Legit Reviews

hey i dont know if this topic has been covered yet but i looked through the forum and didnt see anything.... anyway here goes

i bought a Radeon 9250 - 128mb yesterday and ive been playing counterstrike 1.6 using steam... now the problem is when im trying to pick a server the comp will freeze up for a second and then my screen will go blank and then it comes back.... and it keeps doing that every so often... i downloaded some new drivers but its still doing it... any idea what the problem is?? once i get into the game its fine... the error report says VPU Recovery has reset your accelerator card as it was not responding to graphics driver commands

hmmm...maybe is isnt in all the way or something...(i really have no idea what the problem might be...) try totally reinstalling it. take the card out, clean the drivers off. start over. also, check to make sure that everything is recongizing it. like your display properties. Thats all i can think of.

sounds like it may be something with steam. because when it is in the server list, it isnt using any hard GFX like Direct3d or opengl. I know its a pain in the butt to reinstall steam and all the games, but if it gets to the point try reinstalling steam. If not, try your ram too. if oyu have multiple sticks of ram try one at a time.

make sure you have also update your games.

well i know the card works... it was recognized and it runs the game pretty sweet but i dunno whats up with the black screen

ah well... thanks for your help ppl

chromium2006 wrote:hey i dont know if this topic has been covered yet but i looked through the forum and didnt see anything.... anyway here goes

i bought a Radeon 9250 - 128mb yesterday and ive been playing counterstrike 1.6 using steam... now the problem is when im trying to pick a server the comp will freeze up for a second and then my screen will go blank and then it comes back.... and it keeps doing that every so often... i downloaded some new drivers but its still doing it... any idea what the problem is?? once i get into the game its fine... the error report says VPU Recovery has reset your accelerator card as it was not responding to graphics driver commands

What are your specs?
It sounds like your PSU is not powerfull enough!
Could also be an overheating issue....Does the GFX card have a fan on the heatsink? The heatsink may not have a good contact with the GPU on your card....

AMD SEMPRON - 1.8 GHZ
512 DDR
not sure what the MB is ( ill need to take a look at the invoice )

i dont think its overheated.... i mean i just got it yesterday and when i play games it runs perfect... well it did... then errors starting happening during gameplay... didnt close the game just caused an error and then i went back and resumed play... if i was still alive

should i talk to the guy i bought it from and ask him wtf ?

Welcome to LR Forums by the way!

Try uninstalling the drivers, then use ATI's uninstall utility to make sure all driver files are gone...
If you had a Nvidia card b4 this card, then use driver cleaner to remove any remaining parts of Nvidia's drivers....Then reinstall your latest ATI drivers...

Also try disabling "write combining" (r-click desktop/properties/settings/advanced/trobbleshoot)
Also if you have the option in your Bios, Disable "Fast writes"
Neither of theese increase performance, or at least by verry little..can help with stability!

To be sure it's not a heat issue, leave your side door off the case, and if you can get a fan to blow on or near the GFX card even better.... then if it's still the same after some gaming it could be driver/game or hardware prob....

kenc51 wrote: Also try disabling "write combining" (r-click desktop/properties/settings/advanced/trobbleshoot)
Also if you have the option in your Bios, Disable "Fast writes"
Neither of theese increase performance, or at least by verry little..can help with stability!

Whats that stuff and what does it do? or atleast try to do?

bigblockmatt wrote:

kenc51 wrote: Also try disabling "write combining" (r-click desktop/properties/settings/advanced/trobbleshoot)
Also if you have the option in your Bios, Disable "Fast writes"
Neither of theese increase performance, or at least by verry little..can help with stability!

Whats that stuff and what does it do? or atleast try to do?

Fast writes is supposed to allow data to move via your AGP port by bypassing your system ram.....It will only give you an extra 20-50 3dmark scores if your lucky! Write combining is some thing that allows your OS to cache (buffer) data before it is written to memory or your HDD --> gives no performance increase (@ least nothing noticable) - fast writes is normally only an option is some Bios's and write comining is an OS option..... (geeky or what ) --> Google is an enthusiasts best friend....that's after forums like this...LOL

the videocard i had before was just some onboard crap

i noticed in the options menu for my card there is a VPU Recover which basically alt tabs out of game after the black screen i get

i can go right back into the game like i never left.... it says VPU Recovery allows the display driver to reset the graphics processor in the event that it stops responding to commands from the display driver

i took out the card and put it back in to make sure it wasnt loose inside... i reinstalled steam i dont know how many times... did all the updates for my monitor so that it works fine with my card.

maybe the card doesnt like Steam? the device manager says my card is running fine so ill take it's word on that

did you check if it happens in other games as well? how are the temperatures? try opening the side of the comp. and place a big fan blowing on the card. if it helps then your card is overheating. is air circulation good in your case?

the only other game ive played was NHL 06 Demo and it ran fine... no VPU Recovery and never once was i alt tabbed out

air circulation is good
cpu temp is 32 degrees
mb temp is 31 degrees

dont know the vid card temp?

cpu fan speed - 3375 RPM (roughly)

kenc51 did bring up a good point, it could be psu. higher end video cards do require more power. I dont think a 9350 really qualifies but troubleshooting is the key. Again try the ram thing, using one stick at a time and also redoing steam.

if anything it could bea faulty card, highly unlikely.

kenc51 and DragonCooler are right. I think that you have a "weak" PSU. What PSU do you have? Is it generic or a decent one? How many wattage?

what do you mean by PSU?

PSU= power supply unit. a 9250 isn't a powerhungry card. I think a 300W can do the job...

ok my psu wattage is 350

i think i found the reason why my game is screwing up

ive been using 1024x768 res and i backed down a notch to 800x600 and it didnt do it

so im thinkin my card cant handle the higher res

sound about right?

Sorry to jump in this thread late, but if you went DOWN resolutions and fixed the problem I am interested in seeing what the refresh rate is in Hz.

forget i said anything... i tried it again last night and it did it more than ever... constantly on and off..

i dunno what to do

ive reinstalled everything so many times