GTX280 Died

***ol'norton*** · 01-17-2010, 07:44 PM

I've been having a lot of trouble with my video card lately.
If not booting into Windows 7, then when trying to run any 3D application would cover the screen in garbled colours.

I would boot up in safe mode & reinstall the drivers (tried many different ones) and it would then run fine, pass any stability test & play Dragon Age for 8 hours no worries. But next morning after a cold boot, I would have to reinstall the drivers from safe mode again.
But this morning, no amount of reinstalling & driver cleaning would get it into Win 7.
I have Vista 32bit on dual boot, so i tried to boot into that & found I couldn't get into it either, unless in safe mode.
I put my old 8800GTX in & all was fine.
So I bought a 5870 & so far so good. It's been a long time since I had a ATi card.
The GTX280 is more than 12 months old (16) but the place I bought it said if I pay $50 they woulld send it off to XFX, so I thought it is worth a try, it will be a good upgrade for my sister if they fix it.

**Just Learnin'** · 01-17-2010, 08:36 PM

Glad to here your funding of the local PC parts industry may pay off Johnny!

Any thoughts as to what may have caused the problem or is it a common problem for the GTX 280 cards to go like that? I hope not as I have 2 of them myself. If no replacement was forthcoming I would have tried the "bake it" fix myself.

Any noticeable differences in the image quality between the Nvidia and ATi offerings in games or otherwise?

**lakeside2189** · 01-17-2010, 08:41 PM

I think your going to like the 5870 Johnny..They are sweet running cards with no issues for me...Also run cool..way cool...

Not sure which card you got but i have tried a few..The Asus bios works smoother than most...Here is the link..

http://www.overclockers.com/hd-5870-bios-flashing/

I am using the XFX now and the Asus bios makes it one smooth card..It is unlocked to 1200/1400...

***ol'norton*** · 01-17-2010, 09:07 PM

Originally Posted by Just Learnin'

Glad to here your funding of the local PC parts industry may pay off Johnny!

Any thoughts as to what may have caused the problem or is it a common problem for the GTX 280 cards to go like that? I hope not as I have 2 of them myself. If no replacement was forthcoming I would have tried the "bake it" fix myself.

Any noticeable differences in the image quality between the Nvidia and ATi offerings in games or otherwise?

I've been reading around the net a lot while trying to solve this problem, & a lot of people have had trouble since going to the 195.62 WHQL Win 7 drivers.
I told a bloke on the Nvidia forum that I doubt the drivers would have physically damaged his cards, but I'm not so sure now. Nvidia cards seem to be dropping like flies.
This bloke had success with the oven trick on his 8800 Ultra.

But pulling it apart to try it would void any warrenty I might have from XFX.

Dragon Age looks exactly the same on the 5870. I expected maybe some difference in tone or something, but it looks & runs the same to me.
I used to run the GTX280 fan on fixed 75% & it would run around 70C / 74C while playing Dragon Age.
I put the 5870 on 75% fan & it was way too loud. But if you leave it on auto it only reached 69C after 1/2 an hour & the fan couldn't be heard.

**Just Learnin'** · 01-17-2010, 09:22 PM

I would have guessed some difference in the image of some sort would have been noticeable, maybe with glasses

...

Anyways the reason I would have tried the bake it trick if no warranty was forthcoming is that I had a dead EVGA 9800GX2 given to me that was off warranty. I baked it and still hold second place for 2 9800GX2 cards in a HWBOT category, it is quite a clocker. My son is still running it now in his PC and it sees nothing but steady gaming use without issue.

**Just Learnin'** · 02-08-2010, 09:39 AM

Any word on the replacement card yet Johnny?

***ol'norton*** · 02-08-2010, 12:23 PM

No, I emailed them but haven't got a reply yet.
I told my sister, she could have my old X48 system & so I put the 8800GTX back into that & it died.

I tried the bake in the oven trick last night, but it didn't help.
So getting a prompt reply on the GTX280 would be handy.
Failing that, I'll get her a HD-5770 for it.
She should be able to play Dragon Age OK @ 1680 X 1050 with one of those ?

***Dave3d*** · 02-08-2010, 01:53 PM

Hmmmm
Sounds like maybe a bad mobo or psu, or maybe airflow (mid-tower)?
IF thats the same system that the 280 died in ......
I do not trust any mid-tower case anymore.
Put my old system in one for a little bit, and the vid card and the cpu got SO hot, I pulled them and broke out my old TT tower to use instead.
Or, were you just OC'ing the heck out of em?

Did you have the vid fans @ 100% ?
I have all of my fans @ 100% since I heard the nvidia chips were dying prematurely.
Havent had a single glitch with any of them so far.

***ol'norton*** · 02-08-2010, 10:18 PM

No they were different motherboards, PSU's & Cases.
Both cases are very well ventilated
Although I did try the 8800GTX in this system when the 280GTX died & it worked fine.
It sat on the shelf for 2 weeks until I put it back in the old rig on Sunday & I got the same garbled screen as the 280GTX.
The HD-5870 has worked without a hitch in the same system for 2 weeks.
The 280GTX was run stock with stock cooling, fans @ 75%
The 8800GTX had been volt-modded heavily overclocked & run on dry ice, water, but mostly Thermalright cooler.

**Just Learnin'** · 02-08-2010, 10:20 PM

Runs Dragon Age: Origins at max quality 1280x1024 flawlessly. Runs quiet, couldn't hear it over my PCP&C 750 power supply even at load, GPU-Z log says fan never went over 40%, 33C idle 54C load, ~25C ambient in a big case.

This model came with an older BIOS, only gives 720 stream processors. Sapphire's website has a PowerPoint download that has links and describes the process where you can format a USB thumb drive to flash the card to the new BIOS. If you can follow instructions or have flashed a BIOS before, you'll be fine. 800 stream processors show up for me now. I also downloaded the driver (only) from the ATI site, 9.12. Haven't installed CCC yet - I want to evaluate the card further.

Card looks good, the Sapphire logo is backlit by a blue LED, and the PCB is black, matches my MB. A bit shorter than the 8800GTS.

This card is replacing an EVGA 8800GTS 320 OC, which was fitted with a Thermalright heatsink and fan. I was able to run Dragon Age: Origins with the old card at average quality with no AA, and it stuttered in taxing situations. Thanks EVGA, a great card, still works fine, but nVidia currently can't match the value of the 5770, and this is an excellent version. The heatsink and fanshroud seem well-designed, and I anticipate some overclocking capability without needing a different cooling setup. If you want to run some of the great new games, and have an older card, I recommend this card as an upgrade.

The system: DFI Lanparty DK X48, 2GB Geil 4-4-4-12 DD2 @960, 2 x WD250 in RAID0, E8500 @3.6Ghz, LianLi PC7077 (huge case, lots of air), Windows XP SP3 32bit

http://www.amazon.com/Sapphire-Vapor.../dp/B0030IVTRC

XFX RMA's can be painfully slow...

***ol'norton*** · 02-08-2010, 10:33 PM

Thanks Pete,
My sister won't be here for another 3 weeks, but if I haven't got anything from XFX by then, the HD-5770 sounds good enough for $200. Aus.

Pete, you once put up a link to a site that compared Graphics cards.
Do you still have a link to it?