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Wierd Video Artifacts

post #1 of 8
7/29/05 at 10:06am
Thread Starter 
Hey all, I am just curious as to what your thoughts on my issue is. Recently (though at this point i think its coincidence), i started getting some crashes with a video error while playing games. Its not immediate, usually after 5-10 mins of gaming and completely random. At first, i thought this was a problem with a new video driver i had just installed. So i uninstalled it and went back to the old version which i had no issues with. In short, no, I still got the crashes.

So to eliminate some leftover or corrupt file, i formatted and reinstalled. Everything looked good, system was running, but now i am noticing red and blue "blotches" or artifacts randomly appearing around the screen and blinking in and out after about 5-10 mins of gaming. So, i thought, well, I can eliminate the display being the culprit, so i hooked up an external monitor. Same result. I checked the fan on the card, and its looks to be running fine. I notice the blotches while playing World of Warcraft, I plan on downloading 3dMark or something to day to give the card a workout to see if it happens there too.

At this point i am thinking I am going to have to RMA the laptop because something is wrong with the video card. Its a 9860 with an ATI X800. What are your thoughts?
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post #2 of 8
7/29/05 at 10:29am
Thread Starter 
A little more information. For quite some time, i was using the omega drivers (never overclocked the card). When ATI started to support the X800 Mobility i switched to those drivers. In order to make sure it wasnt driver related (or atleast non-support driver related), i switched to the drivers posted by Sager, and i still get the crashes/artifacts.
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post #3 of 8
7/29/05 at 1:34pm
Thread Starter 
Well i ran 3dmark, and it didnt crash, but because the scenes are so dark, its hard to see the artifacts. They are a deep/dark red/blue, so unless against something white or light colored, its difficult to see.

Anyone have any thoughts?
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post #4 of 8
7/29/05 at 3:25pm
I would have to say video card or drivers. At this point leaning toward video card. Also does the artfacts show up in the same area all the time? Another thing that would be interesting is to look at the World of Warcraft box on the back and see if it has the ATI or Nvidia logo on it. If its the Nvidia logo then you will just need to play around with the settings and drivers. If its the ATI logo I would go trying drivers and see what happens. Also you can see if it happens in the same place or similar frames of the game. If so then its corrupted game files for rendering. If the benchmarks work fine then I am guessing its the game. But oddly on my Nvidia card the benchmarks work fine but its in the depot right now being fixed. Ok, try what I mentioned, try another game, try different drivers, see if it happens in the same general rendering area of the game, if not fixed or see a change I would contact technical support to see what there thoughts are. The card may be getting to hot. Have you tried to remove the video card and replace it by unhooking all the cables and hooking them back up. Good luck...
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post #5 of 8
8/1/05 at 4:15pm
Thread Starter 
well i have come to the conclusion its definitely the video card. 3dmark eventually started displaying the artifacts and completely crashing. Like i said, the card has to get hot before it seems to start messing up. Hopefully an RMA wont take long
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post #6 of 8
8/2/05 at 8:50pm
Hey zard, I had the same problem. Mine progressively got worse, and after a few days, even the POST screen was hosed. It's off to UPS tomorrow. I figure I should have it back by... oh, say... September.
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post #7 of 8
8/3/05 at 3:19am
Quote:
Originally Posted by _greg_
Hey zard, I had the same problem. Mine progressively got worse, and after a few days, even the POST screen was hosed. It's off to UPS tomorrow. I figure I should have it back by... oh, say... September.

wow by september they could build you a new one and send it back good luck, yeah mine still is has not even left the depot yet from alienware from 8 days ago, hopefully I will get a new one, guess I am dreaming huh.


zard::: have you called technical support yet, maybe they will send you the card and you can install it with out you having to send the notebook back. this is up to you to do but its another option to think about..
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post #8 of 8
8/3/05 at 6:50am
Hey Guys,
Had same problem, (a toasted GPU), and got on to sager tech dept, they wanted me to send whole computer back, which from Ireland, would have cost me an arm and a leg!! So I got them to email me instructions on removing video adapter (gpu) and sent it back to them. 3 weeks later I recieve new one and reverse removal process to install it, they also sent me some thermal paste to keep it extra cool!!
All in all this saved me about $300 in postage costs!!
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