Scrambled image on LH side of monitor - GPU or monitor problem?

[kevkiev]

Just happened tonight while surfing the net: all of a sudden about 20% of the left hand side of my monitor became all scrambled. I restarted and initially got the same scrambling (i.e. on the screen that shows my motherboard info) until my PC was fully booted then everything was fine. About 15 minutes later the same thing happened, and restarting fixed it again. It's been about a half hour or so without any problems.

 

I figure it's either the GPU or my monitor, but my gut tells me it's the monitor simply because it's almost 11 years old (30" 2560x1600 NEC MultiSync). It's given me great service over the years, although It did develop a thin vertical yellow line running down the middle of the screen about 6 months ago, but I've just been ignoring it. (Well, kinda, it's gotten to the point of bugging me when I'm gaming during a night scene - it makes the whole one half of the screen a tiny bit lighter. When the game is in daylight, things are bright enough that the difference pretty much disappears. As I'm typing, I'm realizing how weird that might sound.) I exhausted all troubleshooting tips I could find, so chalked it up to the monitor's age but just haven't got around to replacing it. So maybe this scrambling means my monitor really is in it's death throes?

 

My GPU is a 980TI that I got about 6 mos. ago and it's never given me a problem (not definitive that it's not crapping out now, I know). My GPU, and CPU, temps are fine.

 

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thank ya.

 

edit: go figure - as I finished typing the same thing happened. The scrambling/ flickering lasted about 3 seconds then went away.

[SMB92]

Seems like a monitor problem if its hanging around, I've had some image corruption with bad OCs on my 980ti but usually lasts a split second or so.

 

Do you have another monitor handy to test?

[kevkiev]

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately, no other monitor to test things out. I had kind of a bad time OC'g my 980TI (came with a bit of a factory OC) compared to other cards I've had, so I have just put a teeny tiny OC on it right after I bought it and left it at that (was pretty happy with its performance anyways). It's been a while, but I ran a number of tests and everything was solid and has been for the 6 mos. of its life.

 

Edit: I'm thinking of another possibility, that the OC on my CPU has gone bad. I've had it at just under 4.7g for ages and it's always been solid, but my chip is also getting pretty long in the tooth so I cranked it back to 4.2 to see if that helps.

 

Edit2: Nope, after about 20 minutes of goodness, just had about a 3-second flash of scrambledom.

[Erik005]

Maybe you could test it with a TV?

[kevkiev]

Not a bad idea with the TV, thanks. However, I decided to screw the budget and snagged a new Samsung this afternoon. (Was hoping to eke some more life outta my NEC, but you know how that happens when browsing shiny new parts? :tongue: ) Will find out soon enough if that's the fix, otherwise I'll probably have to return the 980TI.

[jones177]

One of my 980 tis died Last weekend. The computer would not start with it installed. Fortunately it is a SLI rig & 980 ti #2 works fine.

What bugs me though is that it is a EVGA card like yours & the replacment warranty only had 45 days left. I guess I am lucky.

 

Back in 2007 my 8800GTS died the same way(computer would not boot). Back then EVGA had a lifetime warranty.

 

Later