Display Issue
We started the review process on this card quite a while ago after receiving the review sample from ASUS and began to put it through the usual paces. We noticed immediately that it did not cooperate well with our Dell 3007WFP monitor, where it produced a corrupted BIOS screen and green speckled artifacts within Windows. We went through basic troubleshooting steps before sending it back for replacement as we believed the card to be defective at that time. Of course, prior to sending the card back, we could not resist disassembling it and taking additional pictures for your viewing pleasure.
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Fast forward a few months later after receiving a replacement card from ASUS, with assurances that the video card worked fine. We plugged it in and fired it up to be met with the same issues that the prior card had. We tried a second Dell 3007WFP monitor and even a completely different system with a different motherboard, to rule that out. We believe there is some sort of compatibility issue specifically between the Dell 3007WFP monitor and this card, specifically when running via the dual-link DVI port at 2560x1600. Resolutions that only required a single link of bandwidth (whether over DVI or DP) did not cause any issues with our test equipment.
This is an extremely specific kind of comparability issue that only occurred with the Dell 3007WFP in dual-link mode at 2560x1600. Other displays worked fine, and the on board Display Port connectors also worked fine. Also, the DVI ports in single-link resolutions, 1920x1080 and downward also worked fine. So if you specifically have a Dell 3007WFP and are going to run it on this card at 2560x1600, you will have a problem with screen corruption. However, if you run on the Display Ports, or less than 2560x1600 on the DVI port, it will also work fine. We confirmed it is a display issue because when we took screenshots within Windows, there was no corruption at all, meaning the GPU was fine, it is strictly something after the RAMDAC that is causing interference in the display in that specific scenario.
We were still able to move forward with our evaluation and play games at 2560x1600.
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This is a photograph of the corruption you will see in that scenario when the computer is booting up.
We contacted ASUS again about the issue, and got a pleasant reply that ASUS is going to fine tune its custom design of its output configuration in future models which should resolve the issue we experienced.
We have been internally looking into the issue since you originally reported it. It has been difficult to duplicate as it looks to be sensitivity related and can be even impacted by variance in shielding of the cable and other factors. We have been able to resolve the issue with different cables. That being noted we have we worked and fine tuned the custom design of our output configuration. HQ is communicating the new design will resolve the issue you are experiencing with the current usage environment and cables you are using now. This new design will be the same one coming in next week.
When we get one of these cards we will test it and follow-up with confirmation that it is working fine on these displays.