Graphics card kaput?

[MartinMorrison]

Hi,

Bought a 8800GT from take2 2.5 years ago. Today I got a few blue screens, restarted and continued playing fine. Then blue screened again and pc won't start. On startup the boot loading stuff works fine for 5 seconds, then freaks out and all the letters scramble out, blue lines appear on screen and windows loading screen appears, works fine, then goes to black screen and nothing changes. Startup repair works...but there are blue lines across the screen and it never actually gets to desktop.

Took the graphics card out and PC boots fine and works fine using onboard graphics. So guess my card is just completely broken? How does that even happen...anything I can do to try fix it?

 

[The_Assimilator]

Probably the solder that attaches the GPU to its PCB came loose - this has been a problem ever since the computer industry switched to using lead-free solder a few years back. The only thing you can do is "bake" the card in an oven to melt the solder and hopefully cause it to reflow and reconnect, but this is a temporary solution - you should think about buying a new card (unless you card still has warranty, in which case return it to Take2).

 

[zeyad 001]

Umm Cant you just get a soldring iron and buy a reel of solder and wire it yourself?

 

[JIMMYtheSKULL]

There is the oven trick, google it, i have a mate whos fixed a 7900gtx and a 8800gts with this method. i also have another mate who after trying totaly F@#$ed up his card everything fell off.

 

[MartinMorrison]

*sobs*

 

[kingrob]

Have you got sufficient cooling for your pc & is it in an air conditioned room?

Normally in summer time that graphics cards say goodbye.

 

[MartinMorrison]

There is a case fan and a massive fan on the card and when room is hot there is aircon..

 

[Pada]

If the card ran too hot for long periods, then you'll most likely have to reflow (bake) it.

Hopefully for your sake, the card has a 3 year warranty, because then you can just get it replaced

Please take note that simply having a big case & graphics card fan will help almost nothing if the graphics card has a poor heatsink, which will mean that it would still be unable to transfer the heat into the air fast enough.

 

[MartinMorrison]

https://www.take2.co.za/electronics-asus-nvidia-geforce-8800gt-512mb-pci-e-3169446.html?inactive=1

It's that card. Massive heatsink. Dunno.

 

[NoLogic001]

Check what temperature that card is idling at and get back to us. It could just be heatsink/fan issues.

 

[Pada]

MartinMorrison: that is a tiny heatsink. A massive heatsink would take up more than 1 PCI slot.