Graphics Artifacting v8.3

whisperedecho · Mar 13, 2008, 02:40 PM

Hi everyone. I have a Radeon X1900GT graphics card with an AMD Athlon 3700+ ~2.2GHz processor.

I've been having problems with my 3D DirectX Games as of late. I only notice the artifacting in 3D games that use DirectX. I have noticed the glitches in Silent Hunter 4, Black Penumbra, and Call of Duty 2.

Here is a screenshot of the glitch in Silent Hunter 4 that I am experiencing:

You can notice the glitch in the bottom portion of the screenshot. When I move my view around the glitch seems to "shimmer".

I have also noticed horizontal/vertical lines that will stem from textures and seemingly run off into the horizon.

I don't have any graphics problems in Windows or when running less intensive games such as Hearts of Iron 2.

I have done everything I can think of.

1) I have cleaned the dust out of the computer and video card multiple times to rule out overheating. My graphics card according to RivaTuner after playing a 3D game only goes as high as 65 degrees Celsius.

2) I have uninstalled and re-installed the ATI drivers multiple times and cleaning the old drivers out with DriverCleaner.NET. I even went so far as to reformat my computer and reinstall the latest drivers.

3) I have uninstalled and re-installed the latest drivers for my motherboard chipset. (ASUS A895X)

4) I have played around with tweaks using both ATI Tray Tools and the CCC but nothing seems to have an effect.

5) I have reinstalled DirectX making sure I have the latest version which is now March 2008.

I have also tried enlisting the help of ATI Support but they were not very helpful. They just told me to upgrade my drivers which I had already done.

Any suggestions on how to fix this?

FR4GGL3 · Mar 13, 2008, 05:09 PM

try to enable the geometry instancing with the ati tray tools.

but that's only a guess.

whisperedecho · Mar 13, 2008, 05:11 PM

Yeah, I already tried doing that but it didn't work.

I just talked to an Engineering friend of mine and he suggested I try downgrading my drivers back to 7.8 because apparently ATI redid their 3D engine around version 7.10.

I'll post back here on whether it is successful in fixing the problem or not.

[hobo]eclipse · Mar 13, 2008, 05:31 PM

maybe try with v sync off or on? opposite whatever you had.

whisperedecho · Mar 13, 2008, 06:03 PM

Tried playing with vsync both on and off. Vsync actually makes the problems worse. I even tried setting AA to 2x in ATI Tray Tools as I saw it suggested somewhere else. It helped a little bit but I was still having problems.

I just finished downgrading to Catalyst version 7.8. I still have to test it out and see if it fixes the problem.

whisperedecho · Mar 13, 2008, 06:37 PM

Well, I just tried playing twice and I noticed a minor glitch in the game so I'm pretty sure the issue is still unsolved. I'm now also having the game crash after playing for about 5 mins or so and I'm not sure if that's because I downgraded the drivers or not.

Nachbrenner · Mar 14, 2008, 02:10 PM

"Black Penumbra" is an OpenGL game and can be fixed by using atioglxx.dll from CAT 7.11 as mentioned here:
ATI Catalyst 8.3 Out Now
The torch and the map at the beginning of the game are rendered properly then (i tried the demo).

I found no playable demo of Silent Hunter 4, but the spike in the screenshot is a floating point miscalculation.

Just downloading COD2 demo, what are the actual issues?

whisperedecho · Mar 14, 2008, 07:54 PM

The issue as far as COD2 was that the textures would artifact like in the second screenshot except on a massive scale to the point where I had to uninstall the game because I could not play it.

The issues when playing SH4 are mainly what you see in the screenshots above. Mainly I get that floating point miscalculation in the second screenshot.

Currently, I'm using Catalyst v. 8.3 drivers with ATI Tray Tools. I heard someone in another forum claim that setting Global Anti-Aliasing to 2x helps but after playing SH4 for a couple minutes, the glitches were back.

There is no demo currently for SH4. I talked to a friend of mine but he agreed that I've pretty much tried everything.

What could I do to fix the floating point miscalculation? I have tried adjusting the Texture LOD in ATI Tray Tools but it didn't have any effect. I have also tried flipping the queue size and enabling/disabling vertical sync and none of those options have had any effect so far.

This is really frustrating for me as I can't seem to narrow down the cause of the problem, whether it be from overheating, a problem with Direct3D itself, a driver problem, etc.

I don't think it's overheating though as I've used RivaTuner and my card only goes as high as 65 degrees when I am playing a 3D game where the glitches occur.

