# Blu and yellow checkered boxes appear on screen



## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

Hello. I just updated my gaming rig, and I am having problems with my video/display. Whenver I open a gaming application blue or yellow checkered squares will appear horizontally across my monitor, and then when I exit the game it appears on my desktop. Any ideas whats wrong?


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## Tanis (May 30, 2006)

Hi and welcome to TSG.

This initially sounds like either a graphics card problem or power problem, especially as you say you have just updated your rig.

Exactly what upgrades have you done and what was installed previously?
What is the exact make and model of your power supply? You should be able to see this on a sticker / plate on the side of the PSU itself. Its normally visible if you take the side off the case.


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

I previously had a 8800 GTS, and the same problem occurred except it was blue and yellow lines across the screen and the gaming applications were crashing. I had to manually restart my computer whenever a game crashed, and I could even see that the boot up screen was messed up. I initially thought it was a power supply problem, so I upgraded to a 800 watt power supply, but the same problems occurred. I then got some tests done at my local computer shop, and they said it was a heat issue, and that my last graphics card was damaged, because my old case had no air flow and was overheating my video card. I then upgraded my graphics card to a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295 and bought a new thermacool case with 4 fans that circulated the air very well. Everything was working for about a week and then these checkered little boxes that flashed blue yellow and red appeared during my gaming applications, but did not cause it to crash. The games run fine, Im just worried that my new graphics card might be overheating, but my speed fan application says its running at about 50 degrees Celsius which is fine. I have no idea whats going on, I already reinstalled my windows 7 yesterday, and then it came back.


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

this is a picture of what im talking about. The colors vary from blue to red to yellow and go diagonally across my screen.


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

can you please help mee


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## Tanis (May 30, 2006)

OK, lets see if we can get a bit more info about your system 

1) Download and install HWMonitor, personally I think its alot better and more useful than speedfan. When installed, start it up and let it detect all your sensors etc. then screenshot the window (do this when the system is idle, before doing any gaming etc.). When you have the idle screenshot, start up a game and run it for 5-10 mins (assuming no crashes), then close the game and screenshot the HWmonitor screen again, post both screenshots here.

2) Run a full DXDiag and post the results.

3) Are all your drivers fully up to date?


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

1) I was playing for about 10 minutes
2) Done
3) All of my drivers are up to date


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## Tanis (May 30, 2006)

I am not 100% about this, as I don't have a great deal of experience in faulty powersupplies (unless they have totally gone), but I am a little suspicious of the reported voltages on your +5v, I would only expect to see a variation of up to 5%, your max is a little over 10% above +5v.

Your temps are a little high on the GPU, especially for a GTX295. I am running a GTX460, have stock cooling throughout the machine, no extra heatsinks or fans, and mine only maxes out at maybe 55 degrees heavy gaming load.

You say you have an 800w PSU, when did you upgrade to that and what make and model is it?

You say your new case has 4 fans, where are they located on the case and which ones blow air in and which blow air out?

I don't suppose you actually know what 'tests' your local PC place did?

I would also download Memtest86 and do a full test of your RAM as that could also cause problem if they are faulty. Download the bootable ISO image and burn it to CD, don't use the tests that runs in Windows as other processes can interrupt it or cause false results. Then boot from the CD you burned and run a full RAM test, let it complete at least 2 full tests (this may take a while) and see if it reports any errors.

It doesn't look like you have SP1 installed for Windows 7, so I would get that aswell while you are at it. I have been using SP1 since its release and not had any problems.


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

I upgraded to an *OCZ Elitestream 800w PSU* about two weeks ago.

My case actually has 3 fans, not including the GPU or CPU fans
1. Fan located on back top of computer- blows air out
2. Fan located on bottom front of computer- blows air in
3. Fan located on on top of computer - blows air out

I ran memtest 86 and after about 3 minutes I got a ton of errors. The bottom kept cranking out errors, and it was getting in the 200,000 range. I stopped it at around 6 minutes. What does this mean?


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## Tanis (May 30, 2006)

That would suggest to me that you have either a faulty RAM module or possibly a faulty RAM slot on the motherboard. I would assume, from your specs, that you have 2x 2Gb RAM sticks, so next thing to do it test each stick individually.

Take both sticks out, then put 1 stick back in the first RAM slot - power up and test the system, do what you would normally do that causes the problems on screen (or boot up and run memtest again). If you get the problem (or errors if running memtest), shut down, take that stick out and put the other stick in the same slot. Power up and test again.

Repeat this test with each stick in each slot on the motherboard, by a process of elimination you should be able to identify if you have a faulty RAM stick or a faulty slot i.e.

i) If you get the fault with one particular stick in every slot on the motherboard - that stick is bad.
ii) If you get the fault with both sticks, in every slot - I would tend to think both sticks are bad (although could be board aswell, a bit difficult if this happens).
iii) If you get the fault with either stick in 1 particular slot (but not other slots) then that slot on the board is bad 

etc. etc.

I would tend to think you have a bad stick of RAM personally, but need to test to be sure.

Hope this makes sense


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

I did what you said and ran memtest again and I got the fault with both sticks, in every slot. It seems that either both my 2gb ram sticks are bad or my motherboard is bad. Every time I ran the test, I got flooded errors when it got to this point:

Pass: 31%
Test: 34%
Test #7 [Block Move]
Testing: 0k - 32M 32M of 2047
Pattern: relocated


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## Tanis (May 30, 2006)

Have you got access to any other, known working PC that you can either borrow the RAM from or test you RAM in? That is proabably the easiest way to confirm which it is.

You only other option really, is to buy some RAM to test with or you could replace the motherboard (a quick search shows them at around £30-£50 GBP, so not expensive), which would probably be cheaper than replacing the RAM, however if it then turns out the MB isn't at fault you will need to replace the RAM anyway! Bit of a dilema really, unless you have any known good parts to swap in/out, perhaps borrowing from a friend or relative briefly if you don't have any yourself.

What make are the RAM sticks?

PSU should be OK (should of mentioned that in last post), OCZ are a pretty decent make, I have used them a fair bit in the past and not had any problems with them. Infact, I currently have a 850w OCZ PSU in my machine.

Sorry I can't give you a more definate answer than that


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

I just tested some other ram from my brothers desktop, and the problem in memtest occurred again. I guess the motherboard is causing the problems from the looks of it, or is there another explanation?


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## Tanis (May 30, 2006)

If you tested the same way, i.e. known working RAM and got errors in each slot, then I would think there is a problem with the motherboard.


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## CameronW (May 24, 2011)

I've seen this issue before. Usually it's heat related... 

You'll see these exact issues when you OC your GPU too far.

Have you tried going into BIOS and reseting it to factory settings... You'd be suprised on how often that works... especially after changing hardware like a graphics card.

Give it a shot let me know


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## pyromonkey450 (May 13, 2011)

What exactly do I do once I'm in the BIOS. Are you saying I should flash it? My GPU isn't overclocked btw


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## CameronW (May 24, 2011)

Well don't flash it using a utillity or anything. Just load default values/reset to default values.


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