I have recently put together the following New PC: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3 (rev.2.0) Intel CORE2 Duo E8400 XFX GeForce 8800GT 512MB ‘Alpha Dog Edition’ (PV-T88P-YDF4) Kingston DDR2 800 (KVR800 D2N5/1G) x 2 Western Digital ‘Caviar’ SATA2 160GB HDD Satellite SL8600APFC 600W ATX2.2 EPS I first started and configured the rig with an ECS 8800GT which worked great (12,068 3DMark), unfortunately it had been damaged in transit and i exchanged it for the XFX. when i installed it and switched on i got a 'scream'sound -seemed to be coming from the HDD. I reseated the card, reset BIOS to Failsafe and installed latest NVidia driver; all seemed well. Made some small changes to BIOS - Got 11,860 3DMark and started to play COD4. After 20 mins the game froze (with repeating sound) I switched off, checked there was no overheating - all was cool, waited, then when switched on I got nothing on monitor, but HDD was on and POST beeps indicated Video or Monitor fault. Tried reseating stuff, changed monitor etc but no joy. It is now with technician but they seem unable to find problem. When they get it running it crashes as soon as they try a game or graphics test. Your thoughts guys PLEASE.
It could be a faulty graphics card again, however, I'm looking at the power supply. I have never heard of Satellite, and if I haven't heard of a company that makes PSUs, it's a very bad sign. I'd try exchanging it for a decent unit like a Corsair HX 520W - even if it doesn't solve your problem, it will prevent big issues later.
Hi sammorris, thanks for answering. Well first the PSU is made by Soly Tech see reviews; http://www.guru3d.com/article/solytech-sl8600eps-600-watt-psu-review/ http://reviews.pcapex.com/power_supply/solytech_600w_power_supply.php its branded Satellite here in Brasil (where the Corsair products are not available - and everything imported costs a fortune!) I hadn't seen the later pcapex review when i bought!! What I can't understand is why the XFX card screamed and refused to give anything but minimal graphics until i made the BIOS and driver changes when the ECS card had been working great at those settings? I didn't mention - but the first XFX card i tried I returned as faulty straight away, without changing the BIOS and driver, and the ECS card i had been using worked fine when i put it back?? What do you think caused the the 'scream'?
My HD3870 has a warning sounder on it, for which 'scream' would be a good adjective - the only time it's gone off for me was when I left out the power connector - so it stands to reason that it isn't getting proper power - as to why the other card didn't scream, put it this way - I've had two HD3870s, and only one of them had a beeper on it. Hope this helps Oh, and yeah, that Solytech that got awful reviews? All I needed to know was this sentence. "...and also saw the word "Deer" stamped along the side of the circuit board, my hopes for this power supply were significantly lowered." If you see that brand name anywhere on a PSU, run away, run far away.
