Unexplainable video-card related crashes

By Mickez
in Hardware Hangout

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Mickez

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Hello! I've recently bought a new GPU but to my awe I found that I got some unexplainable crashes from it!

I can't seem to figure out the problem, after much testing and configuring - I'm beginning to think it's this individual card that is broken or just doesn't go well at all with my build.

My problem is: After approx. 10-15 min of playing a game my computer freezes and crashes. The sound is stuttering and screen is black. I have tested three games, Guild Wars 2, Far Cry 3 and Minecraft. I do not experience the problem on minecraft, I'm figuring it escapes the problem since it uses Open GL and not DirectX, could be wrong though.

Everything worked fine on my old graphics card.

What I have tried:

  • I have tried to change to a better power supply (to the one I'm currently using in the list)
  • I have tried to under-clock my GPU
  • I have tried to lowering the fan-speed and power usage of the GPU
  • I have tried to install the beta catalyst drivers (12.11)
  • I have tried to make a clean driver install following this guide.
  • The temperature of the card is never exceeding 56 degrees celsius.
  • I only experience a crash when playing a game with DirectX, like guild wars 2 of Far Cry 3.

My old graphics card was a Sapphire Radeon HD 5670, 1GB.

My new graphics card is a Sapphire Radeon HD 7850, 2GB.

My current computer specs is:

Thanks for taking a look! :) If you need any more info I'll be happy to supply it.

Grand Master

Detection

Posted
Posted

There are a few problems with the 7xxx series cards, CCC 12.11 Beta 11 are the best drivers atm but still in Beta so hopefully more fixes will come

From everything I've read, DX9 game give the most problems

Some cards are thought to be faulty by some who also experience crashes, but I say wait until the drivers reach WHQL ,

For now, use the Beta Driver report form on this Beta download page and explain in detail your problem

Also is your motherboard BIOS up to date ?

Explorer

Mickez

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do a stress test http://www.ozone3d.net/benchmarks/fur/ by what you've explained in your post i'm betting it'll fail, and if it does I'd get the card RMA'd

Ok. I'll try that tomorrow.

There are a few problems with the 7xxx series cards, CCC 12.11 Beta 11 are the best drivers atm but still in Beta so hopefully more fixes will come

From everything I've read, DX9 game give the most problems

Some cards are thought to be faulty by some who also experience crashes, but I say wait until the drivers reach WHQL ,

For now, use the Beta Driver report form on this Beta download page and explain in detail your problem

Also is your motherboard BIOS up to date ?

OK. I'll report my problem tomorrow. And no, i haven't updated my bios since I've bought the motherboard, do you think it might contribute to the problem?

Grand Master

Detection

Posted
Posted

OK. I'll report my problem tomorrow. And no, i haven't updated my bios since I've bought the motherboard, do you think it might contribute to the problem?

It wouldn't hurt to try, BIOS updates generally add support for new hardware, mainly CPUs its never a bad thing to keep it updated

Explorer

Mickez

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do a stress test http://www.ozone3d.net/benchmarks/fur/ by what you've explained in your post i'm betting it'll fail, and if it does I'd get the card RMA'd

I ran it for 5 minutes and it did not fail.

As I suspected it must be related to DirectX - that benchmark was in OpenGL.

Veteran

Alwaysonacoffebreak

Posted
Posted

If the stress test ran fine your card isn't failing but probably it's the drivers that are causing the problem.

Remove the current drivers and download the 12.10 from AMD homepage.

Also, I am not sure about this, it just popped into my head but it might have to do something with corrupt directx files aswell, try reinstalling those as well.

Explorer

Mickez

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Already tried making a clean driver install but it didn't help.

I also thought about that my directX install might be corrupt but it worked fine on my old GPU and wouldn't really explain why I can play a while and then suddenly crash.

There isn't by chance anywhere I can find a log?

Veteran

Alwaysonacoffebreak

Posted
Posted

Well you can check Event viewer for some information. If it's an directx or driver related crash it usually stores the info there.

My own 6790's had this problem but for me it was that they were overheating too quick but since you ran the stress test it can't really be that and should still be something directx related.

There are also couple of other things that I could think of (If someone thinks I'm wrong please correct me), one thing you can try is to update the Graphics BIOS (If there is any update for it) secondly the PSU seems to be pretty weak, this doesn't consern the gpu a bit but I wouldn't suggest putting 2 different company RAM's in the same build, those might cause other crashes, if all else fails you did you do an clean Windows install after swapping the card? Windows sometimes has a strange way of hooking itself to a specific hardware in your system, don't know why but I've seen it do that.

Explorer

Mickez

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Well you can check Event viewer for some information. If it's an directx or driver related crash it usually stores the info there.

My own 6790's had this problem but for me it was that they were overheating too quick but since you ran the stress test it can't really be that and should still be something directx related.

There are also couple of other things that I could think of (If someone thinks I'm wrong please correct me), one thing you can try is to update the Graphics BIOS (If there is any update for it) secondly the PSU seems to be pretty weak, this doesn't consern the gpu a bit but I wouldn't suggest putting 2 different company RAM's in the same build, those might cause other crashes, if all else fails you did you do an clean Windows install after swapping the card? Windows sometimes has a strange way of hooking itself to a specific hardware in your system, don't know why but I've seen it do that.

Where do I find the event viewer?

I thought a 500W psu was decent, but it held up during stress test with fan at 56%.

And the problem occurred when I only had one of the rams as well, I was worried when I bought more but I ran a memory test and it seemed to be ok. I bought the 8gb recently and thought it'd be a nice bonus to keep my old as well.

I'll maybe try reinstall the system, I think win8 has a nice way doing this keeping all software and files.

Grand Master

ahhell

Posted
Posted

Where do I find the event viewer?

I thought a 500W psu was decent, but it held up during stress test with fan at 56%.

And the problem occurred when I only had one of the rams as well, I was worried when I bought more but I ran a memory test and it seemed to be ok. I bought the 8gb recently and thought it'd be a nice bonus to keep my old as well.

I'll maybe try reinstall the system, I think win8 has a nice way doing this keeping all software and files.

Pull the new memory out. You need to start eliminating variables in order to narrow down the problem.

Explorer

Mickez

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I'm very dubious about that power supply.

Edit : Actually i'm surprised nobody has pointed it out. I'd try and get a hold of a decent (reads: "Known brand") power supply and try it.

The brand I have is well know here in Sweden and have to my experience been very good.

I thought the power supply was my problem at first (which did not have nearly the same output wattage as this one have) and therefore changed to this - it was the first thing I tried (my old power supply was a corsair, I think). Turned out my problem wasn't the power supply, the crash did still occur.

Also the PSU can't be the problem since it didn't crash when I did the OpenGL stress test, which forced the fan of the GPU go very fast.

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