GeForce 6800 Ultra freezing!! *resolved*

[Laza]

OK I've tried this:

- Modded a PNY ultra BIOS with ultra voltages to same GT stock 2D/3D speeds (350MHz) and 500MHz mem
- Moddd the ultra BIOS further to use GT voltages (less heat, the ultra voltages were pretty hot)
- Raised AGP voltage 0.1V in my motherboard's BIOS
- Threw out my SB Live! soundcard and used SoundStorm insead (got a few more fps from this)

None helped thought :/ The ultra BIOS didn't give the same freezes, the screen went blank and finally just went into power saving mode. But the card was so hot I lowered the voltages back to GT levels. But the 2d/3d clock sync thing didn't help the crashes. Actually nothing did, I still have them :-(

Now the last thing I can think of is:
- New PSU (current one ,350W HEC, gives 12V@18A 5V@33A 3.3V@28A, should be way enough)
- Wait for a BIOS update from PNY (they never release them though but maybe someone can get one)
- Wait for new drivers or a fix to this

Damn it really sucks! The card gives a nice performance but no stability =/

 

[RampantAndroid]

Hey, check out my latest post, try using powerstrip...it mods you BIOS for you, it worked for my 6800 ultra! I hope this is enough to help you people...

 

[LukFilm]

I'm running PNY 6800GT on Dell PowerEdge 400SC with 250W no problem, so you PS *could* be the culprit.

 

[RampantAndroid]

sorry, but a 560W Thermaltake truepower isnt going to give my videocard problems!

 

[Laza]

Update:

Tried yesterday with my friend's 430W Antec TruePower. It works! No stuttering, no crashes, no graphical glitches anymore...damn..seems a PSU with a 20A 12V rail is a minimum requirement.

 

[AssyrianKing]

yeh im glad you found the problem. I love my PSU , i'd say nothing comes close 2 it or its features. plus has a great 5 year warranty! with swap replacement so u get a brand new one instead of waiting for repairs. and its got 2 individual 12v rails with 33A each.

If your considering a top PSU for your high-end system or are an overclocker you should consider this on top of all, esp with its adjustable dials for your voltage rails for overclockers.

OCZ PowerStream PSU

 

[RampantAndroid]

Personally, I prefer my Thermaltake 560W, it has enough power, and the rails dont fluctuate and it has PFC.

 

[pzwovr6]

I'm also using an Asus V9999 Ultra Deluxe 256MB card, and having freezes during Doom 3 with the default 425/1100 overclocked settings.

I managed to avoid freezes and blue screen shutdowns by changing the OC settings to 420/1000 using the SmartDoctor utility. I was able to play Doom 3 for 2 hours without any crashes, but still had minor hangs/freezes when certain events would occur during a level (but which only lasted about 5 seconds then cleared).

I cannot get this card to run at default OC settings, and I want it to run at default settings since that is what I paid $880 for. I am very wary of messing with the card's BIOS so I have tried using COOLBITS2 to make the same changes to the 2D and 3D clock speeds. Is this accomplishing the same thing as editing the 6800's BIOS?

After changing both the 2D and 3D clock speeds to 425/1100, Doom 3 still freezes but I also got a new form of crashing this time. I get a screen full of like brown and white jagged lines, horizontally across the screen and the system and monitor just stay frozen like that.

Do I really need to flash the BIOS? Does COOLBITS2 accomplish the same thing?

How do I find the BIOS file in my computer for this card (not one on the 'net, but the one I have installed) ? I looked for .rom files but only saw a few in system folder with no recognizable names (bios1, bios4, etc.).

 

[RampantAndroid]

pzwovr6- yes, software like powerstrip and coolbits (never used coolbits) does alter your bios for you...hence, you can alter the bios, and then remove the editing software and not loose your changes.

The reason these hang ups occue, is that when the card swtich from 2d to 3d (doom 3- elevator door opens, or the loading screen switches into the level) the card moves from its 400 mhz clock to its 425 mhz clock, and thus draw a lot of power to do so...sometimes enough that it will cause a freeze (even my thermaltake 560W causes freezes) However, dont use Doom 3 to judge your card, as it itself is very unstable...download the patch for doom to start out.

Also, if you overclock your 2d settings, beware, your temp could jump 5 degrees C easily...mine did, and I'm using a coolermaster pratorean case (not that great for cooling, at least not like a SOHO Tower) I'll be upgrading my fans ASAP to account for the temp jump.

Hope this helps

 

[pzwovr6]

I discovered the issue with Doom 3. I needed to click on "No Overclock" option, instead of setting the overclock settings to the default 400/1000. Apparently that is not good enough, and the overclock software/bios causes the card to crash with Doom 3.

I'm running Doom 3 now with High Quality video enabled and using 1024 x 768 and it's amazing! I've just played for over 2 hours and only had one slight freeze, like you mentioned, but only at the start of the level when I first started the game. Since then I've not had any freezes or pauses whatsoever.

 

[Laza]

Argh the problem wasn't solved after all.

Tried

300W HEC (12V@12A)
350W HEC (12V@18A)
Enermax EG365AX (353W, with a whopping 26A +12V rail)
Antec TruePower 430P (430W, 12V@26A)

Same problems with all of them. Occasional 5-10sec pauses, sometimes a complete hang. (sound starts looping in the background, sometimes the system responds but veeeeeery slowly)
I tried using both internal Soundstorm sound and my PCI SB live.
I also took out the thermal pads on the card and replaced the goo with arctic silver.
Also modded a ULTRA BIOS file to sync 2D and 3D clocks.

No difference.

