To Flash or Not To Flash (that is the question)

[tazmo8448]

I have a Sapphire Radeon Dual X R9 280 OC edition that started giving me vertical lines in displays along with strange cursor artifacts. The card during a game shut down (orange screens with hi-pitched squeals) and after rebooting (restart) it would work fine for a spell then do the vertical line thing and crash the system. I tried to do an updated graphic driver install (ver18.9.2) but after trying several times it just would not install and only ran on the basic Windows VGA driver.

Would or could doing a bios flash maybe solve the issue? (I don't overclock anything btw) I know at this point it couldn't hurt anything; but was curious because I had a fan issue once with my Asus mobo (M5A99FX Pro R2.0) and doing a bios flash fixed that along with some minor boot issues.

 

[Law-II]

Hi

card is dead; replace it or if under warranty RMA

atb

Law-II

 

[Voluman]

It is dead. If you have guarantee then use it. If you wanna some experience/fun than flash

 

[king of swag187]

What kind of nonsense is this? Just because it can't install the driver doesn't mean it's dead yet, but it looks like the VRAM is failing

 

[Frogger]

after rebooting (restart) it would work fine for a spell then do the vertical line thing and crash the system.

If you can replicate the above on each restart ...... might be overheating .........otherwise it falls back on the Vram..

 

[tazmo8448]

yeah Frogger that was the first thing I checked was the temps (Speccy) and they were well within range around 60/70 C during a game...I even took it apart an re-pasted it with MX-4 which I've done before on a HD 6870, that still keeps on going (in fact that's what's running now)... I reckon with the Vram goes kaput that's all she wrote...grrr
have always had good luck with Sapphire products this would be the first to bite the dust...

 

[eidairaman1]

yeah Frogger that was the first thing I checked was the temps (Speccy) and they were well within range around 60/70 C during a game...I even took it apart an re-pasted it with MX-4 which I've done before on a HD 6870, that still keeps on going (in fact that's what's running now)... I reckon with the Vram goes kaput that's all she wrote...grrr
have always had good luck with Sapphire products this would be the first to bite the dust...

280s were known to fail.

Please take a photo of all white stickers on back of card and post them here.

Get a GPU-Z Screenshot and post it here too.

Also since you took the card apart, do it again and get a clear picture of the Information on the VRam modules.

 

[tazmo8448]

@eidairaman1 here are the three stickers on the back

top line should read: R9 280 3G GDDR5 PCI-E (CONNECTION TYPES) THEN DUAL-X OC WITH BOOST
2ND LINE: PN 299-8E249-M00SA

2nd Sticker A145100009543

not sure what exactly you're looking for when I take it apart, other than maybe those chip deals surrounding the processor that have rubber grommets???... can you clarify that a bit?

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/162073/sapphire-r9280-3072-140508-3

this is the exact model for reference if need be.

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/162073/sapphire-r9280-3072-140508-3

 

[eidairaman1]

@eidairaman1 here are the three stickers on the back

View attachment 107438
top line should read: R9 280 3G GDDR5 PCI-E (CONNECTION TYPES) THEN DUAL-X OC WITH BOOST
2ND LINE: PN 299-8E249-M00SA

2nd Sticker A145100009543

not sure what exactly you're looking for when I take it apart, other than maybe those chip deals surrounding the processor that have rubber grommets???... can you clarify that a bit?

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/162073/sapphire-r9280-3072-140508-3

this is the exact model for reference if need be.

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/162073/sapphire-r9280-3072-140508-3

Yes the black squares around the card

Yes the black squares around the card

Here is your card http://www.sapphiretech.com/productdetial.asp?pid=C4D1B443-6105-4A63-85DE-1732CC9C443D&lang=eng

 

[tazmo8448]

still trying to figure out what these pictures can do for the situation. now that it's apart an out of the computer taking a screenshot of GPU-Z is a tad problematic...but will do for what it's worth...
on to the photos....here are the two halves laid open......

 

[eidairaman1]

still trying to figure out what these pictures can do for the situation. now that it's apart an out of the computer taking a screenshot of GPU-Z is a tad problematic...but will do for what it's worth...
on to the photos....here are the two halves laid open......
View attachment 107440
View attachment 107441

Take a close up picture of one of the black squares surrounding the die itself, make sure the lettering on one of those black squares is clear so we can see it, it will help you to determine which bios files are compatible with that card because card manufacturers don't always use the same exact memory, it could vary from hynix to elpedia to Samsung. Card manufacturers do that to keep costs down

 

[tazmo8448]

okay looking at one of the 12 squares (chips?) they are black on black and extremely faint to the point that using a strong magnifying glass they are barely perceptible...
they have lightly stamped with as follows:
SKhynix
H5GC2H2H24BA
T2C 417A
i happen to have a copy of the .rom i made in June of last year from the GPU-Z program plus several copies made at that time using the bios numbers

 

[eidairaman1]

okay looking at one of the 12 squares (chips?) they are black on black and extremely faint to the point that using a strong magnifying glass they are barely perceptible...
they have lightly stamped with as follows:
SKhynix
H5GC2H2H24BA
T2C 417A
i happen to have a copy of the .rom i made in June of last year from the GPU-Z program plus several copies made at that time using the bios numbers

Can you please post the screenshot of gpu-z?

