8800 Ultra question.

[alienware]

Hey peeps. I have been offered a trade for an 8800 Ultra (EVGA) but one of the heads on the card only displays in shades of purple. Apparently the other head works 100%.

Has any one ever experienced this and is it card threatening?

Also, does any one know what would cause this?

TIA !

 

[alienware]

After thinking about this for a second (using my electronics experience) I would imagine the purple is coming about because of red and blue being mixed. So that means if these cards (I will need to look at DVI outs) work on the RGB philosophy that the green is not working. Which could be either a dry solder joint or a duff DVI socket.

Hmm.

 

[thestepster]

id skip it mate no sence in pissin about with a card that can be on its way out, out of curiosity what you trading in return?

 

[alienware]

Well here is the predicament. I have the Xonar D2X. It only fits in one of my motherboards and the only full length style PCIE is one slot below the top PCIE 16x. The xonar was completely free, of course.

It 'works' at the moment because I am using SLI 8600 GTS. Which aside from being noisy as they have those horrid little whirry fans the top one is getting REALLY hot as the Xonar totally blocks it. So either way to fit a dual slot card it is going to have to come out.

I only play Fallout 3 on that rig because I can play it in bed with my pad. Any otehr gaming is taken care of here.

Problem is the 8600s only have 256mb of texture ram. I have a 22" monitor and lowering the texture quality to meduim and lowering FSAA and Ani means that from where I sit when playing I can't make things out properly, it just gets too crappy.

I think I am going to do it tbh. It doesn't sound too terminal and if it lasts 6 months it'll be fine. It doesn't sound like an electonic failure to me, more of a problem with the physical port.

 

[alienware]

Oh also, I have the small PCIE card that comes dedicated to the Crosshair AND a PCI terratec. So I am not short of sound cards and TBH this Xonar is absolute rubbish for gaming..

As an example, in Fallout... Bingo bango bongo I refuse to go go go go go go AD AD ADA DA D (glitch glitch CRASH).

At which point the sample carries on looping until I disable and re-enable the card in system props.

 

[alienware]

Sorry, god I'm a dumbass... He's willing to do a straight swap for the Asus.

 

[thestepster]

y not sell the sound card and buy a fully functioning one? 8800gt's are easy to come across these days and u can get them for about £35 i have 3 myself

 

[alienware]

Dude this is an EVGA 8800 ULTRA. They sell for about £120. I need AT LEAST an 8800GTX in there tbh for the larger texture memory.

Apparently he has ran Furmark and etc for hours and it's fine. Which doesn't suggest the card is about to die (I mean come on with an Nvidia card that would utterly finish it off).

I just asked if the purple is a blank screen (which I will walk away from) or if it's working fine and displaying a purple picture.

Also he has linked me to his Ebay feedback and he has 521 100% positive feedback. Also he has answered my question with this -

Yes, there is burned pin on rgb or one leg of

multiplexor is burned, so the there is only green

text, green windows logo and green world around. I

would definitely resolder a new multiplexor if I

had one which I don't at the moment. The other

output if fine.

Indicating that the issue is way past the GPU ram and so on. It's literally the head and I won't be using it. That's fine with me as I only have one monitor. The Xonar IMO is a dead weight and of no use to me at all. It has to come out for the driver reasons, let alone nowhere to put it once it does..

 

[thestepster]

for £120 ppl would be best to spend there money on a lot better cards some of these old cards are so overpriced its unreal

but if you feel like u could handle the purple when playin games with it then go for it mate but personally id have walked away a while ago evga 8800 ultra or not

 

[alienware]

Dude, you're missing the fact that it's only one DVI port that is doing that. The other one is 100%.

TBH the 8800u is a very fast card. More than enough for the one game I will throw at it.

 

[tinytomlogan]

wouldnt touch it with a barge pole. Get a newer card mate. Much better of with a 260 or even a 285 for that money

 

[alienware]

That's the issue Tom I don't have any money. I do have an Asus Xonar that's utter poo for gaming.

Nothing ventured nothing gained I guess..

 

[Diablo]

The 8800 ultra is ancient, you could sell the Asus for £60 maybe and then get a 250gts which is a rebadged 9800GTX, which is faster than the 8800GTX or Ultra. The 8800 Ultra is power hungry, loud, hot and old. Sure its better than an 8600 but with a duffed up DVI port, its not a smart buy. Turn off the 3D sound on the Asus card, and fallout 3 will run better.

