Windows 7: Games crash immdiately - ATI 4870 - Windows 7 x64

Hi All,

I've been googling this for a week now and found people with similare problems but none are exactly what ive been experiencing.

I have the RTM of Windows 7 x64. Fresh install. I'm running and AMD Phenom x4 9550 with a Sapphire ATI 4870 512 (not OC'd on either).

Windows 7 runs everything except for games. (especcially steam games).

After installing the OS, and latest drivers for the 4870 (9.8), I chucked on Steam and Left 4 Dead. Tried to run L4D, and got a warning from the Steam client saying my drivers werent up to date... even though they were. I continued anyway. Got past the menu, opening screen, went to go pick up ammo and then the screen went blank and made a .5 of a second sound loop (kind of a buzzing noise from the speakers). the PC was completely unresponsive, needed to hard reset.

I checked the event viewer but logs contained no errors (like the PC just had the plug pulled on it.). Tired running steam as administrator with xp sp2 compatibility, this time the game wouldn't make it through the level intro (ie not pre-rendered movie before the menu, the in-game gfx movie after menu before you start playing) before crashing again.

it does this with EVERY steam game. I installed Assassin's Creed (non-Steam version) and had the same issue. However, I seemed to be able to resolve this by putting the game into xp sp2 compatibility and run as admin. So I thought perhaps that while steam is running as admin in xp compaitibility , L4D wasnt. So disabled the UAC and tried again... no luck either.

other thing's I've tried:
- manually setting the fan speed of the 4870 to 100% and took side off of case in case it was being caused by overheating... no luck.
- Rolled back to 9.7 catalyst drivers, no luck.
- Tried running Steam games thru XP mode (with virtual PC, NOT xp compatibility settings). No luck.

Same problem occurs each time, with any steam game (only tried assassin's creed as non-steam games go). 1 or 2 seconds into the game (beyond the menu and into actual game play), system locks up, blank screen and sound loop. Need to restart PC.

All these games worked perfectly under Vista x86

Write down any important bios settings, then reset the bios to factory defaults. Then try.

Could also be your power supply is too weak since you didn't mention which one you have, although I doubt it.

Hi Heretic.
welcome to SF.

have you tried adding "-DX9" (minus quotes) to the launch options for L4D?
in some cases, i've read that doing this helps with some issues.
if you dont know:
right click on -gamename- icon in the steam, games window. hit properties, then Launch Options, and add that command, and Apply.

Vavle's games arnt optimized for directx 10, or 11 for that matter. so it's necessary for some games to be setup that way.

hope it helps.

##########SOLVED#######################


Don't ask me why this worked... I yanked out the card, started up the computer, left it for 10 mins whille a grabbed a bite to eat, turned off the computer, plugged the card back in, restarted. Everything appearsto be working again...

peculiar. i wouldn't have though of doing, that. as it makes absolutely no sense. but, hey. glad it fixed your problem.

perhaps the card was not seated correctly and all it needed was to be re seated?

I know, pretty thin... I just hate Unsolved Mysteries

Did you update DirectX ?

Download details: DirectX End-User Runtime

I have the exact same problem with the same OS and GPU in L4D. Would like to try a different solution besides pulling it out of the case.

Have you tried yanking it out and it failed? Or would you just prefer to try something else?

I researched the problem for weeks and came up with no answer. Let me know if you do find anything tho.

I'd rather try something else but since you didn't find another way for that long I might try your method.
I also have a 4350 in my computer but I don't really want to have to play L4D with all the textures on low at 800x600, lol.