A computer components & hardware forum. HardwareBanter

If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Go Back   Home » HardwareBanter forum » Video Cards » Nvidia Videocards
Site Map Home Register Authors List Search Today's Posts Mark Forums Read Web Partners

Gainward FX5600 ultra freezing



 
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old August 5th 03, 07:41 PM
Stephen
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default Gainward FX5600 ultra freezing

I have had a Gainward Ultra/760 XP (FX5600 ultra) for 3 weeks and have
been unable to run 3D games for more than about 15 minutes without the
PC freezing and having to be turned off and on. I upgraded from a
Geforce 2 which ran everything without problems. The games I play are
Everquest and UT2003 and the problem also arises in 3Dmark03. The
freeze almost always happens when a new level/zone is loading or has
just loaded and very rarely in the middle of a level.

I have:

Athlon 2500
MSI KT4VL motherboard
512 Mb Corsair PC2700 RAM
SB Live
US Robotics network card
Thermaltake 420W PSU
Windows 98SE

These are some of the many things I have tried:

Upgrading to 44.03 drivers
Upgrading to 448 4 in 1 drivers
Upgrading to DirectX 9.0b
Ensuring that video, network and sound cards are not sharing IRQs
Changed AGP aperture from 128 to 64 and 32
Disabled/enabled fast writes
Lowered hardware acceleration
Increased AGP voltage
Underclocked/overclocked video card
Removed sound and network cards

I assume my PSU is good enough and I don't think it can be
overheating.
I also tried the card in another lower-spec PC and had exactly the
same problems.
My final option is to return the card - but I don't know whether it is
a problem with this particular card or if there is some compatability
with my system.

Has anyone got any ideas please?

Thanks in advance
  #2  
Old August 7th 03, 10:09 PM
Terry Hancock
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

"Stephen" wrote in message
om...
I have had a Gainward Ultra/760 XP (FX5600 ultra) for 3 weeks and have
been unable to run 3D games for more than about 15 minutes without the
PC freezing and having to be turned off and on. I upgraded from a
Geforce 2 which ran everything without problems. The games I play are
Everquest and UT2003 and the problem also arises in 3Dmark03. The
freeze almost always happens when a new level/zone is loading or has
just loaded and very rarely in the middle of a level.

I have:

Athlon 2500
MSI KT4VL motherboard
512 Mb Corsair PC2700 RAM
SB Live
US Robotics network card
Thermaltake 420W PSU
Windows 98SE

These are some of the many things I have tried:

Upgrading to 44.03 drivers
Upgrading to 448 4 in 1 drivers
Upgrading to DirectX 9.0b
Ensuring that video, network and sound cards are not sharing IRQs
Changed AGP aperture from 128 to 64 and 32
Disabled/enabled fast writes
Lowered hardware acceleration
Increased AGP voltage
Underclocked/overclocked video card
Removed sound and network cards

I assume my PSU is good enough and I don't think it can be
overheating.
I also tried the card in another lower-spec PC and had exactly the
same problems.
My final option is to return the card - but I don't know whether it is
a problem with this particular card or if there is some compatability
with my system.

Has anyone got any ideas please?

Thanks in advance




hi.

a bit late if u sent the card back, but i had similar problem with my
fx5900, 400 watt pwr and volcano 7+.

I had to re-route all power connectors and make sure that the fx card was
only sharing with other low drain items, in my case just the volcano 7 and a
twin intake fan unit. when i used power splitters from the hd to power th fx
card it would randomly lock up and never complete 3dmark 2003. now it works
fine and gives a 3dmark of 4934 with an xp2100 - try giving the card its own
power supply and see if it cures your problem

terry


  #3  
Old August 7th 03, 10:31 PM
missmuffy33
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

sorry to be a dope terry, but i'm not sure what you mean when you say "try
giving the card its own power supply"

the card plugs right into the mobo and draws power that way... not by
sharing a 4-pin connector like what plugs into a hard drive

i must be missing something

this is of interest to me since i am having the EXACT same problem but with
different specs (see the thread subject "geforce fx 5200 on athlon 900"):

PNY Verto GeForce FX 5200 128meg (non-ultra)
Abit KT7 (latest bios and latest VIA 4-in-1)
Athlon Thunderstruck 900
512 PC133
2 NICS (realtek & netgear)
SB PCI 512
Antec 300 W PSU
Windows XP Pro, SP1

i also play different games...


