I’m a bit bewildered about my computer at the moment. If you’ll remember, a few weeks ago while Chip was here my computer seems to choke and die and needed a whole system tune-up/reinstall to get it working again. The final diagnosis of that whole ordeal was that a stick of RAM had gone bad. Now, just today, the system starting acting up again. For the moment it’s only acting up when I’m playing a game but it’s very disconcerting none-the-less. If I remember correctly, 90% of the error messages we were getting were “memory” related. It never really specified more than that. I’m starting to think it might actually be video memory. The problems all started last time when we were playing a game and continued every time something graphics related was even touched. It also could simply be a nVidia driver issue this time since I installed new drivers yesterday. What leads me to think it’s a video card issue is the fact that I’m typing this without incident from the on-board GeForce 2 that my motherboard has built in. I also just playing 2 levels of Red Faction as a “test” and it was rock solid. 30 minutes ago I couldn’t take 10 steps without it crashing. I’m going to try and roll back the drivers to 41.xx and see how it handles. If problems continue I may be in need of a second new video card. If you’ll remember back 8 months or so, my previous GeForce 4 crapped out on me after the long drive back to NH. I figured it was merely the stress of a 1200 mile driver with minimal padding for my case and called Gainward. They were very helpful tech-support wise and shipped me a new (and faster) card instantly as a replacement. So, could Gainward cards really be this flaky? We’ll see. If they were wouldn’t errors have occurred when I ran SiSandra (benchmark) after the clean reinstall? Or the thousand times I’ve played a game since then? There has to be some other variable that’s making the card unhappy but for the life of me I can’t figure out what it might be. We’ll try the drivers. If not then I’m at a loss this time. We’ve removed “bad” memory and now it’s happening again. It’s like cancer. If I cut one piece out it keeps coming back in different places. Very aggravating. That said, if it is the graphics card, I’d be in the unfortunate market for a new one. I can’t have this happening every 20 minutes. I have A LOT of Photoshop work to do this semester. So, since Gainward is obviously not going to be on the top of my shopping list, what do you guys recommend?
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You did just upgrade your video drivers, didn’t you?
I’d pin it on the software before the hardware, as it was rock solid prior to the last upgrade…
“You did just upgrade your video drivers, didn’t you?”
Yes, that’s why I said, and I quote… “It also could simply be a nVidia driver issue this time since I installed new drivers yesterday.”
“I’d pin it on the software before the hardware, as it was rock solid prior to the last upgrade…”
That’s what I was thinking too. I just put in an hours worth into NeverWinter Nights and it was just fine. I’m thinking Red Faction is just sketchy. I’ll have to wait for a patch to be sure.
The question still stands however: what video cards would you guys recommend based off of any news, good or bad, that you’ve heard?
I was in a hurry and just skimmed then commented. 🙂
heh, I’ve been out of that game for quite some time….
I’ve heard good things about the new radeons and the new GeForces.The only thing that is bad about the new GeForces is that they sound like a jumbo jet as they are being cooled. I think new models are coming out soon though…
The current GeForceFX cards arn’t worth the money, from what I’ve heard. ATI is currently the performance leader, but I personally don’t trust their drivers at all, but they seem to be pretty popular right now.
yeah, I hear that. ATI is supposedly doing good things, but I don’t think I can trust in their drivers. (and you think Nvidia is bad ;))
from what I know, you can do one of two things. if you absolutely have to have something right this instant, the winner is the ATI radeon 9700 pro. if you can wait. then wait another 6 weeks. that’s when the new hotness is out – the NV35 and a 256mb (!) version of the ATI Radeon 9800 pro. look again then, and then decide…
“…since Gainward is obviously not going to be on the top of my shopping list…”
like we’ve said, it might not be the HW, so don’t go blaming the manufacturer. I’ve had problems with nvidia cards and installing thier new drivers (and then downgrading) since the driver revs were in single digits. And if you look around, Gainward is at the top of the manufacturing lists with thier products as of late, including making one of the better GeForce FX cards.
Yah, I’m more or less convinced it’s a weird driver issue. I installed Postal 2 last night for no reason in perticular and it did the exact same thing. Then I played NWN for an 2 hours and everything ran as smooth as butter. I can’t figure it out. Red Faction and Postal are both FPS’ers but that’s about all they have in commmon as far as I can tell. Maybe they’re built off the same engine, but I doubt it. Volition seems rather guarded about their GeoMod engine. It just seems weird the new, relatively new, first person games crash instantly and everything else works fine, especially NWN. Oh, and I’ve dropped back to 41.xx Detonators and it didn’t help. I’m basically just really aggrivated at this point. I don’t think it’s hardware but I know it’s not an issue that will fix itself. Something needs to be done and I’ll be damned if I know what.