Radeon 9800xt problems

[theEnd]

Ok, i have an asus 9800xt and after reading through every thread i can find on here about overclocking the 9800 cards, i've come to the conclusion that there is either something wrong with my card, or i have an extreme dud. i can't even mildly overclock the card before seeing artifacts that appear as little white dots. i'm talking 420 engine, 370 memory, and i've over clocked each separately, with no luck. sometimes i can even see one or two white dots here and there after playing graphically intensive games such as the farcry demo, or either 3dmark 03 or aquamark 3 for long periods of time, with the stock settings. the rest of my system specs are a 2.8c on an abit ic-7 max3, with a mild overclock to 3.0ghz, 1gig corsair pc3200 xms, a 160gig sata hard drive, and an antec trupower 430 watt psu. what gives? dud card, or is something wrong? any help is GREATLY appreciated.

[oc-rookie]

What's your AGP voltage?

[theEnd]

the agp voltage was at 1.55 but it's now at 1.6

[oc-rookie]

Try 1.65, is there anything else on the same power connection? <---I can't think of the wording

[theEnd]

no, i've checked and double-checked, the card is connected by itself directly to the psu. i'll try 1.65 vagp and see how that goes.

[theEnd]

setting the vagp to 1.65 doesn't help it at all. my +3.3v rail seems to be either reported low or actually is low, staying at a constant 3.25 if that has anything to do with it.

[oc-rookie]

New card to an old install or a completely new build?

Chipset drivers? Which Cat's are you running? DirextX? What are the temps being reported from the overdrive tab of the ATI control panel?

[theEnd]

every part in my computer is brand new, as i just built it a couple of weeks ago. the card doesn't support the overdrive feature, it's an asus 9800xt, and all the drivers are the latest, also directx9.0b. i'm beginning to think i got a dud card for overclocking which pisses me off; the only reason i paid extra to get the asus was because of the cooling solution and the reviews i read about how it was able to overclock well.

[oc-rookie]

How about you put the system to default, overclock the card and see if it still happens. What are the temps on the card?

[theEnd]

i'll try that and report back, the temps are good... 46C idle, and around 56C under full stress. thanks for the help by the way

[theEnd]

well, running the fsb at stock settings helped a little but any increase of the engine over 420mhz with no memory overclock yields little bits of snow. it must be a dud card, hopefully i'll have better luck in the future. thanks for the help man.

[The Virus]

Sounds like a PSU problem. These days having a 500-550psu is a must espesially with your setup. Goodluck.

[theEnd]

you're telling me 430 watts isn't enough? 2 optical drives, a sata hard drive, a 9800xt, audigy 2zs, i875, and a 2.8c draw more than 430 watts? i always thought over 400 was required but not 500

[Peen]

ur card is messed up, i ran 350watt generic with similar setup for 8 months just fine, overclocked good too. Having snow wouldnt be a PSU problem, it would be heat id say. Maybe you can RMA , and say like ........ i dont know give them excuse to exchange with a new one .

[saaya]

Originally posted by The Virus
Sounds like a PSU problem. These days having a 500-550psu is a must espesially with your setup. Goodluck.

not true!

if you can, try to rma it since it wont run at stock speed. if you have soldered on the pcb you can still try to remove the mod carefully, you can scratch off the extra solder tin with a sharp knife carefully and pray they wont see it. artifacts at stock speed is no good...

[theEnd]

i've done no mods whatsoever, it HAS to be a bad card because the engine won't even go 418 without snow when i also overclock the memory. also, the memory i can overclock pretty good by itself (400 on air), with no increase to the engine, but as soon as i up the core.... snow. I was hoping i wouldn't have to rma, but it's looking that way.