So I got this Dell XPS 420 with a 9800 GT in it.

Well, i started to get the blue screen of death that was video adapter related, and could still get the system up in safe mode but with all these verticle lines running up and down the screen.  Even going into BIOS or whatever it's called, and on windows load up, everything was garbled.  So I decided it was the card.

So for a quick fix I went and got a "Galaxy" GeForce GT520 cause I didn't know for sure what my power supply was and thought going for a 300w would get me up and going for the night (cause I have all my work on my main PC :(

But alas, I put the thing in and my monitor is just a black box.  No hint of any life.  This new card doesn't seem to need the 6 pin power supply that the 9800 GT had, but the fan is kicking away and everything.  It's a small card and as "far as I know" this XPS 420 is PCI-E 2.0 16x compliant and all like this card requires. 

Is there some compatibilty issues I'm not finding here??   

UGH, DAMNIT!  lol.  If anybody has any ideas it would be much appreciated.  Keep in mind I didn't know what half these things meant when I started working on this mess 8 hours ago!  10 years ago I was pretty adept but with work and all my skills are in complete disarray :( 

A quick look at the specs shows 3 PCIE slots: 1 16x, 1 4/8x and 1 1x. You sure it's in the right slot?

Besides that, do you notice any absence of HD or mobo activity? Does it post (beep) any differently than usual?

Are you sure that your monitor is set to display the proper input (dvi, hdmi, vga)?

Nothing much I can think of now right off the top of my head. Hopefully someone else has better insight.

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Originally posted by Sylvarii
About 4 years ago i had a dell xps 720 which had two 8800 gtx sli card set up and the same thing happened to me,blue screen with error code.It turned out to be the actual mother board,i had dell replace the cards and still got the same error if i had the sli set up.One single card set up was okay but i tested both cards and they both work in the single card set up.Think the mother board was a 580i or something.

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The BSOD said display driver, and you saw some graphical corruption. I can see where that would lead you to believe that it's the video card.

And there's a good chance your old video card was dead.

But there's also a good chance it's not the only thing that's dead. Good chance the motherboard is damaged, the RAM could be damaged, and the power supply is a likely culprit to have caused it all.

If you don't have a lot of spare parts laying around, you may be able to salvage it with a trip to a ~good~ mom and pop computer shop. Definitely not the Geek Squad or anything from any large retail chain though.

Indeed, well check this crap out,

So I put my old video card back in, booted it up, same old problem.

Restarted, and in the BIOS I checked and CAREFULLY noted that the system was indeed getting it's video from the PEG setting.  Which is what it should be for the new card.   (PCI Express)

I restarted with the intention of then shutting down, to put the new card back in, but found that I don't have crazy interference lines anymore...

As in things "might" be okay for now.   The system is using a standard VGA adapter for display so I haven't seen if things get crazy again when I reinstall the 9600 GT drivers.  I suppose I'll do that next in a bit.   Could there have been some dust or something that was fixed in the resetting of the card?

Next issue though, why didn't the new card work?

Wonder if I'm entering the troubleshooting black hole lol....

EDIT:  also I like what you brought up about the power supply causing the problem.  Actually, now that I think about it RIGHT BEFORE this problem happened with the verticile lines on the screen, my pc was unplugged.  I plugged it in, It fired up and shut down 3 times real quick in fast succession...  I thought "that was weird", but didn't give it a second thought till now.  Still interesting the verticle lines and garbled mess have gone away after like 2 dozen reboots etc.  And the second reboot after I reseted the original card.

Originally posted by Ridelynn

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Originally posted by Sylvarii
About 4 years ago i had a dell xps 720 which had two 8800 gtx sli card set up and the same thing happened to me,blue screen with error code.It turned out to be the actual mother board,i had dell replace the cards and still got the same error if i had the sli set up.One single card set up was okay but i tested both cards and they both work in the single card set up.Think the mother board was a 580i or something.

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The BSOD said display driver, and you saw some graphical corruption. I can see where that would lead you to believe that it's the video card.

And there's a good chance your old video card was dead.

But there's also a good chance it's not the only thing that's dead. Good chance the motherboard is damaged, the RAM could be damaged, and the power supply is a likely culprit to have caused it all.

If you don't have a lot of spare parts laying around, you may be able to salvage it with a trip to a ~good~ mom and pop computer shop. Definitely not the Geek Squad or anything from any large retail chain though.

