9700 Pro Help

[Axis64]

I have just brought a 9700 Pro of a guy on another forum and it has a slight problem (Which i was aware of when i brought it, it was only last night so i dont have the card yet.) he has posted this on another forum, what do you suggest?

Hi guys,

I got my new Radeon 9700 Pro yesterday which I bought from an online auction. I got it at a good price on a no-returns basis as the seller wasn't sure whether it was the card, or his machine that was faulty.

Anyway, I put it in my machine and booted up. The first time it booted, I had lots of blue blocks, evenly spaced out across the Windows 2000 start-up screen and also when it got into Windows.

After I had installed the drivers for the card and restarted again, the corruption on the start-up screen remained, but there was none in Windows. I tried a game, and sure enough, was presented with a screen corruption.

I've tried re-flashing the BIOS to a 9700NP and also a 9500NP, hoping that if I tried to only use 4 pipelines it would be ok. I still get corruption in 3D applications, but none when sat in Windows. I've tried running the Milkdrop plug-in for Winamp and I get no corruption in that, although I get corruption while playing a video in WMP.

So, my question is... has anyone had this problem before? Is the card faulty, or is it a simple fix? I've taken the shim off and bolted the old CPU heatsink I had fixed to my 9500 to the card, so it can't be overheating. I'm just about to try flashing to a 9700 Pro and will also try the Omega drivers.

Oh, it has Samsung RAM.

[Ravens Nest]

I've never had that problem myself, the evenly spaced blue squares sounds a bit like corrupted pipelines.

Perhaps if you run ATItools let it lower the mem and core till the artifacts disapear then you may still be able to run the 9700 pro at lower speeds.
http://www.techpowerup.com/atitool/

But the videocard sounds like has had some permanent damage done to it, well it maybe overheating, hopefully there isnt any permant damage and you putting a heatsink on may make it run cool enough to get rid of the corruption.

If not then you could try putting it back together with the shim and original fan and RMA to ATI, you may get lucky and be sent back a 9800 pro who knows.

Good luck!

[Axis64]

Thanks for the advice mate, i will give that a try.

[schmunk]

I have had (almost) exactly the same problem with my 9700 Pro.

I bought it refurbished from Retek Direct with a 1-month warranty and it crapped out after 2 1/2 months...

I found that putting a fan towards it made it stop, so removed the heatsink to ensure everything was OK - guess what... No paste under the heatsink.

When I added Arctic Silver and replaced the HSF it still had the squares (becoming vertical lines), even with extra cooling.

Never mind (only £60... ) I'll buy a brand new 6800LE soon enough and Unlock / OC it to infinity... and beyond!

[Axis64]

I've never had that problem myself, the evenly spaced blue squares sounds a bit like corrupted pipelines.

Perhaps if you run ATItools let it lower the mem and core till the artifacts disapear then you may still be able to run the 9700 pro at lower speeds.
http://www.techpowerup.com/atitool/

But the videocard sounds like has had some permanent damage done to it, well it maybe overheating, hopefully there isnt any permant damage and you putting a heatsink on may make it run cool enough to get rid of the corruption.

If not then you could try putting it back together with the shim and original fan and RMA to ATI, you may get lucky and be sent back a 9800 pro who knows.

Good luck!

How low should i lower the mem & core too, i am a newbie to all this.

[Ravens Nest]

How low should i lower the mem & core too, i am a newbie to all this.

Well the 9700 pro has speeds as follows..
CORE 325MHz
MEMORY 310MHz (620MHz DDR effective)

So you could try running your card at 9700 non-pro speeds.

CORE 275MHz
MEMORY 270MHz (540MHz DDR effective)

Give that a try, obviously if you go lower than Non-Pro speeds, i think you should RMA it as it will just be too slow for the latest games.

[Axis64]

Well the 9700 pro has speeds as follows..
CORE 325MHz
MEMORY 310MHz (620MHz DDR effective)

So you could try running your card at 9700 non-pro speeds.

CORE 275MHz
MEMORY 270MHz (540MHz DDR effective)

Give that a try, obviously if you go lower than Non-Pro speeds, i think you should RMA it as it will just be too slow for the latest games.

How do i go about RMA'ing it? as i have brought it second hand?

[Ravens Nest]

You have to see if it is a Built by ATi card or a powered by ATI card.
Go to
Start - Control panel - Display - Settings - Advanced -Options -Details

Then write down what BIOS Part number you have
Then go to this ATI website and see if it is a Built By ATI graphics card.

Read this first
http://mirror.ati.com/support/identify/index.html
Then Type the BIOS part number into here..
http://apps.ati.com/102lookup/index.asp

If it is a Built by ATI graphics card then you can RMA it to ATI.
http://mirror.ati.com/support/rma/index.html


if not the you'll have to see the manufactorer of the Graphics card and see if they will let you RMA it.

[yanansi]

i have got this problem and i am sure that it is the ram.hope it could RMA.GL