New Graphics card?

[Dogz]

Hello everyone, I am experiencing on some of my games a sort of lag and the screen will flash purple and then resume. Is this a problem with my graphics card or something else entirely. If it is my graphics card what should I upgrade to to replace my Nvidia GeForce 8600 GT. Also in Microsoft Flight Simulator X the Driver failed for some reason causing me to reboot.

 

[smarteyeball]

Have you recently updated any video drivers, game patches - started playing new games?

Or has it suddenly started to occur with the same games, same drivers etc?

if you've updated your drivers, try rolling back to a previous version.

If it's the latter, it could be the card is on it's way out (have you tried monitoring it's temps with GPU-Z ?)

The card itself it could be overheating due to dust build up, thermal paste degradation, age etc

Another factor could include:

Motherboard is failing.

PSU is starting to fail (judging by the specs, the machine is several years old and has a generic Power Supply that came with the case?)


If it's the card, there will plenty of others that will recommend a replacement card. But keep in mind that if it's a generic PSU, it's most likely a low wattage / AMP so any high end cards would be out of the question without upgrading a few other components as well.

 

[Dogz]

The drivers have been updated and it is only with a particular game the but I don't want upgrade the mobo yet. although maybe Ill get a new PSU. any suggestions? The mobo hasn't let me down at all yet.

 

[Kirsch]

Your card should be sufficient to run the game on Medium Settings. Possibly try lowering any anti-aliasing to see if the game runs better.

If it is only having problems with that specific game, before dropping a couple hundred bucks mess around with the graphics settings.

 

[Dogz]

I found this PSU on Newegg it should be enough. Newegg.com - COOLER MASTER RS-400-PSAR-J3 400W ATX12V V2.31 Power Supply

 

[Dogz]

Your card should be sufficient to run the game on Medium Settings. Possibly try lowering any anti-aliasing to see if the game runs better.

If it is only having problems with that specific game, before dropping a couple hundred bucks mess around with the graphics settings.

I will try that.

 

[smarteyeball]

Well, if it's game specific - the good news is that it only a driver issue. No need to spend cash when the h/ware is okay.

 

[Dogz]

Great!!