UPDATE:

So, old card is back in, all 9800 GT drivers up to date and installed (which I did a dozen times before when the problem first arose), and everything seems back to "normal".   I booted up Oblivion and cranked everything up to absolute max and went out into a grassy tree area and everything seems to be okay so far.  The fan on the card slowly started to rev up as it tried to render shadows on grass and through trees etc.

But no graphical anomolies so far.  So lingering questions....

A: When I put the new card in I heard fan noises like I couldn't Imagine.  Even the main fan for the PC seemed to be in overdrive mode.  It's sounded like an air conditioner unit.

B: Could it have been a dust issue?  Got the vaccuum in there, it really needed it!

C: Why didn't the new card work?

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Originally posted by Sylvarii

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Originally posted by Ridelynn

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Originally posted by Sylvarii
About 4 years ago i had a dell xps 720 which had two 8800 gtx sli card set up and the same thing happened to me,blue screen with error code.It turned out to be the actual mother board,i had dell replace the cards and still got the same error if i had the sli set up.One single card set up was okay but i tested both cards and they both work in the single card set up.Think the mother board was a 580i or something.

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The BSOD said display driver, and you saw some graphical corruption. I can see where that would lead you to believe that it's the video card.

And there's a good chance your old video card was dead.

But there's also a good chance it's not the only thing that's dead. Good chance the motherboard is damaged, the RAM could be damaged, and the power supply is a likely culprit to have caused it all.

If you don't have a lot of spare parts laying around, you may be able to salvage it with a trip to a ~good~ mom and pop computer shop. Definitely not the Geek Squad or anything from any large retail chain though.

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You are talking to the wrong guy lol,did you notice the bit where i said 'about 4 years ago i HAD' not ive got.I was just giving an example to the original post on what happened to me four years ago with a dell xps 720,i have had two system since then.Think you mistake me for the OP.

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Nope, I was quoting you because it was an excellent example. I was speaking more or less to the OP though, sorry I failed to make that distinction.

Originally posted by loeslein

UPDATE:

So, old card is back in, all 9800 GT drivers up to date and installed (which I did a dozen times before when the problem first arose), and everything seems back to "normal".   I booted up Oblivion and cranked everything up to absolute max and went out into a grassy tree area and everything seems to be okay so far.  The fan on the card slowly started to rev up as it tried to render shadows on grass and through trees etc.

But no graphical anomolies so far.  So lingering questions....

A: When I put the new card in I heard fan noises like I couldn't Imagine.  Even the main fan for the PC seemed to be in overdrive mode.  It's sounded like an air conditioner unit.

B: Could it have been a dust issue?  Got the vaccuum in there, it really needed it!

C: Why didn't the new card work?

C: I had the same exact issue when I replaced my 8800 to a Gt520. Same exact issue...

I had to put it in 4 different times but it eventually worked, your guess is as good as mine.

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Originally posted by loeslein
UPDATE:
So, old card is back in, all 9800 GT drivers up to date and installed (which I did a dozen times before when the problem first arose), and everything seems back to "normal".   I booted up Oblivion and cranked everything up to absolute max and went out into a grassy tree area and everything seems to be okay so far.  The fan on the card slowly started to rev up as it tried to render shadows on grass and through trees etc.
But no graphical anomolies so far.  So lingering questions....
A: When I put the new card in I heard fan noises like I couldn't Imagine.  Even the main fan for the PC seemed to be in overdrive mode.  It's sounded like an air conditioner unit.
B: Could it have been a dust issue?  Got the vaccuum in there, it really needed it!
C: Why didn't the new card work?

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Hard to say to any of those questions. Gremlins, phase of the moon, solar flare interference, government conspiracy, alien probes, international spies - take your pick.

The new card ~should~ have worked. Your computer ~shouldn't~ have been doing a lot of crazy stuff that it was. But computers have a lot of complex inter-related parts, something off with one can have very unintended and strange consequences. It's likely that your computer will make a loud popping sound, smell funny, and then just not turn on one day, or it's also likely that it will continue to run fine for the next 10 years. It's not that it's impossible to know what caused it all, but it takes a lot of details and poking around, and without being there to see it, I don't have the expertise to know all the right questions to ask (although maybe someone else here does), and likely even if I were there in person I may not even have all the right equipment to figure it out.

I'm glad to hear that everything is more or less working now though. And that's the important part really.