 

[alienware]

Hi Diablo..

Fallout runs better when I disable the 3D sound. However, I don't even know if I could call it better. It's terrible tbh. With audio and video it's absolutely faultless but in Fallout 3 it's a nightmare.

I only want a card for Fallout 3 as that is the only game I play there (on bed, under window, fans etc). It's far more comfortable than sitting next to this thing hehe.

I know I could sell the Xonar and yes, it would fetch £60. However then it's minus fees and I really hate selling on Ebay. So many times I have had people trying to skank me out of partial refunds ETC ETC. Paypal just does not protect sellers AT ALL.

Plus the Xonar is missing the link cable to the MIDI board which is a problem when you consider your target audience are music gurus. Seriously, it's a terrible card for gaming.

Plus this way I only spend £4 on postage. I get rid of a card that has nowhere to go if I use a dual slot card and if the 8800 works as described I will be more than happy. I just don't want to spend anything right now as things are tight and I am going away in August.

And of course, the Xonar owes me nothing and the guy that gave it to me said (when I asked him if he would mind me doing this) "Dude, can't you just put it on the floor and stamp on it and then smash it into small pieces?"

 

[Diablo]

The performance in Bethesda games (oblivion and FO3) made me get rid of the Xonar, and go creative, even thought the sound quality isn't nearly as nice.

For a trade, the 8800 Ultra isn't bad, but it will need more power and will be noisy. Just know what ur getting into is all I can say. If you remove the card wouldn't that achieve quite a lot of the objective (no sound loops or clippy sounds)

 

[alienware]

The 8800 u cannot possibly be as hot as the 280. Especially when considering my 280 was the XXX mental nutter edition.

Fan is the same right? that centrifugal thing.

The issue I am having started way before I fitted the D2x. I've only had that in there for about two weeks. The sound issue did not happen at all with my Terratec Aureon and with the Asus Xfi thing it crackled (common problem on most boards).

The issue is down to the fact that the 8600GTS are only 256mb. Fallout is brilliant on high inside the metros and such but as soon as you wander the wastes? it freezes in VATS for ages etc.

I have had a word with my mate who I co-ran an IT shop in London with many years ago and he said he can replace the failed component as long as I can get the replacement part. Little bit of history - this guy could braid off a DIMM port and replace it. He's what I refer to as an electronics animal haha.

Not sure I can get the part but TBH if it works as promised then it'll be perfect for the job in hand. And I still have the GTS and am £0 out of pocket should it fail.

Later in the year I can spend money but right now money is tight.

 

[alienware]

Oh and yes, I can lower the texture quality and disable HDR lighting and turn off AA and put aniso very low, but the issue then is I sit 12ft back from the monitor and everything becomes impossible to see. Quantum stops glowing and looks like an empty soda bottle ETC ETC.

 

[alienware]

Hehe, this is actually rather interesting

I spoke to my friend today and he said this -

It's an automatic switch, for want of a better description.

Imagine if you had a load of, er, robot cars that were in three lanes, but there were roadworks so everything had do go down the same lane. The multiplexer would filter the cars down into the one lane, and a demultiplexer would separate them out into three lanes again (the same three lanes as they were on) at the other end.

So basically I have a strong suspicion one of the Demux has failed. Price? 50p. And that explains (the three lane thing) why there is no green as one of them has obviously failed. Also he told me if the signal is fine at the point of mux/demux then the GPU and ram and so on are all doing their thing. I've looked over some massive board pics of the 8800u and I think I know where they are. they're 8 legged and thankfully on the back of the card near the DVI ports. Either that or they are on the heatsink side as there will be a pair of them. So either way they should be easily replacable

 

[Diablo]

Just bear in mind that soldering things on to the PCB is a great way to write off your card. The solder used in industrial settings melts at a higher temperature, and the heat needed to melt it is tremendous (more than a decent soldering iron provides).

On a side note, Asus really need to sort out the issues with the cards, it makes them useless for gaming.

Good luck with the replacement dude.

 

[alienware]

Removing things from a PCB is easy, you just need to use a braid and know the way to do it. Also, never use a solder iron that gets too hot as it will break off the traces on the board.

TBH if the card does what he says it does then I'll be happy. As long as one DVI works I'm good to go