FX5600 to 6600GT issues - rebooting

[Deedee]

My FX5600 was working FINE and I should have left well enough alone I suppose but I had a 6600GT sitting around and decided I might as well throw it into my Sims2 box and see how it looks. First thing I noticed was slow down, stalls/sticks/frozen, spikes of 3D materials all over the place and crashes that go immediately into system reboots! WOW! What have I done? More importantly, what can I do about it, anyone else gone through this? In windowed mode I still get the spikes and 3D mess and my neighborhood is mostly black but my system didn't reboot... I'd rather go back to good ole' full screen mode if possible though. Any help/ideas appreciated.

:lion:
Deedee

[bairy]

Can you put the 5600 back in?

If not/if you don't want to, try reinstalling the drivers. It might just be after the wrong ones. One of the latest sets of nvidia drivers is here > http://www.zen19389.zen.co.uk/7189.exe

[cat2cat]

Hello Deedee.
I just upgraded from an FX5200 to a 6600GT and I had some installation problems also. I only had a 250 Watt power supply and the Users manual say the 6600GT requires at least 300. I bought a new power supply and installed the latest drivers and now my system runs fine.

But before you go to all that expense I would check a couple of other things first. The 6600GT runs very hot and your problem sounds like it could be heat related. Early versions of this card were known to have fan problems, so make sure that the fan is running, and make sure it stays running all the time. I know it sounds stupid but check anyway. Also check the cards GPU temperature in Windows display properties. With Windows at idle mine runs at 58C.

I hope some of this helps.

[Deedee]

@bairy - I might just do that, LOL!

@cat2cat - I am pretty sure you're right on all counts as I've highly suspected exactly what you've described, just wanted it to be something else apparently, heh. Thanks for the backup opinion and moral support.

I used to live in Phoenix (Gilbert actually) so I learned a thing or two about overheating there, but even up here I gotta a/c my computer room as there's 8 computers in the one small room I just go in here to warm up sometimes, LOL! It was 10 but I've given up the one that did nothing but network some peripherals and another one died, so I have some spare parts I can maybe pilfer another PS out of the leftover stock and see if it helps, I agree it probably will too. There goes my lazy afternoon eh?

What's super annoying is that extensive testing using 3DMARK (http://www.futuremark.com/) (gaming benchmark tool) doesn't bring on any problems and no other game does either... just Sims2 *sigh* an annoyance and a mystery rolled into one I guess.

Thanks :lion:

[Deedee]

UGH - I upgraded from a no-name 300 that I was over-using with extra drives and fans, etc to an Enermax 535 and loaded up the game... then I sat back and enjoyed the lack of materials spikes and video delays... until my system rebooted itself.

Back to the drawing board. :(

[KKai]

1. Install your old video card back into your computer

2. Backup your files first

3. Install your new video card

4. Reinstall your OS :P