Nachbrenner · Mar 15, 2008, 08:45 AM

Judging from german SH4 forum BUG-THREAD SilentHunter4 ab Version 1.4 - Thema entwickelt von eve community
this game and it's patches have been improved to death.

I completed the COD2 demo w/o problems with any gfx settings.
I'm surprised that R520 and R580 behave that different.
Try the option "DX7 renderer"
Or rename the executable to disable the profile in CAT 8.3
Here is the full list of "optimised" programs:

Code:

Nfs.exe GVOnline.bin    tw2.exe elementclient.exe   KartRider.exe  
 QQSG.exe    TW2008.exe  DiRT.exe    ForceSingleGPU.exe  TW2006.exe
  game.exe    SupremeCommander.exe    hl.exe  SpiderSolitaire.exe
 Solitaire.exe   PurblePlace.exe Minesweeper.exe Mahjong.exe InkBall.exe
 Hearts.exe  FreeCell.exe    chess.exe   R6Vegas_Launcher.exe  
  3dsmax*.exe Crysis*.exe UT3*.exe    Wargame-g4wlive.exe hellgate*.exe
   SinEpisodes.exe iw3mp.exe   iw3sp.exe   Matrix.exe  *Stranglehold.exe 
  Bioshock.exe    wic*.exe    LostPlanet*.exe sims.icd    nhl2007.exe
 GodFather.exe   pc_matador.exe  episode.exe AcroRd32.exe    XR_3DA.exe
  Scarface.exe    TestDriveUnlimited.exe  mm.exe  Gothic3.exe
 HitmanBloodMoney.exe    NWN2*.exe   TW2007.exe  ARX.exe
 SplinterCell4.exe   NFSC_demo.exe   NFSC.exe    RelicCOH.exe 
   starwars_pc.exe LegoStarWarsII.exe  fifa07*.exe fsx.exe primarysurf.exe
 CoJ.exe FEARXP.exe  BF2142*.exe JustCause*.exe  nhl06.exe  
 battleofthegods.exe cccprev.exe RomeTW*.exe H5_Game.exe
 Condemned.exe   trl.exe Inventor.exe    Dwm.exe legends.exe gt.exe
  graw*.exe   sweaw.exe   game.dat    Timeshift*.exe  nbalive06.exe  
 oblivion.exe    x3*.exe gwdev.exe   pop3.exe    USM.exe BattlefrontII.exe
   speedDemo.exe   speed.exe   narnia.exe  white.exe   KingKong*.exe  
 3DMark06*.exe   RD3.exe Age3.exe    Suffering2*.exe Sam2.exe  
  KingKongDemo*.exe   BOS.exe CoD2?P_s.exe    Fable.exe   EiB.exe
 Sims2EP2.exe    DungeonSiege2.exe   fs9.exe AFR-FriendlyD3D.exe
 FEARspdemo.exe  FEAR.exe    ACTOFWAR*.exe   Ehshell.exe X2-Demo.exe
 X2.exe  tribesv_?pdemo_en.exe   Swat4SPDemo.exe
 PandoraMultiPlayerDemo.exe  Sims2EP1.exe    PCMark05.exe  
  PCMark04.exe    PainGame.exe    Speed2demo.exe  MaxPayne2Demo.exe
   FFXiWinBench.exe    FFXiBench.exe   Biademo.exe Tiger 2004.exe
  Snowblind-Demo.exe  Snowblind.exe   BreedSPD.exe    Breed.exe  
 XPANDRALLY.exe  TV_CD_DVD.exe   TRAOD*.exe  Battlefront.exe
 Sims2.exe   ShadowVault.exe patriots.exe    thrones.exe Pariah.exe
  nba2005.exe mohpa.exe   GW.exe  pol.exe Driv3r.exe  DFX.exe Bia.exe
 TechDemo.exe    aquamark.exe    w40k.exe    pop2.exe    FarCry.exe
  WoW.exe EverQuest2.exe  Speed2.exe  Lithtech.exe    Swat4.exe  
 SwgClient_r.exe SplinterCell3.exe   Painkiller.exe  MaxPayne2.exe  
  FlatOutdemo.exe CMR5.exe    BfVietnam.exe   LockOn.exe  3DMark05.exe 
   3DMark03.exe    3DMark2001SE.exe    3DMark2001.exe  BF2.exe
 Morrowind.exe   TW2005.exe  TW2004.exe  halo.exe    hl2.exe UT2004.exe
  UT2003.exe  RD2D.exe    RD2.exe CT3.exe pop.exe RaceDriver.exe
  SplinterCell2.exe   SplinterCell.exe

kn00tcn · Mar 15, 2008, 11:03 PM

where'd that list come from

Nachbrenner · Mar 15, 2008, 11:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kn00tcn

where'd that list come from

It's inside ati3duag.dll.
Note the new option "ForceSingleGPU.exe"

whisperedecho · Mar 16, 2008, 01:31 AM

I think I have narrowed down the problem to Direct3D.