Originally posted by Ridelynn

 

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Originally posted by loeslein
UPDATE:
So, old card is back in, all 9800 GT drivers up to date and installed (which I did a dozen times before when the problem first arose), and everything seems back to "normal".   I booted up Oblivion and cranked everything up to absolute max and went out into a grassy tree area and everything seems to be okay so far.  The fan on the card slowly started to rev up as it tried to render shadows on grass and through trees etc.
But no graphical anomolies so far.  So lingering questions....
A: When I put the new card in I heard fan noises like I couldn't Imagine.  Even the main fan for the PC seemed to be in overdrive mode.  It's sounded like an air conditioner unit.
B: Could it have been a dust issue?  Got the vaccuum in there, it really needed it!
C: Why didn't the new card work?

---

 

Hard to say to any of those questions. Gremlins, phase of the moon, solar flare interference, government conspiracy, alien probes, international spies - take your pick.

The new card ~should~ have worked. Your computer ~shouldn't~ have been doing a lot of crazy stuff that it was. But computers have a lot of complex inter-related parts, something off with one can have very unintended and strange consequences. It's likely that your computer will make a loud popping sound, smell funny, and then just not turn on one day, or it's also likely that it will continue to run fine for the next 10 years. It's not that it's impossible to know what caused it all, but it takes a lot of details and poking around, and without being there to see it, I don't have the expertise to know all the right questions to ask (although maybe someone else here does), and likely even if I were there in person I may not even have all the right equipment to figure it out.

I'm glad to hear that everything is more or less working now though. And that's the important part really.

Yes, I fully expect now for this thing to go up in a puff of smoke any second now. 

And definetly the thing that I thought was the weirdest, was how everything was all garbled up graphic wise on the monitor as soon as I saw the Dell spash screen and system boot up.

I mean I seriously have put 12 hours into this issue today, and the first 7 hours on countless forums led me to believe that the 9800 was FRIED. 

But it's still working.  And I've always kept my drivers up to date. I've always felt I've run a clean PC and get better performance off my Dell purchases every 4 years, than most kids who build their comp and let ITunes and pron/movie downloads run in the background for 4 weeks straight without a reboot.

BUT, tonight, after 3 1/2 years with this PC.  This 9800 GT's fan revved up like usaul when I started to require some graphics performance, but revved down SLOWLY after I exited back to Windows.

I can SWEAR it has never done that before.  When I was done playing most games in the past, I have ALWAYS had to shut off my computer, or do a restart, simply because I couldn't hear the TV over the fan, and I wouldn't want to wake my then roomates or girfrriend lol.

Originally posted by loeslein

UPDATE:

So, old card is back in, all 9800 GT drivers up to date and installed (which I did a dozen times before when the problem first arose), and everything seems back to "normal".   I booted up Oblivion and cranked everything up to absolute max and went out into a grassy tree area and everything seems to be okay so far.  The fan on the card slowly started to rev up as it tried to render shadows on grass and through trees etc.

But no graphical anomolies so far.  So lingering questions....

A: When I put the new card in I heard fan noises like I couldn't Imagine.  Even the main fan for the PC seemed to be in overdrive mode.  It's sounded like an air conditioner unit.

B: Could it have been a dust issue?  Got the vaccuum in there, it really needed it!

C: Why didn't the new card work?

The two biggest demons for PC's are memory and power.

A: Sounds like your new card is working too hard, possibly caused by other issues. You might consider some software which shows you GPU temperature. Average temp should be around 45-55C. If it goes over 70C+ I would be concerned.

B: Doubtful that it's a dust issue, would have to be pretty grubby to stop it from operating.

C: I'm thinking power supply (lack of it). New cards on the market need quite a bit of fuel to run. Or your BIOS won't support that particular card.

I'm not an expert, but I hope that helps a little. Glad to hear you've recovered your system

Cheers

The NVidia 520 is a very low end card, nVidia lists it's TDP at 29W. The 9800 GT (depending on the flavor) is closer to 125W give or take. The 520 is probably slower than the 9800 GT in the first place.

I won't say the power supply may not have been at fault, but it wasn't lack of power that kept the 520 from working. My best guess would be either BIOS setting or firmware incompatibility, or just not seated properly, but it's hard to tell what it was after the fact and not being there.

