Monitor suddenly crapped to hell and back

[Shyria Dracnoir]

So I was about to boot up TF2 this evening when my computer's display suddenly had a spaz attack. I've tried a system reboot to earlier (I had installed a game a few days ago that was only technically rated up to Vista) but it doesnt appear to have helped. I'm currently posting from my laptop with some pictures taken of the desktop display. Is this a problem with the monitor or a deeper problem with my system? It seems a lot more serious than Aerozord's problem he had recently because this is affecting things like window sizes and my desktop layout.

http://i212.photobucket.com/albums/cc230/Shyria_Dracnoir/DSC00327.jpg

http://i212.photobucket.com/albums/cc230/Shyria_Dracnoir/DSC00328.jpg

[Seil]

It's possessed. You need an old priest and a young priest.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Please be serious, I'm honestly freaking out over this. I've done a system restore, I've unplugged it, dusted everything and plugged it back in but nothing is working. I have no clue where to begin troubleshooting and if I do end up having to do something like replace my video card I have no idea where to begin looking for a decent one and how to make sure I'm not getting ripped off.

[Seil]

'Kay, I'm thinking that this has happened unexpectedly, so I assume you didn't install anything or spill anything on it or whatever. From the pics I think it's a PC. (It's really dark, and I've been drinking.)

The best I think I can offer is to right-click on the desktop and hit 'Display Settings.' I know from experience that if it's a hardware issue, then hitting 'System Restore' won't do anything. The good news is that if it's really something hardware wise, you can probably hit a thrift store or hit a friend into getting you a test monitor on the cheap.

If you want to common-sense it, you should make sure it's a hardware thing or a wanky virus thing. Get a new monitor and hook it up - if it runs normally, it's a wanker. If it runs fizzle dizzle garble dee, it's a virus thing.

However, you didn't mention anything in the OP about anything, so I'll assume it's a hardware thing, ie. new Monitor.

(ie. Thrift store time.)

[Shyria Dracnoir]

I tried messing with display settings. It says my resolution is stuck at 640 x 480 even though I know it used to be higher (it says the recommended is 1366 x 768). Unfortunately I can't test the monitor thing right now since I only have this one and I doubt my TV will be able to substitute. Feeeeck.....

[Krylo]

Most likely your video card is fucked.

[Meister]

Your resolution and colour depth got reduced to the basic minimum and you can't change settings. Well, that doesn't happen in the monitor hardware. If you can, hook up the monitor to the laptop and see how the picture comes out, it should be perfectly normal.

I'm thinking video card drivers. Try reinstalling and/or updating those. They should have come on a CD with the computer, or you can usually find them on the manufacturer's website.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Thing is, I replaced the video card that originally came with the computer because it wasn't running Steam very well and the drivers all appear to be updated for the card (Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX) but it's still crapping up. I'll try hooking the monitor to the laptop, but I'm not sure what will happen.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Alright, I plugged the monitor into the laptop and it seems to be working normally. Guess it is the video card that's crapping up.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers hasn't helped.

[Krylo]

A system restore should have reverted the drivers anyway.

In other words as I said before: Video Card = Fucked.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Blugh.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

On review, maybe I didn't uninstall and reinstall the drivers properly. Doing another system restore to try and get a better look at things.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Bluuuuuuuuugh, I hate technology sometimes.

Fuck this, I'm going to trawl the school forums and see if anyone can give me some resources on buying a replacement card.

[akaSM]

Try unplugging the card, cleaning the contacts and the slot and plug it back again. You can use a (damp) cotton cloth to clean the contacts of the card.

For the slot, compressed air would be the best option but, you can also do it the old NES way :3. Just try to keep your saliva in your mouth, not the slot :P

If the card's fucked up, you won't lose anything by trying.

For the suggestions on graphic cards, you'll need your processor model (right click in whatever My PC is called now -> properties) so that you don't end up getting a card that's too powerful for it. Nothing bad will happen if you do but, you don't want to get a card that could be bottlenecked by your processor, do you?

Also, getting over 2GB of VRAM in the card is overkill. You would need a extremely powerful card to use that amount of VRAM. So, if you find a *brand* card with 2GB of VRAM and another card, the exact same model with 3GB of VRAM, go with the cheaper one.

As for an actual suggestion, the Radeon 6850 is quite powerful and not that expensive, it should be around 150 USD at Newegg.

You can take a look here (http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_list.php) for some benchmark results. Even though (artificial) benchmarks don't really reflect daily usage, that page has also a cost/performance ratio for the cards, which is nice.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Processor model is AMD Sempron 140 Processor.