When I run dxdiag and do the Direct3D test, the cube spins very fast. I read on another forum that this is because I have a high-performance driver. The cube has never spun fast for me before. I had recently installed the March 2008 DirectX update so I was hoping that this might solve my problems but I just played SH4 and it did not. The glitches are still prevalent.

I am pretty sure that Direct3D is the problem because when I ran a stress test on my machine the other night, part of the test was to run stress tests with Direct3D graphics and I noticed minor glitches similar to the second screenshot with textures stretching out.

I am Googling Direct3D corruption to see if there is any way around this but do you guys know anything about Direct3D corruption or what could be causing it?

whisperedecho · Mar 16, 2008, 01:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nachbrenner

It's inside ati3duag.dll.
Note the new option "ForceSingleGPU.exe"

Where is this ForceSingleGPU.exe located?

whisperedecho · Mar 16, 2008, 01:49 AM

I just re-opened my ticket at ATI support about this issue.

I found what could be the cause of the glitches. Whenever I install ATI drivers I always get an "Unknown Device".

You can see the Unknown Device highlighted above. When I checked the properties for it, I found the following results:

I cannot reinstall the drivers because apparently there are no drivers installed with this "device". Has anyone encountered this?

Nachbrenner · Mar 16, 2008, 01:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whisperedecho

Where is this ForceSingleGPU.exe located?

Nowhere, if you have a crossfire system, you can rename an existing executable not working in crossfire mode.

whisperedecho · Mar 16, 2008, 02:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nachbrenner

Nowhere, if you have a crossfire system, you can rename an existing executable not working in crossfire mode.

Yeah, I don't have a crossfire system set up. My graphics card is capable of Crossfire though.

whisperedecho · Mar 16, 2008, 03:25 AM

I fixed the unknown driver issue by installing the WDM drivers. This seemed to help out a lot in reducing corruption in the graphics but I noticed after about an hour of play in SH4 that the glitches came back so I don't know if it's just stress on the card that causes the glitches or what but hopefully I will figure that out soon.

drwire · Mar 16, 2008, 07:27 PM

hello, I have the same problem as you with my x1900gt rev2. In some games I could fix it enabling any kind of AA and then disabling it.

After trying many ways for fix this Im thinking that this could be a memory overheating problem.

PS: after researching many forums I found one in wich they say that the problem is related to the power supply. They say that the x1900gt need 22-25A in the 12V line (mine is 18A).

whisperedecho · Mar 17, 2008, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by drwire

hello, I have the same problem as you with my x1900gt rev2. In some games I could fix it enabling any kind of AA and then disabling it.

After trying many ways for fix this Im thinking that this could be a memory overheating problem.

PS: after researching many forums I found one in wich they say that the problem is related to the power supply. They say that the x1900gt need 22-25A in the 12V line (mine is 18A).

I highly doubt the problem is related to my PSU because I have never had these kinds of glitches when I played SH4/COD2 in the past. I only recently noticed these problems. The only thing I can think of is if the PSU is going bad possibly.

kn00tcn · Mar 17, 2008, 08:57 PM

psu can be going bad ya, maybe check if you can borrow another or underclock the card (or cpu)

whisperedecho · Mar 17, 2008, 10:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kn00tcn

psu can be going bad ya, maybe check if you can borrow another or underclock the card (or cpu)

I tried underclocking the card and running an artifact test with ATI Tool but I still got artifacts. I think my card has possibly had some overheating damage done to it at some point or another and I guess I'm going to have to buy a new card when I have the money.

I noticed that the artifacts start appearing when the card reaches 60 degrees Celsius. It normally runs around 53 degrees.

I can still run games that aren't too intensive like RTS games. Just can't play first-person shooters or anything like that. Oh well.

whisperedecho · Mar 26, 2008, 02:00 PM

I solved the problem.

My card had lots of dust behind the fan section. I was able to force some of it out through the fan but in order to get all of it out, I am going to have to detach the cooling section from the card.

Once I cleaned out some of the dust, my card was running at about 46 degrees at idle instead of 53 like it was before. I also set up a fan profile using RivaTuner to run the fan at 100% duty cycle.

When I ran the fan at 100% I got no artifacts while running ATI Tool for 2 minutes 30 seconds.

I am now able to play Company of Heroes with no glitches!

So it looks like it was overheating!