturing plant is right over in the local industrial park. So that is really my only plus right now...
I tried a few more games... and surprisingly, the benchmarking tool AquaMark3 didn't show any signs of corruption at all, which is kinda weird... but everything else I tried did...

[TheMathGuy]

You (might) have a 9800 SE . . . and if you've used the wrond drivers, it might be trying to use 8 pipes like a (ahem) "real" 9800. Open up ATI tool and see how many pipes are enabled . . . you might have to disable four of them (because of some sort of physical damage. See if the proper Catalyst drivers for a 9800 SE work.

[Norgus]

An absolute last resort would be to find the correct firmware for your model of card, and flash it over your current firmware. If that and using the right drivers doesnt work then I would think its physically damaged in some way.

[linkinkampf19]

Woah.. thanks TheMathGuy and Norgus... never thought of either of those things. Once I get the card reinstalled (you think I was gonna try and play games with it? j/k) I'll try those techniques and give it a shot... any other possibilities?

[J]

Ummm... I don't want to sound pessimistic but if after underclocking it, keeps doing the same, the previous owner may have busted the card by OC' it waaaay too high, I have seen this at my work place, we overclocked an old Radeon 7000 to the point of no return and it had the same problems even when it was put back to default clock speeds. The core or memory may be damaged because of an overclock. Norgus and TheMathGuy have some reasonable solutions but in the end your card may be defective beyond repair. I can tell you this out of experience. I had to trash mine and resort to an 9550 because it was in my budget.

[TheMathGuy]

I had to trash mine and resort to an 9550 because it was in my budget.

Bummer . . . 9800PRO to 9550 is a long way down . . .


Of course, you could sell it back on eBay (probably won't cover your purchase price, though), or contact the person who sold it and ask him to be honorable (which would surprise me to no end). . . By the way, I'm assuming you're using the Catalyst drivers. Occaisionally you can fix problems with ATI cards by going to OC Faq (I think) or Omega drivers. I've used the Omega drivers before . . . they didn't work particularly well (froze a game that I play often) but it might be something to try . . .

[linkinkampf19]

So far the seller has actually been very helpful, and he is currently digging his way through paperwork and trying to find the specs and all to his old Dell machine (the one he used with this card). He's hoping that he will be able to find it and get another refurb for me... if this all works out, I'm hoping there is a way (besides hacking Ebay) to give him an insane amount of positive feedback, for any Ebayer who goes to that length for his/hers customers is truly awesome.