Geforce EVGA 6800 Ultra locks up - Is there a diagnostic tool available?

[PolishPaul]

So i've had this PC for a year now, bought it second hand, a pretty good build. The card is an EVGA Geforce 6800 Ultra with the latest drivers. I've always had a problem playing certain games where the PC will simply freeze looping the sound that was playing at that exact moment (usually a buzz or hum).

Now i've suspected many things about this machine, but i'm beginning to feel it is the video card. I've been working on hardware for a while now and i'm not a newb. I've ran mem test on my machine, HDD diagnostics, etc. I've noticed now while playing "company of heroes" that the graphics are glitching up. I've reset all my hardware and cleaned the contacts on the VC. Hopefully that glitch will go away but,

The game locks up eventually - It happened on games like BF2 (no longer), WoW (especially), and a few other rare ocasions. Especially on WoW and Company of Heroes.

My question is - is there a diagnostic tool that i can use to run the VC through some test to see if its having any problems? I mean other than dxdiag?

Temperature does not seem to be the issue here, and i have 2 separate 12V connectors (separate rails) connected to it that are not connected to other devices.

 

[SYL\X/3K]

czesc,
to me sounds like Temperature problem because i had similar problems with my ATI Radeon 7200. The fan failed and the Temps risen really high. check if the fan spins when the video card is running , What kind of Temperatures are you getting?
Try cleaning out the dust
Im also thinking about your PSU ?.... Test it out

 

[turtile]

It sounds like it is most likely a heat/power problem. Is the card overclocked? You could try lowering it to stock if it is.

Try monitoring the temperature at load and test out another card.

 

[PolishPaul]

i had a temp probe on it before and it was low... Cleaned the fan out while resetting the card. PSU is good, last PSU had the same problem (top of the line PSU's). I'm also beggining to think its a sound card issue as well?

 

[turtile]

Even if the sound card has trouble, it shouldn't effect the computer much at all.
Did you check the temperature of the video card while playing?

 

[PolishPaul]

yeah.. i had the temp probe on the heat sink.. perhaps i should find a more suitable location to test the temp. What's weird is that games like Vegas and others that are graphic intensive never lock up. Seems to be a select few.

I fiddled with the sound card settings but it only seemed to make it worse?

I'm also thinking there must be a HW conflict?... Any ideas.. this has stumped me for a while. Does anyone know of any diagnostic tools i can use on the VC to see if its behaving correctly?

 

[turtile]

If you want to eliminate the sound card, uninstall the drivers then the card (just drivers if onboard) and see if the problem persists.

Did you run memtest to check the memory for errors?

 

[PolishPaul]

Good idea, i'll try that. Yeah, i had mem test running overnight without any errors.

oh yeah, and czesc Sylwek, siemana!

 

[networkgeek]

you done a complete format and reinstall of everything lately?

if not I would suggest that. you might have some weird software corruption in the OS. happened to me one time. performance in games went down and didnt get better till I reformatted. then frame rates were way up

 

[FlashDude]

Why don't you just monitor the Temps with the Nvidia software. This sure sounds like a motherboard or PSU problem. Do you have another machine you can try the card in?