"Terry Hancock" wrote in message
...
"Stephen" wrote in message
om...
I have had a Gainward Ultra/760 XP (FX5600 ultra) for 3 weeks and have
been unable to run 3D games for more than about 15 minutes without the
PC freezing and having to be turned off and on. I upgraded from a
Geforce 2 which ran everything without problems. The games I play are
Everquest and UT2003 and the problem also arises in 3Dmark03. The
freeze almost always happens when a new level/zone is loading or has
just loaded and very rarely in the middle of a level.

I have:

Athlon 2500
MSI KT4VL motherboard
512 Mb Corsair PC2700 RAM
SB Live
US Robotics network card
Thermaltake 420W PSU
Windows 98SE

These are some of the many things I have tried:

Upgrading to 44.03 drivers
Upgrading to 448 4 in 1 drivers
Upgrading to DirectX 9.0b
Ensuring that video, network and sound cards are not sharing IRQs
Changed AGP aperture from 128 to 64 and 32
Disabled/enabled fast writes
Lowered hardware acceleration
Increased AGP voltage
Underclocked/overclocked video card
Removed sound and network cards

I assume my PSU is good enough and I don't think it can be
overheating.
I also tried the card in another lower-spec PC and had exactly the
same problems.
My final option is to return the card - but I don't know whether it is
a problem with this particular card or if there is some compatability
with my system.

Has anyone got any ideas please?

Thanks in advance




hi.

a bit late if u sent the card back, but i had similar problem with my
fx5900, 400 watt pwr and volcano 7+.

I had to re-route all power connectors and make sure that the fx card was
only sharing with other low drain items, in my case just the volcano 7 and

a
twin intake fan unit. when i used power splitters from the hd to power th

fx
card it would randomly lock up and never complete 3dmark 2003. now it

works
fine and gives a 3dmark of 4934 with an xp2100 - try giving the card its

own
power supply and see if it cures your problem

terry




  #4  
Old August 8th 03, 09:25 AM
Mario Kadastik
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

wrote:
On Thu, 07 Aug 2003 21:31:22 GMT, "missmuffy33" wrote:


sorry to be a dope terry, but i'm not sure what you mean when you say "try
giving the card its own power supply"

the card plugs right into the mobo and draws power that way... not by
sharing a 4-pin connector like what plugs into a hard drive

i must be missing something

this is of interest to me since i am having the EXACT same problem but with
different specs (see the thread subject "geforce fx 5200 on athlon 900"):

PNY Verto GeForce FX 5200 128meg (non-ultra)
Abit KT7 (latest bios and latest VIA 4-in-1)
Athlon Thunderstruck 900
512 PC133
2 NICS (realtek & netgear)
SB PCI 512
Antec 300 W PSU
Windows XP Pro, SP1

i also play different games...





Check you suplly votages and some Bios setups let you adj the 3.3 V, so set
this for 3.4V or 3.5v as I have had similar problems

Low Votages will cause problems with 3D cards as they draw lots of AMP's


Sorry, if it's a stupid question, but isn't normally lowering voltage a
way to get more AMPS? As far as I know

W=U*I

where W is power (measured in Watts), U is voltage (in volts) and I is
current (measured in ampers).

Using AC current there is also a sqrt(2) in this formula, but as the
internal power should be DC, then this formula should do.

This wouldn't be correct if the power supply is designed to give more
amps with more voltage (W would be a a higher order function of U and
hence increase in voltage would cause a bigger increase in W and
therefore giving you more amps).

Someone knowing the design of power supplys should comment on this (not
that it might help the user having crashes but I'd like to know).

Mario

  #5  
Old August 10th 03, 07:19 AM
Ron Merts
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

ACPI is one of the few things that actually shares IRQs very nicely with
other devices, in particular it's the one device that nVidia card-makers say
it's okay to share with the AGP video card. I personally don't recommend
disabling the ACPI IRQ. All of the Ultra cards use the 4-pin Molex
connector, at least all of the Ultra cards I have seen as well as all FX
5800 and FX 5900 cards, and from what I understand you DO need it connected
for the card to work properly. The only FX 5600 and 5200 Ultra cards from
Gainward have the words "Golden Sample" in their product name(s). The Ultra
760 and Ultra 780 are NOT FX 5600 Ultra cards unless they have the "Golden
Sample" in the product name. Look at the specs, go to Gainward and look for
yourself (www.gainward.com/c-2.html) and you will see that the only FX 5X00
Ultra cards have the words "Golden Sample" in their product name.
Personally I think it's a monstrous marketing mistake by Gainward and it's
more than a little misleading to consumers, but when has honesty and
integrity been a priority for marketing computer hardware/software recently?

