ATTN: 9700 Pro-Beating a dead horse-Lockups in games, Please read.

[Griffin McKorn]

Hello,

Currently I'm using my 2nd "Built by ATI 9700 pro card", the first
one I took back because my games were locking. Same deal with this
card, hard lock anytime the card is stressed (playing modern 3d games)
.. I've changed Mother Board, Sound Card, CPU (wanted to upgrade
anyway), Antec Power Supply, I've free'd up resources by removing all
my SCSI and Network drvices trying to get this card to work. I've
disabled FastWrite and have givin the card a stand alone molex power
connection. Am I missing something? How hot should these cards run
anyway? The heatsink and fan are very hot (which means they're doing
their job I guess), The little plate that sits on the back of the card
towards the back is untouchable hot.

Thanks for any advice.

Take Care,
Griffin McKorn.

Here's the Gear,

P4 3.06
ASUS P4G8X (HT Enabled, newest bios installed)
1 gig 333 ram
Promise FastTrak tx 2
2 WD SE 80 gig HDD
Audigy2 S/C (newest drivers installed)
ATI radeon 9700 Pro (Tried both cat3.5 and Omega drivers)

 

[Michael W Ryder]

Hello,

Currently I'm using my 2nd "Built by ATI 9700 pro card", the first
one I took back because my games were locking. Same deal with this
card, hard lock anytime the card is stressed (playing modern 3d games)
. I've changed Mother Board, Sound Card, CPU (wanted to upgrade
anyway), Antec Power Supply, I've free'd up resources by removing all
my SCSI and Network drvices trying to get this card to work. I've
disabled FastWrite and have givin the card a stand alone molex power
connection. Am I missing something? How hot should these cards run
anyway? The heatsink and fan are very hot (which means they're doing
their job I guess), The little plate that sits on the back of the card
towards the back is untouchable hot.

If it is too hot to touch it is too hot to run. I had similar problems
until I installed a slot fan in the slot below the card. I can feel the
heat in the air coming from the card when I am running the card hard.
Before installing the fan it would crash to the desktop within 5 to 10
minutes. Now it only does this if the game (Morrowind) raises the
temperature of the Pentium 4 CPU too high.

 

[Mark]

Try some fans and cool your card/cpu - use some monitoring software
(sometimes motherboard hardware manufacturer has software tools to check
CPU/Motherboard temps etc)and make sure your temps go lower.

 

[Andrew MacPherson]

The heatsink and fan are very hot (which means they're doing
their job I guess), The little plate that sits on the back of the card
towards the back is untouchable hot.

I bought a second hand 9700 Pro recently and the fan died somewhere in the
unpacking/install process (it might even have been a result of bad
handling in the post). Anyway, I didn't notice at first and the card was
fine in 2d but soon locked up in 3d. Now I have two (quiet) 80mm fans
cooling the card, one tied firmly to the front heatsinks, the other
balanced delicately on two plastic pens laid across the back of the card
at the moment... a highly professional solution obviously ;-)

Even now the card runs pretty darned hot, but the little metal plate you
mention is only "very warm" to the touch instead of "fry an egg". I'm
contemplating giving up on the quiet solution and getting some serious
80mm fans instead. This rev 1.0 Gigabyte seems to have very little
overclocking potential as it stands... not that I'm really bothered
though, it's plenty fast enough even with x4fsaa/x16aniso on permanently.

This may well change when HL2 or Doom3 hit the streets.

Andrew McP

 

[Griffin McKorn]

Griffin McKorn wrote:

If it is too hot to touch it is too hot to run. I had similar
problems
until I installed a slot fan in the slot below the card. I can feel
the
heat in the air coming from the card when I am running the card hard.
Before installing the fan it would crash to the desktop within 5 to 10
minutes. Now it only does this if the game (Morrowind) raises the
temperature of the Pentium 4 CPU too high.

Thanks Michale.

 

[Griffin McKorn]

How about case cooling? How is the air flow? I've read more than one review on the case design having a LOT to do with the cooling
of the components. Try taking the side off & putting a floor fan blowing straight on the mobo. If that works you need to find a
better way to get the air flowing through your case. Just plunking a bunch of fans inside may not be the trick.

Good luck!

Steve

Thanks Steve, I guess I need to start looking at better cooling
solutions.

 

[Griffin McKorn]

Try some fans and cool your card/cpu - use some monitoring software
(sometimes motherboard hardware manufacturer has software tools to check
CPU/Motherboard temps etc)and make sure your temps go lower.

Thanks for the reply.