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hshtam
02-10-2008, 06:15 AM
I recently bought a Jap version of the XFX 8800GT 512mb Alpha Dog, but I found that as I played games for about 30mins, or sometimes last till an hour, the game freezes with tiny red or green dots spread across the whole screen. After about 5 sec of this happening the game completely freezes and nothing responds, plus the sound starts looping thus requiring a restart by the reset button.

I have tried 3 different version of drivers and it seems at the moment driver 169.32 downloaded from the XFX website seem to have suppressed this problem, but nvidia's stability test still crashes within 10 secs of it starting. I searched about this problem and it led me to this forum as there were quite a few threads about the same issue before.

Now I'm wondering how does the warranty work? Will I have to take the card back to the store, as I'm no longer in the country where I bought the card from although I can courier it to my relatives there to take it back to the store for me. But is there any possibility that I could send to somewhere closer to me (New Zealand), say Australia? or is this not allowed as the card is a Japanese version thus must be processed through XFX in Japan? I don't mind paying for postage to have the card RMA'd if I am required to RMA it.

Important thing is I have the receipt and everything, including box and packaging, still with me and I have also created a ticket on the xfxforce website describing the problem and asking them to advise me on what to do next.

mivanx77
02-11-2008, 04:38 AM
Well, if it is still in warranty, start an RMA, make sure quick before the warranty ends. That way you can get a video card, because I'm pretty sure that New Zealand doesn't not have the "Lifetime Warranty".

hshtam
02-12-2008, 12:52 PM
Well, today I tried running the nvidia stability test for each component separately. It showed that my CPU and Hard Disk are both fine, but as soon as I test any one of PCI-E Bus, GPU or Memory, the problem occurs.

Also hoping whether if someone could help confirm whether this is a software or hardware fault? From what I've seen through searching the internet of people who have similar problems, it seems like I have a faulty memory. Apparently if I underclock my memory this problem may be alleviated, should I try this?

sushrukh
02-12-2008, 02:22 PM
Can you try the memories & the GPU in another machine ? Also have you overclocked your system & which PSU are you using ?

Methious
02-12-2008, 07:57 PM
Usually pixelation after playing long enough to warm the video card up is due to a bad memory chip on the card. Or a bad memory chip controller. Open an RMA ticket and see what they'll do for you.

xfxsupport
02-12-2008, 09:36 PM
In your area I am not exactly sure how the RMA process will work but start a support ticket at www.xfxforce.com and we can get it over to the correct area to help resolve this.

hshtam
02-12-2008, 11:17 PM
unfortunately I don't have another system I can test the gfx card on, but I have not overclocked anything at the moment and also I'm using a Silverstone ST50EF-Plus PSU.

I have already started a ticket at xfxforce.com , so I'll try follow it through with that and see what happens.

Thanks for the replies guys