Video card dying? Question for the techies

Ok, so I've been running my GeForce 7900GS for about 4 years now, and I think it may be dying.

In the last week or so when I boot the system, I get vertical green pixelated lines on the windows XP splash screen. Then the video goes to black.

I had the latest Nvidia driver installed. Did a rollback, and rebooted. Fixed the problem temporarily.

Sometimes when I reboot, I get the vertical lines, then a screen full of bizarre artifacts. If I reboot and hit F8 for safe mode, the OS select screen text is all jumbled but readable. Safe mode looks fine. No artifacts, no graphical issues.

I know the card is clean, and I think the fans are running ok. I don't get any BSOD or any error messages on startup.

Been researching the issue and it sounds like a GPU problem. I know that RAM and/or MB issues may also be at fault. What diagnostics can I run, and what is the next step? And no, I don't want to "bake" the card to try and fix it. I'd rather just pony up and buy a new card if necessary.

Thanks in advance for any help.

try and wipe all the drivers out in safe mode then reboot and reinstall them sounds like maybe corrupted drivers.

you could run dxdiag

or if you suspect memory, microsoft has a memor diagnostic tool you can install.

UPDATE:

Ok, so I have run some tests and here are the results.

First, updated BIOS to latest version.
Next, uninstalled vid card, then reinstalled with newest driver.

Ran dxdiag and found no issues in any test.

Downloaded microsoft's RAM test utility, and RAM is funtioning properly. No errors found.

Downloaded GPU-Z utility and monitored GPU stats. Fan is running. Idle temp is around 60-70 degrees. Fired up a graphically intensive game and temp goes to high 80's or so.

Did Furmark test and card never got above 90 degrees.

I only get artifacts now on graphically intensive games.

Dunno what else it could be other than a dying video card.

Any other suggestions?

well if you believe that it's dying then get a new card then and depending on the age of the mb and your preference as to what type of card you buy.

ie nvieda or ati....... but it also breaks down to what cpu you have also, the ati cards are good/great cards but have certain optimizations for amd cpu's since amd bought ati

AGP or PCIE? 7900 is on the boarder between the 2 interfaces, time wise....so I have to ask.

Card is pci-e.

MB and cpu are same age as vid card. I really don't want to spend money on upgrading those.

Have an intel cpu.

90 degrees is very high so this might be heat-related (remember that is in centigrades, not farenheit)

Spike wrote:

90 degrees is very high so this might be heat-related (remember that is in centigrades, not farenheit)

I agree. See this in the Nvidia forums

http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=109856

There are many ways to repair, depending on the card.

If heat is the issue, then the gpu's fan must not be functioning properly any more. My system as a whole always runs well below any dangerous temp levels. Intel system monitors always look great.

Any way to repair a malfunctioning gpu fan?

TheElectrician wrote:

If heat is the issue, then the gpu's fan must not be functioning properly any more. My system as a whole always runs well below any dangerous temp levels. Intel system monitors always look great.

Any way to repair a malfunctioning gpu fan?

http://www.bing.com/search?q=repair+video+card+fan&form=MSNH14&qs=n&sk=&sc=8-7&x=0&y=0

Here's a fan for your card.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ATI-NVIDIA-Geforce-7600GT-7900GS-7900GT-Cooler-Fan-B-/170613441461?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27b95a83b5

Just word of caution. When my fan failed (ok, the fan anchor failed and the heatsink no longer made good contact), being in that condition for too long perminately damaged the chip (and the Mobo). In the end, I had to replace both.

well that does sound like a answer also....had to replace the fan on my agp card a few months back.

Update:

So after much testing and research I have figured out that my GPU is basically on its last leg. My core system is well over 6 years old and despite my hopes of rehabilitating my current setup, I pulled the trigger on a new build.

Here's what I will be building tomorrow:

Case- Antec 300
MB- Gigabyte Z86X-UD3H-B3
CPU- Intel i7 2600k 3.4Ghz
GPU - EVGA Geforce 560 Ti superclocked
Power Supply - OCZ 650W ZS series
RAM - Corsair Vengeance 8Gb DDR3 1600
CPU fan - Cooler Master Hyper 212 plus
OS- Windows 7 Pro x64

Recycling my 1TB sata HD, HP optical drive, 3.5" floppy, and my peripherals.

Told the wife about it AFTER I bought it. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission, as they say.... lol.

Very excited to put the new rig together.

All parts were purchased from my local Micro Center. They were cheaper on ALL parts over Newegg or any other online retailer I could find. Plus, I have it now, vs. waiting for shipping.

It's no Demon-build PC, but some of us have small children and a budget.

Can't wait to get the rig up and running!

Cheers!

Grats!

And I hear you - not many of us have a "Demon-build PC"