Thread: Compute guru's HELP

i built my comptuer and have
phenom II 945 3.0ghz @ stock due to issues
8 gigs of ram
brand new today ATI 6970(was 6870)
Xpower780 power suppply
2 sata hard drives
dvd rom

since i installed the brand new card i cant play any game longer then 5 seconds then display driver stops responding and games crashes and im at desktop......with 6870 had not issues....
used driver sweeper....
installed 11.11 drivers twice now.
only thing is my power supply says MAX OUTPUT 780 WATTS but then says TOTAL OUTPUT 600 WATTS.... and know if these xpower supply are junk or is it another issue...

The peak power rating is something I've really only ever noticed on cheap power supplies. It basically means it's capable of reaching that amount of output in bursts only. The 600W rating is continuous power.

The 6970 is a very power hungry card so it's the likely issue. Try unplugging any non-essential powered devices (extra hard drive, DVD drive etc.) and try one of your games out again. That may not free up enough power to see any results.

I suggest a single rail 750-800W PSU if a replacement is necessary. It would probably be more than you need, but it's better to have it and not need it rather than the other way around. I say single rail because most PSU's can't provide steady 12V power through multiple rails.

See if there are any bios updates for your ATI.

i paid $110 for this stupid psu a year ago, they said xpower was good but im reading different on the net..
i formatted, updated windows 7, new drivers.bios update on mobo, still no go cant even go threw windows 7 system rating test with display driver crashing...
before i formatted i tried skyrim in window mode it worked fine...most likely less load.
im gonna try bf3(once done downloaing again) on lowest graphics, if it works i will crank it... if it works on lowbut not ultra then most likely psu im guessing....

I only use silverstone PSU's now..

SilverStone Strider Series ST85F Power supply - 850 Watt

I picked that one up for $65 this time last year.... killer newegg deal.

what does eeveryone think of this??
Mega Computer - Corsair TX Series CMPSU-850TXV2 850W ATX Power Supply

I sent my whole computer in to the shop buy 90% of my parts, to do their testing, that way i dont buy a new powersupply for nothing....feel so newbish been building my computers since i was 16 and first time i couldnt solve it

well they had it since 1pm yesterday, wonder what they will find. been reading on 6970's having this issue alot, with many kind of fixes, from setting your own 2d 3d clock speed to rolling back driver all the way to 10.12.... never had such a weird issue

got my computer back, was the graphics card, said he couldnt get it running on any test computer without display driver contantly crashing..... so go home threw my 6870 back in and play BF3 for hours..
gonna trade it in for a gtx 580 dont care how long it take to get in stock ill play games with the 6870 till it comes.
Thx for all your help guys!

soooo return the ati 6970.... they obviously dont have a gtx 580 in stock they tell me to go online and order, no biggy. so i go home go online and they have no 580 in stock online either........ so i call futureshop customer support and they say they see its out of stock and it doesnt show when/if future will be ordering more....... so I had no choice but to reorder the EXACT same card....hopefully the new one works.
one thing i noted when i picked the computer up from repair shop they said my card is the original 6970, like when they first cae out, he said thay dont come with that cover/heatsink&fan combo anymore... so im curiouse to see if i get a different style.

reference cards are cool.

Specifically reference 6950's.

Performance of a 6970 for the cost of a 6950.

I've killed every nvidia card I've owned.

ATI cards seem to go forever.

However, they never seem to overclock as well.

Had a 6950, wasn't impressed with the slight improvement from my 460. Sold it real quick.