Is my graphic card dying or something?

[Derek12]

I was browsing in Chrome and then the screen froze, went black and received the display driver stopped responding ... this happened only once for now, I am using the latest drivers 296.10

Thanks

 

[Fourstaff]

Nah, if it happens once or twice, its fine, but if it happens regularly then its a sign that the graphics card is on its way to afterlife.

 

[JrRacinFan]

There can also be a few other culprits, hardware-wise, unstable memory/IMC. Dying PSU. Unlikely but possible a bad sata/ide cable can cause this. Anything that can also lead to driver corruption. If you're not getting it often, as in everyday often at a timespan between, then not too worry. It's just modern day electronics.

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

Occasional black screens are not of great concern. Occasionally drivers are somewhat unstable, but this is a reasonable circumstance given the amount of possible configurations (and various possible points of failure) a PC can have.


You should be concerned whenever you get multiple blue/black screens in a short period of time. Continue running the computer as usual, and start getting concerned only whenever you see a blue/black screen more than once in a week (assuming that there aren't known stability issues with your drivers, which generally isn't a problem with mainstream graphics drivers).

 

[Stry]

Hey, signed up just to post this to ya bud. Its a known issue with browsers that use your GPU, which are pretty much all of them these days. Its usually because your clocks are too high, or too low coupled with your voltage, and it causes the drivers to crash, and reset.

If you're using nVidia, make sure you use Driver Sweeper, and clean out as much of the remnants of your older drivers as you can.

I switched to Chrome, and haven't had the issue since. Whether thats from updating the drivers or not, I don't know. But it never hurts to take preventative measures. Also, versions 19 and 20 of Chrome (the beta and dev versions) are pretty stable, and I find them a lot faster than 16, or whichever is the mainstream.

Ofcourse, its beta software, so, I mean, you get the good with the bad.

Hope this helps. If you can, give your idle voltage on your gpu a slight bump up, but from what I've heard, it involves some bios flashing, which, is a warranty voiding monster, so stay well away if you're not willing to take the risks. But do the easier stuff first.

I still get these, but its because my card doesn't haven't enough Voltage, so, just give it a little bump, and its good to go (when I'm trying to push the card, its stable now )

 

[Derek12]

Thanks to all, yeah I was a bit concerned (before reading your replies) as this was the first time I've received that error without overclocking. I played a bit after the error and it worked fine, if the problem reoccurs I will try what Stry suggest, as I've updated the drivers on top of the older ones

 

[Laurijan]

A graphics test with the program OCCT with error check on would be wise too to see if the card is dying.

 

[Fourstaff]

A graphics test with the program OCCT with error check on would be wise too to see if the card is dying.

If its the PSU which is dying the OCCT will kill the PSU, I wouldn't really recommend doing that.

 

[Derek12]

Many thanks, I used OCCT and no errors in 1 hour w/checking for errors and shader complexity 8, is that enough time?

 

[Laurijan]

Many thanks, I used OCCT and no errors in 1 hour w/checking for errors and shader complexity 8, is that enough time?

imho yes

 

[Derek12]

If its the PSU which is dying the OCCT will kill the PSU, I wouldn't really recommend doing that.

The PSU *seems* fine but I can hear a high pitched noise (I don't know if it comes from the PSU or CPU area but it's NOT the fan) only and ONLY if the computer is idle, when I put some load on CPU the noise disappears, is that normal?
Thanks!

 

[Protagonist]

I was browsing in Chrome and then the screen froze, went black and received the display driver stopped responding ... this happened only once for now, I am using the latest drivers 296.10

Thanks

You're card is not dying, this is an issue i believe caused by Nvidia drivers since the 285 BETA and WHQL, many Geforce users who own 400 or 500 cards some cards started having this issue since the 285 drivers and gradually the issue become less as they released newer drivers, note before the 285 this issue never used to be there. I have used my GTX460 1GB since August 2010 and it never used to have this issue till i updated to 285 BETA drivers then To WHQL the issue be come less, by the time 290 Drivers come it never used to appear i thought it was fixed but then it appeared once on the 290 and once on the 295, 296.10 and now I'm on 301.24 BETA and it appeared once after like 2 weeks after i installed the 301.24 BETA has never appeared again. But with the 285 it used to appear like weekly when surfing the web using Mozilla, all the times it has ever appeared is when surfing the web using Mozilla. it has never appeared when gaming or doing any other thing apart from surfing the web.

 

[Laurijan]

The PSU *seems* fine but I can hear a high pitched noise (I don't know if it comes from the PSU or CPU area but it's NOT the fan) only and ONLY if the computer is idle, when I put some load on CPU the noise disappears, is that normal?
Thanks!

Roll an A4 paper to a tube and use it to locate the source of the whining.

 

[eidairaman1]

Ive been hearing quite a few reports on this from the BSOD, to freezes, to pink squares on screen to blank screens all of a sudden. its a Quality issue with the drivers.

You're card is not dying, this is an issue i believe caused by Nvidia drivers since the 285 BETA and WHQL, many Geforce users who own 400 or 500 cards some cards started having this issue since the 285 drivers and gradually the issue become less as they released newer drivers, note before the 285 this issue never used to be there. I have used my GTX460 1GB since August 2010 and it never used to have this issue till i updated to 285 BETA drivers then To WHQL the issue be come less, by the time 290 Drivers come it never used to appear i thought it was fixed but then it appeared once on the 290 and once on the 295, 296.10 and now I'm on 301.24 BETA and it appeared once after like 2 weeks after i installed the 301.24 BETA has never appeared again. But with the 285 it used to appear like weekly when surfing the web using Mozilla, all the times it has ever appeared is when surfing the web using Mozilla. it has never appeared when gaming or doing any other thing apart from surfing the web.

 

[dorsetknob]

a high pitched noise

sounds like you got a capacitor on the way out somewhere

common symptoms for Imminent capacitor failure are swelling / leaking /high pitched whine/noise
your have to look at your components very carefully

Failing capacitor could be on motherboard or video card or inside your PSU
you could swap out graphics card then PSU to see if problem lies here
Hope this may be of use to you

 

[Derek12]

Thanks to all
@st.bone: I've installed 301.24 now, hope this will be fine, I will report if another incident happens (probably being beta drivers)

@Laurijan: Tried, seems that are both the PSU and CPU VRMs I will take out the PSU but I am now lazy

@dorsetknob: The motherboard and video card caps are physically fine (they are all solid), but I will take a look at PSU's ones now