PC woes after installing new GPU

[Spatial]

Just looking for some advice about a problem I've had with my PC since changing the graphics card this week.

Changed from an ageing Nvidia 7800GT to a Radeon 5670HD 1GB and it's a vast improvement in terms of grunt (for what I need it for) and noise. From that point of view it's great, but since putting it in I seem to have no end of problems.

- the card won't wake properly from sleep. The PC comes on and there's drive activity, but the monitor won't come back. Tried it via multiple connections on the back of the card, and on another set, and it's definitely the card not the monitor as it just doesn't rewake the input device. You literally have to hard reset the system to get it to come back.

Now, the old Nvidia was temperamental with sleep (in that it would sometimes wake itself straight back up) but not like this.

Even when starting the system up cold it seems to take a good 6-7 seconds for the display to initialise before the BIOS gubbins comes up. With the Nvidia that was pretty instant.

- there were slight system hangs. No serious crashes or Windows 7 lock ups but programs that were working fine before slightly locked up (things like Firefox and Adobe) and gave a Not Responding message before almost immediately working again. Even Windows start up seems sluggish.

I've ended up putting the Nvidia card back in for now and it seems back to normal with no issues. Even Windows 7 startup is wizzing along a lot faster on the old card. Naturally each time I've taken the old drivers off and put the new ones on with each replacement.

So, I'm after some quick and dirty pointers about where to start thinking about trying to sort it before I try and return the card.

The first thing that sprung to mind is that my PSU is only 450w and the new Radeon is just powered off the PCI Express port on the motherboard - could that be the issue or is that more than enough power for what I've got in there?

The system is made up of:

Windows 7 - 64bit
4GB ram
Duel 2500+ processor
2 Sata drives

On a similar note, could it actually be the motherboard? It's an Asus 8-bit but it's about 5 years old now. Given the issues with sleep that the Nvidia GPU had, I'm wondering if that's related...? It's some small name brand too (Phoenix?) who haven't released a BIOS update since 2007

Could it be it be processor bottlenecking that's causing the hangs?

Or the short answer (and as I suspect), could it be all of the above?!

[EvilBoris]

I had stupid problems with my graphics card, it wouldn't come out of sleep if my monitor wasn't turned on before the PC.

Are you using DVI?
Try another cable (VGA even) and check through the settings on your monitor for any handshake stuff

I take it the new graphics card isn't meant to have it's own power supply going to it?

[Spatial]

There's no option to power it by anything other than the motherboard.

I was (and am) using DVI but I've also had a go via HDMI and it's the same deal. I've also had a go at different permeations of having the monitor on and off during restart and it's done nothing. Don't think there's any monitor settings for handshake but will have another look.

[briareos_kerensky]

Very stupid question: before installing the new video card, have you uninstalled the nVidia drivers, rebooted and then installed the video card with the new drivers?
You can also try to keep Windows' standard drivers for a while to see if the problems mentioned above keep occurring.
The CPU surely isn't a problem, nor the PSU should be.

[Spatial]

Did that. Even used a utility to remove the bits of crap that the installer didn't.

Going to try the card again later so will leave it without the Catalyst drivers and see if it makes any difference.

[EvilBoris]

Have you got on board graphics on your mobo too?

[abigsmurf]

A lot of sleep related issues can be down to the motherboards, particularly older ones (going into sleep mode is something that's surprisingly complicated). Check forums to see if your mobo model has known issues.

It's possible your power supply could be to blame, 450W should be plenty to cope with that but aging PSU's gradually lower their capacity. Get Speedfan, check your voltages (if you're getting 11v or under on the 12v for example that indicates PSU problems) and CPU/GPU temp (I very much doubt it's temp related, you usually get other warning signs for that).

Could be the memory failing, run memtest or other memory diagnostic tool.

Do a deep scan of your HDD and see if it's giving any SMART warnings.

[Spatial]

Speedfan comes back okay. As does a memory test.

Looking again for my motherboard (it's a AN8 Sli not whatever gibberish I stated above) the last Bios update seems to be 2007. In PC terms that's pretty old hat now and I still wonder if that's causing the problem. It does S1 and S3 but I wonder if it's `flaky`... although a good Googling doesn't seem to throw up people with problems.

Have you got on board graphics on your mobo too?

I do, but it's turned off.

[Spatial]

New card back in and running on latest Windows standard drivers. Still having problems.

I'm noticing that the onboard networking card is pretty sluggish too. Takes a good 10 seconds to set itself up and find a connection where it was pretty much done by the time windows booted using the other card.

Because it's onboard it's making me think that this is a motherboard issue.

[smouty]

This tool whilst design for Windows media centre sorted out all my standby issues

http://slicksolutions.eu/mst.shtml

I had an ATI in my HTPC that worked faultlessly (3450) but the nvidia card in my laptop often crashes on wake-up. It recovers though in win7 rather than crashing the whole PC.

[Spatial]

Thanks, gave that a go but it's made no difference either.

[EvilBoris]

What model of motherboard is it Spatial?

edit ah seen you just said what it was.

If you need a new power supply I've got a decent 550w Corsair one you can have for just postage if you need it. Think I've also got an AMD 4400+ in that same PC too that is just sitting there doing nothing. Should work with your Motherboard.

Found this article that basically says you can flash an A8N SLI PREMIUM bios onto a standard A8N motherboard, apparently the Premium Mobos were a little better supported and the latest bios is a few months newer than the newest A8N SLI basic bios. Worth a shot if you are feeling adventurous.

http://www.ngohq.com/home.php?page=articles&go=read&arc_id=111

[Spatial]

Thanks for the offer of the parts Boris, I'll let you know

Temped to give that bios flash a go...

[briareos_kerensky]

Although it will surely take longer, I suggest a clean install of everything before flashing any BIOS.

[EvilBoris]

Doesn't sound like it's getting through Post correctly, windows shouldn't affect it there should it?