Today I gave up, flashed back the original GT BIOS to my card, and got an updated BIOS for my mobo (A7N8Xdeluxe 1.4). Also trying the newest forceware (66.93). I will report if I can get any more information.

 

[RampantAndroid]

OK, a few questions:

1. Did you try powerstrip? It eliminates the need to manually alter your BIOS, in fact, using an 6800U bios on a GT, I am surprised your card still works...so try powerstrip.

2. What game to you lock in? Doom 3? If so, try a different game, a newer one that uses heavy 3d graphics, and see if it locks there...if not, well, Doom 3 is a game that eats all videocards alive, or dead.

3. How do you have your card set up? Did you give your card its own power rail from the PS? Or did you put fans and HDs on the same rail?

Let me know...

 

[Laza]

Yeah I've tried RivaTuner and coolbits. BTW these are softmods so they don't alter the BIOS in any way (hence the word softmod), freq. settings are read from the windows registry upon startup.

An ultra bios can be used on a GT just fine since they are 100% identical chips. I just edited lower clockspeeds (didn't want to overclock just now) (350/500MHz)

I've tried with nvidia demos, Tribes:Vengeance and Doom3. Probs with all of them.

Yeh I use dedicated power connectors for the card. Also tried to unplug as many other devices as possible and raise the AGP and GFX card core voltage a notch.

 

[RampantAndroid]

Ive never used the ones you mention...powerstrip alters the speeds, I know that for a fact....

 

[Rhagz]

probably mentioned before.. i had the same problem.. try disabling fast writes in your bios, it solved my freezes in 3dmark0x

 

[RampantAndroid]

Actually, I find that fast writes improved my 3dMark scores....for all those who don't know what fast writes are, they allow your proc to send data directly to you video card, instead of first caching it in your system memory, and then going to the video card...obviously, your system has to be failr fast to be abloe to handle this, and some videocard/mobo combinations dont work so great with this....I have an A8v with a 6800U and it works like a charm....

For Laza...upping the AGP volt wont do any good, it isnt the voltage that matters....it is the wattage...and AGP uses the motherboard's 12v rail, which is already supplying all PCI, memory, proc and such.....thats why you need seperate rails for your videocard, plus upping the voltage will only make in run hotter, and introduce even more problems...be careful with that.

 

I?ve read all the posts in this thread, and applied it to my situation. It worked like a charm! I?ve been experiencing random lock-ups and reboots with my Asus V9999Ultra Deluxe card when running Tiger woods 2005 golf game. I download powerstrip from cnet downloads. When I ran it, it showed that my card was running 3D @ 425MHz / 1100MHz, and 2D @ 400MHz / 1100MHz.

So, with the powerstrip utility I moved my 2D setting up to 425MHz to match my 3D setting. It?s now running like a charm. I?d like to thank everyone for their input on this issue. You just cannot get this kind of support from a helpdesk!

 

[RampantAndroid]

Glad to hear that someone else used powerstrip finally....so, yes it does alter your card's BIOS...so, hopefully, this can be the end of this thread with that....

 

[Laza]

No, it doesn't alter the BIOS, it only sets new clock frequencies. I will try the thingy with Powerstrip also, can't see what difference it makes compared with a BIOS flash or RivaTuner tweaking.

 

Check out this link as to the Bios alter question?
http://www.entechtaiwan.net/fo...a9c55b72433794694e8bc9

 

[RampantAndroid]

OK, so from what I gather from HK's post, I was wrong in thinking that powerstrip got the BIOS....it doesnt seem RivaTuner does either, it only does the system registry...so, if overclocking/downclocking doesnt do it, I'd say get DetonatorDestroyer, wipe your drivers and put the new ones back on....then, check out your power supply, and make sure it isn't running hot (the card) after that, I'd say either it is your proc, or memory, or maybe even lots of stuff you have running in the backround (use msconfig to get that crap)

Also, you never said....where do you find these problems?? Doom3? If so, go try a different game, doom 3 is unstable.

 

[randomx]

I have an MSI Neo 2 Platinum and recently got a PNY Geforce 6800. I was having problems with the game hanging in all DirectX 9 games... UT2004, Doom 3, Far Cry, etc. Nothing drastic, just pausing for 10-15 secs. every 30-45 secs. Frustrating. After updating all drivers, reading this thread, and checking Nvidias recommended bios settings, I found the problem. In the bios, I turned off the Fast AGP write, set the AGP speed from its default of "Auto" to "4X8X", and set the AGP aperature to 512MB. (Nvidia says to make it half of the system RAM, but there was no option to set it to 1024MB)

Result: everyting so far runs extra smooth.... Try it out, its a quick fix.

 

[Laza]

I'm still fighting this problem. I tried downclocking also but it still freezes and stutters as before, even if maybe not so badly. Also, keeping the comp. case open seems to help things so the next thing I'll try is to make a new heatsink for the GPU. The warranty is void anyway since I took away the thermal goo and replaced it with Arctic silver.

Damn this, why isn't it being fixed?

 

[Rhagz]

fast writes is the source of this problem in 95% of the cases.. you take no (maybe 0.3%) performance on todays systems, and the stability increase is enormous..

here is something you can try, go to your video settings under troubleshooting and unchech write combining (disable it) and see if that helps.

 

[RampantAndroid]

for one, the GT heatsinks are pretty wimpy....go ahead, if the warranty is void, I'd do it....also, disable fastwrites, max out the apeture, and try getting better case fans...thats what I need to do for my coolermaster case.

Good luck...try getting a diff video card, and try running that in your comp, or see about running your 6800 in a different comp to see if this is really due to your video card (I doubt it is your vid card at this point0

Also, you can use the nVidia console to see your card's temp.