PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

[weekay]

Hi, sorry aboout my english.

I have PNY GF 6600GT graphics card which disconnects the signal after some time, approximately after 5 minutes, no matter if it runs 3D or 2D. In 3D-mode, image is normal, no corruptions etc. The card itself also looks OK.

I was wondering could it be that those Skywell capacitors would be broken? Since after the signal disappears, I cannot restart my comp immediately, I have to wait for some time and then the card works again and signal goes to the monitor? Capacitors need to be discharged?

If it is capacitor fault, is it OK to replace those two caps with ones found on spare motherboards I have, as long as they have same uf and voltage numbers? What things I need to remember? I have succesfully recapped motherboards but never graphic cards, I'm not expert in this thing, just curious

[shadow]

Re: PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

Have you tried another graphics card? Even if its a really crappy one, if that works fine than we know for sure that it is a graphics card problem. Maybe post a few pictures of the card and maybe your motherboard and power supply as well. I have seen dodgy power supplies cause all sorts of weird things. Possibly this is causing the problem.

[weekay]

Re: PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

Hi. I may later post pictures.

I have tried this card with two working systems:

Mobo: Asrock 775Dual-VSTA
Power: Aopen (+12V is 22A)

Mobo: Epox EP-8K5A2
Power: Macron 300w (+12V is 10A, I know Macron is crappy brand, however it is still working)

Both of these systems work well with other graphic cards, Nvidia MX440 and 6800GT. This card I got from friend who complained same symptoms which I can now verify. I have tried to downclock this card by editing and flashing new bios with lower core and memory clocks as well as lower core voltages, no difference. I also did provide addiotional cooling for the card and mainly the PCI-E / AGP convertor chip this card has, no difference. I have also checked the core and the convertor chips for cracks, found none, perftect condition, after checking I reapplied thermal paste.

[weekay]

Re: PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

The card looks like this:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...Pny_6600GT.jpg

I guess those two (or three) electrolytic caps could be the cause?

Values 330uf and 16v on those two bigger caps.
The "medium-size" cap has 560 and 4 (sanyo brand)
Tiny ones are 100uf 25v if I read correclty

[kc8adu]

Re: PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

skywell are known junk.
the sanyo are ok.
i would suspect overheating first but changing the skywell caps cant hurt.
bad caps can cause overheating esp the vrm.

[weekay]

Re: PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

Update to the situation.

I have replaced two Skywell caps with 470uf / 16v Rubycon. However, this does not change anything.

But here's one strange thing I noticed, I tried to run Windows XP dxdiag and I was able to pass DX 8 and 9 tests, but when testing version 7, nothing is shown on the screen. Strange. I tested couple times and result was the same.

I also tried to boot Ubuntu Linux, but after the progress bar got 100%, the screen would show many vertical stripes and flicker, monitor stayed on though.

[zandrax]

Re: PNY GeForce 6600GT AGP

@ weekay: no idea why your Geforce beahaves so strangely, but it's an hardware trouble at 99% because it hangs even on linux.
On nVidia forums there is a big thread on 6600GT and how to make them works. It's long because tries to cover almost all failure points: on your motherboards there are some common points: both psus are at (or below) the bare minimum power requirements and both motherboards employs Via chipsets, so be sure you read it twice, in particular the Bios settings, Via chipsets and Psu paragraphs. Try booting in safe mode too: Windows employs the vga driver which use only a small part of your card.

Zandrax