Problem, any ideas???

[kchi55]

your powersupply might have gotten worn out after that one year. i don't know if psu's deteriorate over time, but if i'm wrong about the psu, just make sure the connectors are tightly secured and everything.

 

[mayorredbeard]

your powersupply might have gotten worn out after that one year. i don't know if psu's deteriorate over time, but if i'm wrong about the psu, just make sure the connectors are tightly secured and everything.

Usually if its not enough power to the video card, on the next reboot it will give you an error saying something like, "GPU NOT RECEIVING POWER" or "INSUFFICENT POWER TO GPU"

Or this is what i experinced with my 6600 a whiles back from a crap powersupply. Shift blame to the monitor and try hooking up a different one. Borrow a friends or if you have another computer try using that monitor.

 

[joker_king16]

I tried another monitor, same problem.

Also, maybe this helps maybe not. When the screen goes out, I can still hear audio from music, movies, etc..that makes me think its not the mb or the cpu.

 

[joker_king16]

bump

 

[mammikoura]

lets see.. well i use a 6800gs.. and it has a connector that directly connects with the power supply. i'm gonna take a guess and say that the 6800 series cards all have this. this would mean.. that the 6800gt uses up considerably more power than.. say.. a card in the 7600 series. i would ask a friend with a higher power supply say.. 520 watt? and see if you still get problems when you use it. now that i think about it, it COULD be a power deficiency problem.

480W is going to be enough for a 6800GT. Unless the psu is broken, but I'm pretty sure that the recommended is 350W. I'm running a 6800GT with a p4 3.0ghz cpu and 2gb of ram with a 420W and it's running fine.

But of course if possible get another psu and test with it, maybe ur psu isn't working like it should.

Same thing happened to me when I oc'd my vid card too much, though then everything (including music etc) froze. I'm pretty sure that this was because the psu didn't have enough juice, since I couldn't really raise the clock speeds or it started freezing.

 

[MeTzenAs1]

It could also just be a simple OS corruption.. yes window xp will do something like this over a simple drive malfunction. If all this hardware switching around and testing leaves you no where you might wanna try a reformat.. I usually do it once every 6 months are so.. just keep a second drive for all your important files and keep the OS on a drive where your not afraid to lose everything. If you keep all your drivers and apps on the second drive reformatting isn't a big deal. Also try resetting every piece of hardware (IE: take out ram put back in, same thing with cpu, and any other cards) Make sure to try and reinstall and video drivers and any other software that has been recently added or updated.

 

[kchi55]

if all other functions such as sound are working and you're just lacking display, it'll probably be insufficient power to the video card, or faulty card.

 

[joker_king16]

if all other functions such as sound are working and you're just lacking display, it'll probably be insufficient power to the video card, or faulty card.

thats what I thought but then starting yesterday the audio stopped working when the dispay turned off as well.

 

[mayorredbeard]

Hmmm, i was going to say it was the video card too...

My best guess at this point is your motherboard is sequentially failing. Rather then crap out all at once, certain components are going. Is it onboard audio? It could be that you got a bad mobo, or its going bad. First the GPU slot failed, then the onboard audio, and tommorow if this is the problem the computer might not start at all.

If you have anyway of getting a hold of a free compatible motherboard, try it. You probably won't be able to boot to windows as using a new mobo will make windows think your installing a new harddrive in a different computer to void copyright laws and activate a self-shutdown, but you should be able to turn it on and get to the windows loading screen and see the windows logo before that happens.

Now, you said,

When the dispay turned off as well.

Does this mean it stays on, then goes off? Often it's the stupid things that get us. Check your audio connections and your VGA cable. Make sure their tight and inserted properly.

Heat has also been known to be a major culprit of strange problems. Although this doesn't seem like heat is to blame in this situation, it can't hurt to check. If you can't check your internal temperatures place a thermometer in the case for an hour with the computer running and get as accurate a reading as possible.

Most of my options are longshots except for the motherboard. If the motherboard isn't the culprit, and neither are the other things i listed, then i think i speak for most of us when i say i'm truly stumped.

 

[joker_king16]

No, the audio comes through a Creative sound card.

I really dont want to buy a lot of components to find out what the problem is. What are your best guesses?