[akaSM]

Well, that was unexpected O_o

Your processor has has a similar performance to my desktop processor (a 3GHz Pentium D)

Here's (http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/316789-33-best-graphics-card-sempron) a thread I found about cards that would go nice with your processor. Remember to check the prices of the stuff they post, take the Radeon 6850 as a reference for price/performance.

EDIT: Also, take a look at your old card's performance, in case you don't want to get something that's less powerful than it. Just have in mind that in your old setup (sempron 140 + 8600 GTX) the card was most likely being bottlenecked by the processor. Even the slightly more powerful Pentium D bottlenecks it.

[akaSM]

Hmm, it seems the Radeon HD 4670 is a nice card for that processor, it's cheaper (around 50 USD) and won't get bottlenecked by your processor. This card is nice if you'll get a new PC sometime in the future.

So, I got 2 recomendations:

Radeon HD 6850

Pros:

The best high end graphics card that has a reasonable price
You can use it in a hypothetical new PC you could get, saving you a latter upgrade, making it (sort of) futureproof

Cons:

Is't kinda expensive compared to the other option
It WILL get bottlenecked by your current PC's processor


Bottomline: get this if getting a new PC is within your plans, you'll see it's true potential with that new PC.


Radeon HD 4670

Pros:

It won't get bottlenecked by your current processor
It's cheaper (around 1/3 of the other option's price)

Cons:

It's not as powerful as the other option OR your old card


Bottomline: get this one if you don't want to spend a lot of money or you'll keep using your current PC for a long time. The card's not bad, I could run TF2 at 720p @ 60fps in high settings with my laptop which had a weaker card (a Radeon HD 3670).

Then again, my laptop had a better processor but, you should get a performance similar to what you had. Remember, your PC's bottleneck is the processor, not the graphics card.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Getting a completely new PC isn't really an option at this point and I doubt I'll get another before something happens to really make this one obsolete, so the Radeon 4670 looks like the best bet.

[synkr0nized]

Based on those screenshots, I'd wager that's definitely a fried video card / failing video card. My mother's laptop a few years back was a model that was poorly designed inside and used cards that were prone to overheating.

Since it's your desktop that's at issue, at least for you replacing the card is waaaaay easier and useful. For me, since I took that laptop off her hands to mess with it when she got a new machine, I found that fixing the card and replacing it were both temporary "solutions", as neither addressed the real problem [the card/laptop design and cooling].



You have a Sempron: your machine is obsolete. :P
But yeah I'm seeing 4670 cards for around fifty bucks (US), which is a good price for a good value card, I guess. Just take a look at Newegg, for example, and sort video cards by a price range you are fine with to see what your options may be: e.g. 50-75 dollar cards (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007709%204026&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&Order=RATING&PageSize=20).

But if you trust sellers on Amazon here's an 8800 GTS for just over sixty dollars (http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-GeForce-8800GTS-PCIe-Video/dp/tech-data/B000KFWFHG/ref=de_a_smtd). Also in that search I linked on Newegg some GT 430 and a 520 Fermi cards are competitively priced with that Radeon. In my opinion these are all better cards than the Radeon 4670.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Ordered the 4670 a little while ago.

[akaSM]

Now, while getting something more powerful for a bit of extra cash is usually nice, I don't think Shy should do that now. Since she will keep this PC for a while, a bottlenecked (by the processor) card would be a waste of money and performance. Again, I had 60 FPS in TF2 with stff on the highest settings (except for AA and some other numbery setting) at 720P. This card is better than the one I had.

[synkr0nized]

Clearly it doesn't matter, as the purchase was made, but all I did was note the price of a card very similar to what she already had (forget the specifics of GTS vs. GTX) and the presence of better cards around the same price as the 4670. I mean listing two cards is hardly giving a person an idea of their options, or so was my thinking by linking to multiple options. *shrug* GDDR5 over GDDR3 and faster core processing and memory speed for only ten dollars with the potential to serve as an HTPC card or something in the future sounds like a good deal to me.

In general, I would say that replacing the CPU and snagging a nicer card is the way to go for folks that have single-core machines when possible to avoid the bottle-necking issue.

[akaSM]

In general, I would say that replacing the CPU and snagging a nicer card is the way to go for folks that have single-core machines when possible to avoid the bottle-necking issue.

