Graphic issue

My computer crashed last night, first there were loads of multicolored horisontal bars all over the screen (artifacts?) before the computer went over into bluescreen. Sadly I cannot remember what the bluescreen said, but it was related to the graphic card, it was probably 0x00000116.
I have a Nvidia Geforce 8800 gtx graphic card.
I first thought overheating, but I can detect no extra heating in the cabinet and all fans still work.

Ever since the crash, I can only start my computer in safe mode, whenever I try to start normally, the same artifacts? will appear as it boots, before going into bluescreen 0x000000116 with memory dump.
I have uninstalled and reinstalled the nvidia drivers, but that did not help.

After reading a bit about it, it seemed to be the graphic card that was the problem, so I ordered a new card yesterday, but today I read a bit more about it and saw a power supply issue or RAM issue could be the problem.
My pc skills are not that good, I hope the new card will fix it, but if not, how can I figure out what exactly the problem is?

 

Make sure your graphics card is clean and seated properly, and if it has a fan, that the fan is clean and spinning freely.
Also, turn it off at the wall for a while (a minute or so), just to make sure there are no issues there.
If you have more than one stick of RAM, take one out at a time and reboot, and see if that helps. If you only have one stick, see if you can borrow some.
Also try removing any peripherals you don't need for booting, such as a printer, USB stick, etc.

 

Do you have the most current drivers for the graphics card?

Chances are the graphics card is going out. My card would produce a ton of artifacts and it slowly went out.

 

The card is sitting properly, and it was not too dirty, I cleaned the fan a bit, but I got the same result when trying to boot. Also tried to remove one RAM at the time and boot, but I got the same result, artifacts all over the screen.

And to Baxter, yes I currently have the latest drivers from Nvidia.

So best chances are that it is in fact my graphic card that is dead then?

 

Graphics card is probably the most likely, although it runs OK in Safe Mode, which suggests that it's drivers or other issues. Do you have an integrated graphics card that you could try, just to test (you would see two separate monitor connections on the back if you did)? Or can you borrow one from another computer to try?
Have you had a look at your Device Manager (right click Computer>Properties>Hardware tab) to see if there are any issues highlighted there?

 

Doesn't safe mode use a generic video driver? I could be mistaken.

 

I was under the impression that safe mode used the built in generic graphic drivers in the motherboard?

Anyway, I took a closer look at the bluescreen, and it seems to be caused my a file called nvlddmkm.sys, which after reading a bit on the web, is a quite common problem. But I cannot find a failsafe fix for it. Any suggestions?
If there aren't any, will a new card solve it?

 

That's my point. If it works with the generic driver, but not with the nvidia driver, you would suspect it is a driver problem.

It looks like one of those tricky issues. High temperatures, RAM, drivers...
You might give the following a try, from:
http://forums.techguy.org/windows-vista/837500-nvlddmkm-sys-blue-screen.html

1. download latest NVIDIA Driver
2. Uninstall the previous version of the Driver & restart
3. once restarted install the downloaded drivers
4. Restart the system
5. Now you have to disable it from startup (type Msconfig in run Goto startup tab & uncheck NVidia option) (there are 2 options there)
6. Now start Services.msc from run command then find Nvidia Display Driver service & Stop & disable it from its properties
Restart the system

I don't think I would bank on a new card solving this problem... although it may use different drivers that work OK.

Hmmm... just thought that maybe a restore to before the problem started might fix it.
BTW, are you using Vista?

 

Right right right. My bad.



I would suggest you uninstall the nvidia driver. Restart. See if it pulls a generic windows driver. If the artifacts don't show then your driver is the problem.

 

I'm trying to uninstall the nvidia drivers in order to install my new graphic card, but every time I launch the uninstall program it leads to another BSOD, 0x0000008e this time.
Is there another way of deleting/uninstalling the drivers?

 

Yikes. Are you uninstalling it through Add/Remove Programs or Device Manager?

In Safe Mode :
Device Manager - Display adapter - Right Click on Uninstall and when the box pops up
check Remove Driver - see if you can update the driver now.

 

I have done both, through device manager it uninstalls without problems, but there is still a listing called Nvidia drivers in my add/remove program list that I cannot remove, it leads to the said BSOD every time I try.

 

After removing the driver in Device Manager did you restart the computer?

You might also want to run CCleaner if it still appears in Add/Remove Programs.

 

Just finished installing the new card, and everything works like a charm again. Still have the extra Nvidia driver listing in the add/remove list, but I might just try CCcleaner and see if it can clean it up

Thanks for all the input, seems as if it was my old card that was the main problem after all

 

Yeah, or the new driver for the new card is working correctly. :-D

 

Woohoo! Good stuff.:hyper
Don't throw out the old card though... as Baxter Stockman says: