Quake3World

ok, so about 3 weeks back my computer starts randomly locking up. Full stop hardcore lockup. eventually i get irritated and update my drivers for everything and still getting the lockups. So i have to reboot and eventually the comp turns on (fans are moving hard drive's chuggin) but no POST, no beeps, nada. try once more, same thing. I grumble and start taking out bits of hardware, when i get to just my vid card and hard drive i pull the vid card. restart and the POST makes plenty of noise. I replace all other parts besides the vid card and POST still occurs.

I pull out my 6800, grab my 9600XT and stick it in, everything boots fine. crap. So i get my card replaced and try it and i get the same POSTless nothing. Stuck my roomate's 5700 in to see if it was an ATi/nVidia thing and the 5700 worked. checked the BIOS nothing touches AGP speeds or voltage. I've had the 6800 since Aug 04 so it's not exactly old. So i got two questions:
1) WTF could cause/fix this?
2) barring another solution, my roomate and i are going to do a mobo exchange since my 6800 works in his mobo. will XP bitch and force me to reinstall if we do this? The changing hardware would be Video, mobo, CPU and RAM (RAM can be swappped if this would prevent a reinstall).

thanks for any help i can provide more info as needed.

powersupply is getting older, running hotter, therefore not putting out enough/stable juice?

try cleaning your powersupply out really well first.

shadd_. wrote:powersupply is getting older, running hotter, therefore not putting out enough/stable juice?

try cleaning your powersupply out really well first.

My bet is on the PSU too.

tested the PSU (tried my friend's 550w) and got the same result, tried cleaning too, no change

Flash
Bios
Newest
Version

Tormentius wrote:On the off chance test the RAM with Memtest. Also make sure the secondary power connector is hooked up on the 6800.

secondary power is connected, if it isn't it REALLLY whines. and test the video card's RAM? the 6800 DOES work in my friends motherboard

haven't flashed the bios yet, i need a bootable floppy and apparently my floppy drive is fucked. so i'm going to install another and try that.

Tormentius wrote:On the off chance test the RAM with Memtest. Also make sure the secondary power connector is hooked up on the 6800.

memtest came back clean

so um...yeah...my computer turned off and wont turn back on. seeing as the other PSU didn't solve the Vid card problem ima try that again to fix this.