Computer freezes, graphic glitches and no sound device? need help!

[pbostrom]

First my setup, MSI K9N NEO am2, amd athlon 3800+ x2) 2*512mb random memory(its good ones cant remember the brand).

well here's the deal, earlier this week i was getting a graphical problem(i have had it before but not as severe) it makes big textured walls out of nothing, if u imagin some1 dragged selected vertices from a model straight across the map, this occurs in pretty much every game i have played, including World in conflict, CoD4, WoW, CoD2 etc. i have formatted my hdd aswell as reinstalled XP about 6 times 2day with 3 different versions of XP pro, the graphic glitches have just become a tad better but game still freezes randomly, even the comp freezes in just idle mode.

After i reinstalled windows it couldnt boot any sound driver or device, it could find it but it was unable to start it up(this was the main reason to why i reinstalled it several times) the sound drivers etc was working perfectly before i reinstalled first time. i have googled for hours after a solution and have found some ppl with the same problem but no solution. the sound device is the internal MB one with Realtek HD audio driver.

also i cant seem to start up CoD4, when it is about to start it just gives the error message that the game crashed for no reason :P, other games i have tried is working, just the graphic glitches.

me and my friends thinks that my motherboard may be broken(for the graphic part) but the sound we got no clue as it worked flawless before.

please help me, iam going to test other MBs, aswell as getting a soundcard.

On Fri, 16 Nov 2007 22:35:53 -0600, pbostrom
<pbostrom.308jty@no.email.invalid> wrote:

>
>First my setup, MSI K9N NEO am2, amd athlon 3800+ x2) 2*512mb random
>memory(its good ones cant remember the brand).
>
>well here's the deal, earlier this week i was getting a graphical
>problem(i have had it before but not as severe) it makes big textured
>walls out of nothing, if u imagin some1 dragged selected vertices from a
>model straight across the map, this occurs in pretty much every game i
>have played, including World in conflict, CoD4, WoW, CoD2 etc.


So in other words, you have either a video card stability or
video driver stability problem.

How about non-gaming, is it ever a problem then?
Have you tried another video driver, other games, and
patches for the effected games?


>i have
>formatted my hdd aswell as reinstalled XP about 6 times 2day with 3
>different versions of XP pro, the graphic glitches have just become a
>tad better but game still freezes randomly, even the comp freezes in
>just idle mode.


If it is a hardware problem, or a software problem but you
keep installing the same software, there is no expectation
the problem will go away, necessarily.

First, check PSu voltage, video card fan. A junky generic
PSU or a failed video card fan are two of the most common
system failures.



>
>After i reinstalled windows it couldnt boot any sound driver or device,
>it could find it but it was unable to start it up(this was the main
>reason to why i reinstalled it several times) the sound drivers etc was
>working perfectly before i reinstalled first time. i have googled for
>hours after a solution and have found some ppl with the same problem but
>no solution. the sound device is the internal MB one with Realtek HD
>audio driver.

Delete the item from Device Manager and get the latest
driver from Realtek. FIRST, reinstall DirectX9C, then
install the audio driver.


>
>also i cant seem to start up CoD4, when it is about to start it just
>gives the error message that the game crashed for no reason :P, other
>games i have tried is working, just the graphic glitches.

I now wonder if your system is stable besides games, and
recommend you run memtest86+ overnight to see if there are
any errors, and run prime95's torture test for several hours
too. If there are any errors, resolve that before dealing
with video card, driver, or gaming factors.



>
>me and my friends thinks that my motherboard may be broken(for the
>graphic part) but the sound we got no clue as it worked flawless
>before.

Rarely there are mobo with bios flaws, check for an updated
bios.

The soundcard, I would wait until other factors are resolved
and then decide what your time is worth because generic RT
onboard sound is not high-end by any stretch, if you had to
you could find a $15 sound card to replace that.

[pbostrom]

i have fixed the problems now, or well sound is functioning, my buddy did some magic stuff behind my back etc, and the graphic bugs are gone, or most of em, the graphic card was going warm, had to install a fan for better airflow and lock the VGA fan speed to 90% or more, will buy a zalman later,but the computer often crashes after a couple of hours using(alot better than before so i dont care) anyway when not in games the computer works fine. thx for the help .

will come back if i find some more problems

On Sun, 18 Nov 2007 11:19:13 -0600, pbostrom
<pbostrom.309zz1@no.email.invalid> wrote:

>
>i have fixed the problems now, or well sound is functioning, my buddy
>did some magic stuff behind my back etc, and the graphic bugs are gone,
>or most of em, the graphic card was going warm, had to install a fan for
>better airflow and lock the VGA fan speed to 90% or more, will buy a
>zalman later,but the computer often crashes after a couple of hours
>using(alot better than before so i dont care) anyway when not in games
>the computer works fine. thx for the help .
>
>will come back if i find some more problems
>


When the stock card cooling isn't enough, and if the fan
wasn't failing, often this indicates a case cooling problem
which could also be thermally stressing other parts.

[pbostrom]

yapp, i am buying a new case (antec nine hundred should be enough) with the zalman vf900 for the graphic card, but im having another problem now, afte awhile in the game sometimes 10 min sometimes 30 and sometimes an hour the computer freezes, and the sound is beeing looped at a speed of a hummingbee. could it be the processor that is overheated??(this also occured before my great reinstallation). also i havnt noticed any of the graphic bugs since i isntalled a new case fan

On Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:25:43 -0600, pbostrom
<pbostrom.30f8xj@no.email.invalid> wrote:

>
>yapp, i am buying a new case (antec nine hundred should be enough) with
>the zalman vf900 for the graphic card, but im having another problem
>now, afte awhile in the game sometimes 10 min sometimes 30 and sometimes
>an hour the computer freezes, and the sound is beeing looped at a speed
>of a hummingbee. could it be the processor that is overheated??(this
>also occured before my great reinstallation). also i havnt noticed any
>of the graphic bugs since i isntalled a new case fan
>

It is more likely a game or driver (video or sound driver)
bug.

[pbostrom]

so if i already got the latest drivers/versions what now? my buddy had the same problem with a similar MB

On Thu, 22 Nov 2007 08:39:18 -0600, pbostrom
<pbostrom.30h4ha@no.email.invalid> wrote:

>
>so if i already got the latest drivers/versions what now? my buddy had
>the same problem with a similar MB
>

I'll assume you mean the newest from the respective chipset
manufacturers, not the video card or motherboard
manufacturer.
Try a newer bios.

Try different game settings for lower fidelity or no 3D
audio and try game patches. If the problem only occurs in
certain games then the game is more likely to blame.

[pbostrom]

i almost always run games like Call of Duty at lowest setting(maximum FPS at your advantage). i will checkout how it works later next week in various test enviroments aswell as changing bios.

on a sidenote when i scanned for artifacts through ATITool it went smooth for a couple of mins but later when it exceeded a certain amounts of numbers per seconds or what ever it was(going to check more into this when i get home to the comp(on a laptop at my parents house)) the computer crashed as i described. so it may be something with the graphic card, could try loan my buddies identical card.

[pbostrom]

ok did some torture testing etc will run 3dmark in a few mins a couple of runs. i have isolated the problem atleast.

its not the harddrive(my buddy suggested this)
not CPU(but could be but not likely)
could be motherboard(ordered a new one with new memory)
not the temperature(got proper cooling)

and heres the kicker did a torture test and it showed my graphic card had severe memory leaks?? <--- could it be this?(3dmark will show me!)

and the software is no problem i think got everything updated aswell as bios.

will be back for more information. btw does the 8800GT sound as a neat card ?