Graphics card(s) not working

[BenjiTheMan]

Hey people,

 

I am facing a serious problem with my graphics card. Prepare for a story

 

My system:

 

Intel Core i7-3770K

• Asus Sabertooth Z77
• 2x 4GB Corsair Vengeance 1600MHz (Cas 7)
• 2x MSI N680GTX Lightning in SLI
• 256GB Samsung 830 series SSD
• 2x 1TB Samsung Spinpoint (F1 en F3)
• EVGA SuperNOVA 750 G2 80 Plus Gold

 

i recently bought a used PC with two MSI gtx680 Lightning in it, When it arrived I never checked whether SLI was working, how stupid. Last week I checked it and saw it was not working, only one card appeared in device management and also Nvidia software only saw one card. The BIOS showed only PCIe slot one was filled, not the second slot. In order to make sure the cards were both ok I switched them and the card in slot one still worked --> conclusion: cards are ok. 

 

But then the real trouble started. After a couple of reboots the system froze constantly in windows, without me being able to reset the pc, so I had to hard shut it by long pressing the power key. After that the PC only boots untill the windows loading scree, the logo appears, and then after a few second it freezes (with the logo) or the screen output stops entirely. Although I have tried quite some different things the problem remains.

 

Here is what I tried:

 

- Start the pc on igp via BIOS settings, this works fine (typing this now via these settings) --> conclusion: the rest of the hardware such as SSD etc are fine

- Use forced PCIe output in the BIOS doesn't change anything

- semi-clean windows 10 install with keeping my personal files --> same problem

- Reboot in safe mode and delete all display related drivers by uninstalling and DriverSweeper --> problem remains

- Install the latest drivers after this in normal mode via IGP output setting, since in safe mode installing the drivers did not work --> problem remains

- Using a card in the second slot only did not work entirely, also no BIOS

 

I have no options to test the cards or to test the slots with another card. Do you people have any idea? I am becoming desperate and even my wife feels sorry for me

 

My fear is that both of my cards are broken or both slots on the motherboard. The latter would suck but since I have warranty I can send it back to ASUS. The former option would make me cry...a lot!

 

Thnx for the help!

[brighteyes890]

Have you tried booting using the integrated graphics?

[Guest]

You weren't on Awesome Hardware asking about those 680's were you?

 

I actually had a recent sounding problem with an old PC I'm building with spare parts for my kids. Windows would just freeze completely, either in Windows or at the loading screen. It's not likely it's the same fault for you, but for me I figured out it was the WiFi PCI card. Windows would freeze whenever trying to connect to the internet, and then on start-up because Windows was trying to connect to the internet every time it was loading.

 

The verdict, freezing seems to be what Windows does when it knows there's hardware in the PCI lane but it's not working as expected. You have to figure out how to get it back into Windows. So try one card at a time in each slot until you can get back into Windows. Also clean the contacts of both cards and the PCIe lanes.

[BenjiTheMan]

1 hour ago, brighteyes890 said:

Have you tried booting using the integrated graphics?

Yes, I put this in the information (igp), it works fine, without any problems. But thnx

1 hour ago, adamjp said:

You weren't on Awesome Hardware asking about those 680's were you?

 

I actually had a recent sounding problem with an old PC I'm building with spare parts for my kids. Windows would just freeze completely, either in Windows or at the loading screen. It's not likely it's the same fault for you, but for me I figured out it was the WiFi PCI card. Windows would freeze whenever trying to connect to the internet, and then on start-up because Windows was trying to connect to the internet every time it was loading.

 

The verdict, freezing seems to be what Windows does when it knows there's hardware in the PCI lane but it's not working as expected. You have to figure out how to get it back into Windows. So try one card at a time in each slot until you can get back into Windows. Also clean the contacts of both cards and the PCIe lanes.

I haven't asked it on the Awesome Hardware forum, someone with similar problems? And as stated in the opening post, I am in windows via the integrated graphics, even with the grafics card in it. using another lane does not seem to help. Besides, when inside windows via the integrated graphics the system shows a GTX 680 in device manager, so it seems ok, no exclamation marks whatsoever. 

Anyway, thanks for the help

[Guest]

58 minutes ago, BenjiTheMan said:

I haven't asked it on the Awesome Hardware forum, someone with similar problems? And as stated in the opening post, I am in windows via the integrated graphics, even with the grafics card in it. using another lane does not seem to help. Besides, when inside windows via the integrated graphics the system shows a GTX 680 in device manager, so it seems ok, no exclamation marks whatsoever. 

Anyway, thanks for the help

Nah it was just someone on the show asking if they should get two 680's vs a 970 recently. Anyway, you tried cleaning out the contacts and both the PCIe slots? I understand that you can get into Windows with iGPU but can you get into Windows with either of the 680's enabled or is it always freezing at load screen for each of the GPU's?

[BenjiTheMan]

2 minutes ago, adamjp said:

Nah it was just someone on the show asking if they should get two 680's vs a 970 recently. Anyway, you tried cleaning out the contacts and both the PCIe slots? I understand that you can get into Windows with iGPU but can you get into Windows with either of the 680's enabled or is it always freezing at load screen for each of the GPU's?

No, haven't cleaned them out yet, will try that, but seems a bit odd. Windows doesn't load with either of the cards in either of the slots unfortunately only via igp