Ron

"missmuffy33" wrote in message
t...
thanks for the info Stephen

i do have my vid card on its own irq, in fact the only irq sharing is with
my 2 nics (both on irq 11)... otherwise everything is on its own

i haven't disabled acpi yet so i'm looking into that
any advice with that?

seems like i have to do it in my bios...

- kevin


"Stephen" wrote in message
m...
Terry, thanks for your suggestion. I'm fairly certain that the last
time I installed the card it was on it's own power supply, but I will
certainly keep that in mind in the future.

Kevin, my video card (all Gainward FXs?) does actually need a separate
power supply - like hard drives! I've never seen one like it before.
As for your problem - I had the same motherboard and Athlon 900 as
you. When I installed my old Geforce 2 on it I had similar problems to
you. I solved them by moving my sound and network cards around until
neither were sharing IRQs (especially with the video card) and I also
disabled ACPI - I was (and still am) running Windows 98SE. I guess
you've already tried those things. I didn't have the flickering effect
though.

Mario, I'm sure you're absolutely correct, but in my BIOS, the only
option was to raise the voltage - so that was what I tried!

Thanks for all your suggestions.

Mario Kadastik wrote in message

...
wrote:
On Thu, 07 Aug 2003 21:31:22 GMT, "missmuffy33"

wrote:


sorry to be a dope terry, but i'm not sure what you mean when you

say
"try
giving the card its own power supply"

the card plugs right into the mobo and draws power that way... not

by
sharing a 4-pin connector like what plugs into a hard drive

i must be missing something

this is of interest to me since i am having the EXACT same problem

but
with
different specs (see the thread subject "geforce fx 5200 on athlon

900"):

PNY Verto GeForce FX 5200 128meg (non-ultra)
Abit KT7 (latest bios and latest VIA 4-in-1)
Athlon Thunderstruck 900
512 PC133
2 NICS (realtek & netgear)
SB PCI 512
Antec 300 W PSU
Windows XP Pro, SP1

i also play different games...




Check you suplly votages and some Bios setups let you adj the 3.3 V,

so set
this for 3.4V or 3.5v as I have had similar problems

Low Votages will cause problems with 3D cards as they draw lots of

AMP's

Sorry, if it's a stupid question, but isn't normally lowering voltage

a
way to get more AMPS? As far as I know

W=U*I

where W is power (measured in Watts), U is voltage (in volts) and I is
current (measured in ampers).

Using AC current there is also a sqrt(2) in this formula, but as the
internal power should be DC, then this formula should do.

This wouldn't be correct if the power supply is designed to give more
amps with more voltage (W would be a a higher order function of U and
hence increase in voltage would cause a bigger increase in W and
therefore giving you more amps).

Someone knowing the design of power supplys should comment on this

(not
that it might help the user having crashes but I'd like to know).

Mario





  #6  
Old August 10th 03, 05:35 PM
missmuffy33
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

tried that but no dice there either
i'm saving my pennies for a new PSU at the moment

we'll see what that does once installed


"Nick" wrote in message
om...
I seem to have improved my situation (though lockups still occur) by
changing the agp driving value from DE to EA in the BIOS. What this
does is increase the strength of the signal that goes to the AGP card.
Let me know if that works for you.



  #7  
Old August 15th 03, 01:42 PM
Stephen
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

I think I've cured my "freezing" problem by installing the new 45.23
Win98/ME drivers.

Thanks again to all who tried to help me.
 




Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump

Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
ATI 9600 Pro V's Geforce FX5600 (non ultra) Trevor Marsh Ati Videocards 3 September 24th 03 09:32 AM
9800SE or fx5600 Ultra Bratboy Ati Videocards 6 September 15th 03 10:26 PM
nvidia Card Recommendation? FX5200 FX5600 ultra 256mb ti 4200 phelps8100 Nvidia Videocards 1 August 9th 03 06:38 PM
FX5600 - Ultra or more memory? Default Nvidia Videocards 4 August 3rd 03 08:56 PM
FX5600 Freezing.. Derek Nvidia Videocards 5 July 29th 03 10:19 PM


All times are GMT +1. The time now is 08:43 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.6.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©2004-2024 HardwareBanter.
The comments are property of their posters.