New graphics card

Strut6569

I am having a "black screen of death" issue. 90% of the time it is when playing ESO. Sometimes it will run for 1 or 2 hours. Sometime 30 seconds, then poof!
I searched the forum and found this was an issue back in 2014, 2015 and seemed to be due to driver issues.

One of the symptoms put forward was high temps in the GPU. I am running HW Monitor and am not showing any high temps at all.

My GPU is a Sapphire AMD Radeon R9 390X, if that helps. I get no messages or crash reports from the game or the system (Win 10).

I am pretty sure the GPU is bad, but no way to prove it. I am looking at replacing it but am not real happy with the prices! The equivalent card is more than I payed for the whole computer in the first place!

Any advice or suggestions for replacement cards that are reasonably priced (US$250-US$500) would be greatly appreciated.

Elsonso

You could try a stress testing program, like FurMark, to test the card before you go and spend a lot of money replacing it.

Other things to consider would be whether the power supply was overtaxed, or possibly be in need of replacement. Also, sometimes connections get oxidation in them and simply need to be unplugged and replugged. You might try reseating the video card and reconnecting the video card power. Make sure you unplug the computer and ground yourself before reseating anything.

Strut6569

Thanks! I will try your suggestions and post back here with results.

Septimus_Magna

Ive played ESO for a couple year on a GTX 1080 and that was doing fine in 1080p, for 1440p I would advice something stronger. ESO is heavy dependent on the CPU so dont expect massive changes with a different GPU.

votan73

@Strut6569
First I you check if the fans still spinning. Than cleaning from dust.

Oldaraness

Septimus_Magna wrote: »

Ive played ESO for a couple year on a GTX 1080 and that was doing fine in 1080p, for 1440p I would advice something stronger. ESO is heavy dependent on the CPU so dont expect massive changes with a different GPU.

Hi! I always read that ESO is dependent on the CPU... I saw there are several options on UserSettings.txt can improve the job of our CPU... but tbh I never understand if these options working for true or not. Anyone can tell me more about this?
I speak about: SET MaxCoresToUse.4, SET RequestedNumJobThreads and SET RequestedNumWorkerThreads

Thank you very much!

Strut6569

votan73 wrote: »

@Strut6569
First I you check if the fans still spinning. Than cleaning from dust.

My next step! Thanks! Also Elsonso's suggestions to pull the card and clean it, as you suggest.

My temp tonight, just as it crashed, was 136F. A friend says that is not too high a temp. Rebooted and it was still 114F. (sorry, I don't do metric).

Thanks all for the feedback!

I'll post results.

Elsonso

No. 136F is in the 50-60C range and should not be an issue. If it gets up close to 200F, start to worry.

Strut6569

Thanks to all! I will be pulling, inspecting, and cleaning the card this weekend and post what I find.

SirAndy

My trusty old GTX 1080 Ti runs ESO just fine all day with all settings maxed.

Not sure what you have to shell out for one of those these days though.

Elsonso

SirAndy wrote: »

My trusty old GTX 1080 Ti runs ESO just fine all day with all settings maxed.

Not sure what you have to shell out for one of those these days though.

I think I saw someone selling one on Amazon for around $1500

aetherial_heavenn

The problem at the moment is that all computer chip related things are very expensive (highest they've ever been) due to international component shortages, so you maybe better waiting to replace either GFX or the CPU. Also digital coin mining has also bumped the prices of GFX cards though the roof.

Meanwhile as suggested, cleaning, checking fans, reseating and pasting may all be a cheaper solution.

Heads up! be careful running GFX stress test benchmarks: some will cook an older GFX card.

I was running an nVidia 670 until last year, which is about the same vintage as yours I think. I just had to run on lower settings and be prepared to miss some animations.

Thinking laterally, perhaps older locally sourced second hand gaming PC that has in it an older GFX card and is within your budget maybe a short term option if your card is actually failing, at least until new GFX and chip prices prices come down. Then you would know it's ok if it's in a working PC that you can check, unlike going the 'refurbished' GFX cards online option. You could also 'mine it' for other parts like power supply, extra fan etc.

Schattenfluegel

You can run ESO on Extreme on a GTX 1070 SC. This Game shouldnt be a Problem for a R9, your Temps are in a normal range, worktemperature :P. It would be more critical at 90 ℃, and even then it will be running. A Graphiccard is throttling down at 100-110℃, to secure the Hardware. It will automaticly reduce the tactrate.

Other Thing, what CPU do you have?

ixthUA

A lot of GPUs have factory overclock, which may be unstable. You can use MSI Afterburner to check your GPU core clock if it's default at 1050 MHz. If it has higher frequency (overclock) - it may be the source of the problem.
Also GPU chip transistors age with time, requiring higher that default voltage to operate, but more voltage means more heat, and GPU may start throttling.
If GPU core is at default frequency and crashes still hapen - it may be memory corruption, in which case replacement is needed.

etchedpixels

If you are comfortable doing it then - try the graphics card in a different machine and/or borrow and swap the graphics card with one from another system and test first.

That kind of system death can be many things and you risk buying a $250 graphics card to find out your CPU cooling is flaky, your CPU needs reseating, your RAM needs reseating or has a dodgy memory location, your motherboard caps or buck convertors are dying, there's a hairline pcb crack and so on.

SirAndy

Elsonso wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

My trusty old GTX 1080 Ti runs ESO just fine all day with all settings maxed.
Not sure what you have to shell out for one of those these days though.

I think I saw someone selling one on Amazon for around $1500

Strut6569

Other Thing, what CPU do you have?[/quote]

AMD Phenom II 1090T

Strut6569

Strut6569 wrote: »

Other Thing, what CPU do you have?

AMD Phenom II 1090T[/quote]

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