You should consider this too, Shy, or at least start saving some money so that, whenever you need a new PC, you can have it as soon as you want it ;)

As for unlocking the core, that's another option but, the last time Shy tried to do something with her PC (setting a TF2 server) it didn't end nicely o_o

OK, now the 2nd part of my previous reply (I was getting late for college >_>)

Hey Synk, it's nice to see you here. When it comes to PCs I'm always looking for your or Skweeb's posts :3

Actually, I only had those 2 choices because, I was looking for a GPU some time ago, I even asked for help here IIRC :P. Since her and mine processor are quite similar, I thought about telling her about one card that would be nice nice for that processor (i.e. one that wouldn't be bottlenecked a lot/at all), and another one in case she wanted a new PC.

BTW, I didn't buy a GPU because, now my mom and sis have replaced watching TV with watching videos on the internet so yeah >_>

[Krylo]

It's also worth noting that CPU bottlenecking a GPU isn't as easy as 'this CPU will bottleneck this GPU', nor is it always the case that the CPU is the bottleneck (though that's usually going to be the case with a single core machine).

It really depends on the games and the settings. Some games with some settings put a much higher load on the GPU than the CPU basically moving the heavy work around. Turning on anti-aliasing, shaders, etc. will put more load on your GPU and allow you to get more out of a high end vid-card even with a mid-low end CPU.

And, again, it varies based on how the game was optimized. There are some that show no difference in FPS with a high end GPU going from a 3.00 GHz to overclocked into 4.00 GHz. Edit: And others that show an incredibly steep performance boost at certain points.

[synkr0nized]

Yeah, I'm not convinced there's any hard and fast way to quantify just how much of a GPU is wasted due to bottlenecking or things like that on a general scale.

I may have overreacted to your post, akaSM, after having interpreted it as a bit hostile, and posted argumentatively, and for that I apologize.




Core unlocking is so neat, to me anyway. It's like a little game home builders get to play, gambling that they can spend less for additional performance. It requires a motherboard, though, that can do it, so in this case I don't think it's really relevant advice (so I left it in the subject line :D). When I stop living off graduate student moneys I would love to toss together some rigs and try to test my luck. But then I'd have the problem of having to find buyers for them or uses for them. I already have too many computers.

I guess I have to also hope they still produce their chips in such a way that the chance for stable cores still sittin' around remains a possibility.

[akaSM]

what Krylo said about games

Yup, optimization can help a lot. My laptop could run Serious Sam HD TSE at a nice framerate at 1080p with highish settings; the same laptop choked on Blur at 720p with medium settings :/

Yeah, I'm not convinced there's any hard and fast way to quantify just how much of a GPU is wasted due to bottlenecking or things like that on a general scale.

I may have overreacted to your post, akaSM, after having interpreted it as a bit hostile, and posted argumentatively, and for that I apologize.

Core unlocking is so neat, to me anyway. It's like a little game home builders get to play, gambling that they can spend less for additional performance. It requires a motherboard, though, that can do it, so in this case I don't think it's really relevant advice (so I left it in the subject line :D). When I stop living off graduate student moneys I would love to toss together some rigs and try to test my luck. But then I'd have the problem of having to find buyers for them or uses for them. I already have too many computers.

I guess I have to also hope they still produce their chips in such a way that the chance for stable cores still sittin' around remains a possibility.

Don't worry Synk. If my post seemed aggressive towards you, I'd like to apologize :).

And yeah, there's no way to know how much will a certain CPU bottleneck a GPU.

While I trust NPF for advice, I don't know about whatever place Shy may go and look for the card, and I didn't want Shy to have the same experience I had some time ago.

When I was looking for a GPU, I went to a place with lots of small PC related stores, there was one of them that sold a nice variety of GPUs so, I went to ask for prices and stuff. I was interested in a Radeon HD 3650 (it should have the same power as my laptop's 3670, was available around here and not extremely expensive) but, that guy kept offering me a Nvidia GTX 560 (one of the top cards) because "games depend more on the GPU than the CPU" (which is true, in most cases) and it didn't matter if I had an old (Pentium D) processor. That guy even showed me a presentation about how better was it to get a higher end card, compared to a higher end processor (again, true). Now, while the guy had true facts about the things he was telling me, he ignored one small but important detail:

My PC is really obsolete. A high end card would do me no good with a PC that cannot have more than 1GB of RAM, has an old processor and is quite old; at least not more good than a mid range card :/

I love to tinker around with PC and other things. The only thing I've overclocked (AND undervolted :D) was a phone, and it was awesome :3. If I cannot get the laptop I want (the american dollar has been wonky lately), I'll try to put a good rig together :3