"Paul" wrote in message
...
Adam wrote:
"Adam" wrote in message
...
"Paul" wrote in message
...
Adam wrote:

Sure, I doubt that the video card manufacturer would
use a cheap Molex connector on the video card.

I may have unknowingly used cheap Molex extension connectors,
which I'll try replacing first before soldering (which will make it
difficult to swap video cards).


A side question ... which ATI Radeon video card is this ...
http://imageshack.us/a/img69/5258/atiradeon9800pro.jpg
It doesn't look like an ATi Radeon 9800 Pro.


It's a 9800 XT, out of a Dell.

http://www.memory4less.com/m4l_itemd...mid=1441161823

The 9800 XT gets an honorable mention here, and uses a different GPU
(R360)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R300

While the chip number is changed, it doesn't look all that
much different than a 9800 Pro listed here. The two seem
almost identical, except for clock speed difference and
more RAM on the newer card.

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards....d1=36&card2=34

*******

Note that, the 9800 Pro is universal keyed, and can fit
in a 1.5V or 3.3V slot. The keys in the slot control card
insertion.

http://www.ixbt.com/video2/images/r9...scan-front.jpg

The 9800 XT on the other hand, is a 1.5V only card. It only
has one slot to fit a key.

http://www.memory4less.com/images/pr...2/N3511-lg.jpg

It's funny, that while the 9800 Pro has a 3.3V slot cut in it,
when I plugged mine into a 3.3V only AGP motherboard (P2B-S),
the machine would not post. Nothing was damaged. I think
I got a beep code. So if the card is "universal", it
isn't "that universal" :-(

Your slot is AGP Pro, where the front and back section
of pins, carry extra power. The center section matches
the "normal" set of AGP pins. And there are no keys that
I can see in your slot, in that section. And that means
either a 1.5V or a 3.3V card will fit. So the 9800 XT should
not be a problem.

Before you buy the 9800 XT, do some Googling first to see
whether there are problems or not.

Paul


Thanks (Guru Paul), what's the best way to clean up the burned Molex
connector?



I replaced the burned Molex extension cable with a new one.
However, when the video card was connected to
the new Molex extension cable, I got the following message ...

"You have not connected the power extension cable to
your Radeon 9800 video card
Please refer to the "Getting Started Guide" for
proper hardware installation !!!"


So, I connected the video card "directly" to the power supply,
which successfully circumvented the message. But,
video defects still exist with the new Molex extension cable.
Could the problem be an insufficient power supply?
I have the following ...

AGI HP-250NLXAA 250W 60/50Hz ATX Power Supply
http://www.ebay.com/itm/AGI-HP-250NL...-/370606177189



You cannot "clean up" a burned connector.

I learned this the hard way, on a $6000 piece of equipment at work.

Initially, I thought you could clean connectors too, but I was wrong.

The machine had an internal defect, and a burned connector. I tried
several times to "clean" the pins of the black burnt stuff. The deal is,
once the metal changes from shiny and smooth, to heat-stressed
slightly whitish finish, the resistance of the pin has gone
up permanently. It's like the nice metal finish on the pin
is gone. You have to replace both the male and female
connector parts, so new shiny pins are present on both sides.
On the machine in the lab, I just soldered the two bits
to each other, because I was sick of opening the thing up
over and over again. Once I soldered the thing, I had
no more trouble with it.

So instead of pulling the Molex off the video card, I soldered
the +5V wire to the backside of the Molex. This was to save me
the trouble of using a solder sucker and pulling the solder
out of all four of the Molex holes. The other three Molex
pins were undamaged. So my repair method was "additive",
and didn't involve removing any solder from the video card.
Sometimes, the PCB gets damaged while you're removing
solder, and I figured I'd avoid that by just soldering the
wire (as shown in the photograph). The reason for the hollow
vertical metal thing, was so there wouldn't be any wire draping
around the pin. By elevating the solder joint, it puts more
mechanical stress on the base, where the metal thing joins
to the card, and I have to be careful not to tug on the cable
too hard. It's to avoid the potential for a short circuit,
if I soldered closer to the card itself.

The pin and wire carry 5V at around 5 amps on the 9800 Pro.
The Molex pin is capable of carrying a bit more than that
(perhaps up to 8 amps). But the pin surfaces must be
"new virgin material" for that to work. If the pins are damaged,
doing a little cleaning on them is not going to make them happy
to carry 5 amps again.

I don't know where your video defects are coming from. There
were some Nvidia chips, were broken solder balls on the GPU
caused video problems. If the fan dies on a video card and
the GPU overheats, that can cause permanent defects. Sometimes
lines on a monitor, are actually a *monitor* problem. It really
depends on how the lines look, as to which part of the
gear you would suspect as defective. On an LCD monitor, defective
matrix drivers on the LCD panel, can cause solid vertical lines
to appear on the display.

Paul


Okay, let me see if I can get someone to do a similar soldering solution.
If not, it may be better to swap out this AGP video card.
The video defects are definitely coming from this AGP video card,
which now has a heatsink part attached (since the fan failed).
The video defects disappear when another PCI video card is swapped in.