I have a 9800gt in an old system.  I went to play cox and it wanted the latest and greatest nvidia drivers.  Well, what a big mistake.  The temp on the card went up, screen got those overheating artifacts you often see then the system would do  an overheat shutdown.  Even youtube videos would have artifacts.  At first I thought it was the card as I wasn't using the system that much.  Turned out to be the new driver. Did a system restore rollback to before the driver update and the problem went away.

Maybe I missed it, and maybe it has nothing to do with it, but, did you use driver sweeper or some driver cleaning utility, after uninstalling old drivers, before installing the new ones ? For no other reason, perhaps , than to make sure traces of the old drivers are not causing a conflict with the new ones, to rule out that possibility.

op!dust and heat is computer worst enemy so once a season undust the thing up!and make sure all fan are working!

Originally posted by drbaltazar

op!dust and heat is computer worst enemy so once a season undust the thing up!and make sure all fan are working!

QFT

dust and heat can cause all sorts problems

an over heated psu or videocard can cause the inside of the case to heat up... then the cpu and ram and hdd heat up and then you have a nice little hot pocket going

and before you know it the hdd has bad sectors and the videocard is messing up or something has fried

goodluck

Another Update incase anybody cares.

So yesterday I started to get screen craziness again with the old 9800 GT. Since I work off this PC I started to shit my pants again and freak out etc. 6 more months I said to myself! I just want 6 more months out of this PC!

I never took that GT520 back, thought I would keep it around for backup cause I figured it would happen again. So I pop that sucker back in there and NOTHING. No boot screen, I don't even hear the beep when I mash F8. Just blank monitor. WTF. I scrubbed my computer clean of anything that would resemble an Nvidia driver and still nothing. Called support, they told me my motherboard was fried.

"Fuck you" I thought.

Went to best buy, returned the GT520, and threw down on a Nvidia Geforce GTX 550 TI, had my PC up and back to normal in like 15 minutes.

Not sure what the issue was there.  Crap "Galaxy" GT520 card, or my Dell only works with NVidia lol.

My only regret was maybe not going with the 2GB 550.  I went with the 1GB cause many people told me that because my PC is a Core 2 Quad  Q9400,  2.66 that I wouldn't get much performance gain out of the bigger cards. 

Two tests so far, Oblivions does seem smoother but hard to tell cause everything was basically maxed with the 9800GT, RIFT however a HUGE performance gain.  Went from pretty skimpy settings, to maxed out everything, and was still kicking over 30fps in crowded areas.  Game looks totally friggen different.

So hopefully it's case closed and not a power issue or something that's going to creep up again.  Got a hectic work schedule for the next 6 months so I won't be able to game much, but definitely psyched I'm getting a little extra punch out of this 550.

If you're so worried about memory capacity, then why'd you pick a card that mismatches the memory channels, and thus can't even put the full 1 GB to good use?

Regardless, since you seem likely to need to buy a new video card again in the near future, you really should ask first before buying something random.  I don't think I've ever seen a GeForce GTX 550 Ti at a price that makes it a good value for the money.

Originally posted by Quizzical

If you're so worried about memory capacity, then why'd you pick a card that mismatches the memory channels, and thus can't even put the full 1 GB to good use?

Regardless, since you seem likely to need to buy a new video card again in the near future, you really should ask first before buying something random.  I don't think I've ever seen a GeForce GTX 550 Ti at a price that makes it a good value for the money.

Yeah I didn't have the time.  When the 9800GT first went bonkers I probably spent 8 hours messing with that thing trying everything I could, looking at completely garbled safe mode screens, uninstalling drivers, switching over to that junk 520 and back and forth and so on etc.

Then session two the other day was a good 4 hours doing the same thing with two people telling me my mother board was fried.

I figured I could get some "closure" on the situation by just buying an Nvidia card that seemed to me pretty similiar in size, shape and power specs etc to the 9800.   If I spent the 12 hours and two + days of downtime working instead of messing around with all this garbage, and just went with the 550 quick fix, I could have made enough money buy two 550's and throw one in the garbage lol.

I'm prepared if anything happens again though.  A backup laptop and two fairly functioning 6 year old PC's that I know keep updated enough (learned my lesson) that if this thing shits the bed again I can live until a new one arrives in the mail.  It's just a huge pain the ass.

Plus in 7 days I actually go work in the field so this PC won't be used much till October. I just want to make it until then and, buy a new PC, and start fresh in the fall.