Need video chip/card help and advice

[csziggy]

When my old mobo burned out, I just went with the video chip on the new mobo because I was not doing any video work any more and not much photo editing. There has been a consistent problem with the video - red dots/pixels, especially when the system has gone to sleep then come back up, sometimes on first boot.

Right now what I have is an ATI Radeon 3000 video chip on the ASUS M4A78L-M mobo with an AMD Athlon II 2.90 GHz processor, 3 GB RAM, Mag 22" wide screen LCD monitor, resolution running at the recommended 1680x1050.

I need to get back to editing and restoring old photos and can't have all those red pixels in the way. Is the problem with my video chip, the video cable (digital, but an older cable), or the monitor? I don't think it is the monitor - the problem did not exist with my old GeForce video card on the old mobo, though it was at a lower resolution. And I am using the same cable as before so I don't think it is that.

If it is the video chip on the board, what card would be good for good resolution for photo editing? The board has PCI Express 2.0 x16 and PCI Express x1 solts, if that helps.

[canetoad]

1. For the red pixels

My first call would have been monitor. OK, so didn't happen with your old card but pixels go bad!.

If you are intending to put in a video card, that action will rule in or our the current graphics chip. If you still have the red pixels, it's cheap to change cables. Maybe you will buy a card with HDMI output. Either way, if neither of these fixes it you can pretty safely say it's the monitor.

For decent pix editing, I reckon something like an Nvidia GT250 is as much video grunt as you need. I'm only saying that because my preference is Nvidia, having had both these and Radeon. AMD mobos and chips do tend to play nicely with Radeon cards tho! If that's what you choose, something in the 55XX to 58XX range would probably be more than sufficient.

Without checking, I think your slots will handle both those cards and neither needs an extra power plug.

[csziggy]

2. If the red pixels were constant I'd know it was the monitor

But they change from boot to boot, refresh, waking from hibernation, change in image on the screen, etc. That pretty much rules out individual pixels going bad on the monitor. They do seem to be at specific wavelengths/colors, which I guess could be the monitor. But they do not always show - sometimes they are there, sometimes not even on the same image, like the desktop background image or the Windows logo.

After I posted the message last night, I downloaded and installed a newer driver for the Radeon chip. So far, no red pixels, so maybe it fixed the problem. If it doesn't, I'll scope out a new Nvidia video card. This is the first ATI video I've ever had - previously I was happy with Nvidia for my home builds. I was doing a lot of video capture and editing before and never had any problem with the cards, plus they kept up with their driver updates. Asus did not have a driver update for the video on this mobo - I had to go to ATI and then it was a problem finding the correct driver. PITA!

Thanks!

[canetoad]

3. Out of interest I googled 'red pixels on LCD'

And among the usual garbage there were a few sensible things; overheating or failing video memory, or a stuck pixel. This last one seems to make sense and there are a number of solutions around. Try googling 'fix stuck pixel' and see if anything helps. :hi:

[csziggy]

4. As I said, the location of the red pixels is not consistent

So I doubt stuck pixels were the problem.

So far since I updated the driver, I haven't had any show up. Maybe that solved the problem.

I'll try some image editing tomorrow and see how it goes.

Thanks!