possible video card problem or northbridge problem

[errycan2]

Hello, about 3 months ago my computer started acting funny. It started when I left the system running overnight (which I used to do a lot) and I turned on the monitor the next morning and the screen was blank exept for the blinking cursor. I did the 3-finger salute, but I didn't end-task anything, just hit cancel. The screen went back to normal. I shut it off when I was finished. The next day, I booted it up, it ran fine, I let it run for a while, came back and the screen was blank - the teal-green windows color but with no desktop icons at all. It wouldn't shut down with the 3-finger salute, I had to shut it off manually. Ever since then, it does that still and especially when I'm playing one of my games the screen will suddenly turn into a bunch of vertical different colored stripes, or will turn into a blank screen of a different color and the system will freeze up, I have to shut it down manually. Sometimes this happens even when I have started the system up and get to the desktop screen or just go to internet explorer to get to my startup page. It happens 98% of the time when I'm trying to play one of my games. So...any ideas? THank you!

System:
Packard Bell (OLD!!!) Built in 1997 or 1998
CPU: Cyrix MII 300
64 MB RAM
Windows 98 SE

Video card is built/integrated into the motherboard by the way. SiS PCI True Co. IOR Graphics and Video Accelerator 1.M Byte Video Memory. Shared memory BIOS version 1.10 06-24-98 Support VESA BIOS Extension version 2.0 (I got that info on the video card from doing the "DEBUG" thing in the MS-DOS prompt, hope that helps...thanks!)

[Tinygnome]

(quote) playing one of my games the screen will suddenly turn into a bunch of vertical different colored stripes, or will turn into a blank screen of a different color and the system will freeze up (/quote)

same thing happed to me...my graphics card was overheating...have you tried dusting out the macheine?

[errycan2]

I haven't tried that yet. It's been about 6 or 7 months since I did that, maybe that will do it. So it does sound like the video card then. I'll give it a try. Thanks.

[Tinygnome]

then try new drivers if dust doesnt fix (all not just graphics card jsut incase)

[GX1_Man]

Sounds like a failing video adapter (at best) and a failing motherboard (at worst). Do you have an old PCI video card you could slide in there to test with? What about taking off the side of the case and after dusting it out, blow a fan in there to see if it helps. Check the CPU fan to see if its turning as well.

With that processor and motherboard and it's age you have probably gotten a full term of service from it.  

[errycan2]

heh heh, you're probably right, it's ancient! I don't have another video card around, the one on the motherboard is built-in. If I have to replace the video card, I don't even know if I'll find one that is compatible with this old thing. Any suggestions for finding a video card for this old system?

[patio]

Any PCI vid card should work fine in that system...course we don't yet know which MBoard you have...

[GX1_Man]

Any PCI 4 or 8 meg card would do just fine. It doesn't need to be anything special except not so bizarre that you can't get drivers for it. An ATI or Matrox would be ideal and eBay is a great place to go for this.