Can you please post the screenshot of gpu-z?

I believe you have one too many alphanumeric characters in the memory code that you provided earlier you gave us 12 characters the BIOS files on this website only have 11

 

[tazmo8448]

what I'll have to do is insert the card in the second slot...am now running an old HD 6870 to have decent graphics.....hopefully gpu-z will 'see' it in that second slot...

those numbers I gave you were even after going over them...see attachment for the copy of the OEM BIOS taken from GPU-Z's utility...changed the name from .rom and zipped it up...this is the original .rom file taken from the card itself.....

 

[eidairaman1]

what I'll have to do is insert the card in the second slot...am now running an old HD 6870 to have decent graphics.....hopefully gpu-z will 'see' it in that second slot...

It will you just got to select the right card

 

[tazmo8448]

latest version of gpu-z

driver version shown is for the main card running (HD 6870)

 

[eidairaman1]

View attachment 107444

View attachment 107445
latest version of gpu-z

driver version shown is for the main card running (HD 6870)

Ok im currently on a mobile interface so i cant view the .zip file.

 

[tazmo8448]

yeah it won't let me attach or download a .rom file either...you would think that type file would be a 'must' considering this site is the go to site for such things....

the $64,000 question is will a re-flash help the card....was here little over a year ago looking at bios's & rom's, tutorials an what not, because the card started acting up....the UEFI switch stopped working an some small things that had me thinking a flash may be in order...an as stated earlier i had some issues with a mobo that flashing it again straightened it right out.

 

[eidairaman1]

yeah it won't let me attach or download a .rom file either...you would think that type file would be a 'must' considering this site is the go to site for such things....

the $64,000 question is will a re-flash help the card....was here little over a year ago looking at bios's & rom's, tutorials an what not, because the card started acting up....the UEFI switch stopped working an some small things that had me thinking a flash may be in order...an as stated earlier i had some issues with a mobo that flashing it again straightened it right out.

How did the uefi switch stop working!?

 

[tazmo8448]

when I first got the card doing a bare bones build my OS was not in UEFI and would not POST with the button on the card depressed to activate UEFI boot mode (it would light up depressed) which is as it should be, then down the road (about a yr later) I converted the OS over to UEFI and activated the UEFI mode in the GPU for booting all was good til I did an OS in place refresh then noticed that the card UEFI button on the card would not activate an after several driver updates

 

[eidairaman1]

when I first got the card doing a bare bones build my OS was not in UEFI and would not POST with the button on the card depressed to activate UEFI boot mode (it would light up depressed) which is as it should be, then down the road (about a yr later) I converted the OS over to UEFI and activated the UEFI mode in the GPU for booting all was good til I did an OS in place refresh then noticed that the card UEFI button on the card would not activate an after several driver updates

Sounds like an operating system problem at this rate

Why are you using such old drivers?

 

[tazmo8448]

The fresh install was over a yr an half ago so it wasn't the cause of the card having issues and the driver that is shown as stated in an earlier post is the 15.7.1 Legacy driver for my 6870 which is being used til I obtain an newer card.

 

[tazmo8448]

Would like to post an update....with nothing to lose I took it apart again and baked the PCB at 390* for 9 minutes ... let it cool and crossing my fingers re-inserted it...to my amazement it actually worked again. No joke.

 

[Law-II]

Would like to post an update....with nothing to lose I took it apart again and baked the PCB at 390* for 9 minutes ... let it cool and crossing my fingers re-inserted it...to my amazement it actually worked again. No joke.

Great to see the vga card working once more, last card I baked just left funny smell in the oven, [*gentle advice] *save up for another vga card while it works; as these issues often reoccur.
atb
Law-II

 

[tazmo8448]

@Law-II you definitely have that right about getting another card....

I got this (R9 200 series) card doing my first 'bare bones' build that coincided with the July 2015 W10 release..as stated I 'retired' a Sapphire 6870 that did yeoman service, that still runs fine after 8 yrs.

First thing after the R9 bit the dust was order an RX 580...
my luck from the end of Sept to the first of Oct, the darn things jumped anywhere from 50 to 80 bucks in those few days.

Same thing happened back in 2013 when I was going to get a 7970 (in Sept it was a good deal) when I had the $$$ in Oct... they went up 200 dollars...just my luck to always be in the hunt for a card at the end of Septembers'