Guild Wars 2

I’ve been using a GTX 285 since launch, which has been fine (only gets choppy in dungeons). So I decided to try the game out with the GTX 670, and within the first 10 minutes of play, my computer freezes; requiring a reboot. (I can just copy/paste white squares all over a random screenshot, and that’s -exactly- what it looks like, lmao!)

It’s happened roughly 8 or so times in the last 3-4 days, taking anywhere from 5-10 minutes, or up to 10+ hours.

Tested with the following drivers, clean install, crashed at least once with each:
GeForce 301.42 Driver,
GeForce 304.48 Driver,
GeForce 304.79 Driver,
GeForce 306.02 Driver,
GeForce 306.23 WHQL Driver (been using this one the majority of the time.)

Few random specs:
CPU: Intel® Core i7 920 @ 2.67HGz
RAM: 12GB Corsair (6×2GB)
Windows 7 Ultimate (x64)
MoBo: ASUS Rampage II Extreme
PSU: Silverstone Strider 1500w

I only research and then build a new rig every 3 or so years, so i’m a little out of the quo right now. A lot of people seem to dislike the 670 as well as the 680/690, so if I end up returning this one, any recommendations on a new card would be appreciated. (I was considering the Radeon 7970, as i’ve never actually tried an AMD card before.)

Artifacts indicate GPU damage.

Run something like Furmark to confirm and then get your money back.

Wow, yeah, that’s a defective GPU. Try another game or evga scanner as well. The 6xx series has weird issues and annoys me as well (I have a 670). The 7970 or 7950 would be a good alternative…but you lose some good things like PhysX, Nvidia Inspector, etc, etc. On the other hand, I don’t hear reports of ATI GPU’s falling “asleep” in WvW like my 670 does thanks to it downclocking because the CPU is taking over. Annoying.

Yeah I’d strongly recommend running some sort of GPU benchmark, preferably one that stresses VRAM as well, since that looks suspiciously like there’s just a fault with the card. GW2 is able to push GPU’s quite hard so that’s why I’d recommend a proper stresstest rather than just another game, since it may only happen at high GPU stress levels.

As for the 600 series cards in general, while there are certainly people having problems with them, there are plenty of people having those same problems (crashes and performance issues) with older series cards as well, and equally there are plenty of people with 600 cards who are not having those problems. It’s just that you don’t tend to hear much from the latter category of players because most of them have no reason to come to the forums.

The main thing 600 series cards have that might be affecting them specifically (on top of other potential problems) is the GPU boost feature, which seems like it can still be a bit temperamental sometimes and downclock the card in situations where it’s not supposed to (it also seems to be more likely to happen when a high end model like a 670/680 is paired with a more limiting CPU, like any AMD or Core 2 model).

I myself recently upgraded to a GTX 680 (from a GTX 470) and I’m very happy with the upgrade. GW2 has been running really well and is perfectly stable (306.23 drivers) and I haven’t noticed any problems with GPU downclocking in any of my games. I do have it paired with an i5 2500k @ 3.3ghz and am running EVGA Precision fulltime in the background – they might be reducing the likelihood of downclock problems.

Just ran FurMark 1.10.1 for 40 minutes, and it sat on 56fps @ 87ºC pretty much the entire time with no problems…

Then I turn my computer off, boot it up again about an hour later and had to go afk for 15 minutes – so it was idle on the desktop with nothing running in the background – I come back and it’s crashed in exactly the same manner (cept the squares are red this time.)

Reboot it, came back to this thread, and then it crashes yet again in the middle of typing out this message (white squares again.)

I don’t think it’s stress related after witnessing that.

It is definitely physically damaged though. Take it back. I’m struggling to think of a time I’ve ever seen that sort of problem caused by software.

Was that 40 minute run a complete test? Or did you stop it?

Fwiw, i’m running this game on an EVGA 670 and I have FPS that I would expect. Lowest it gets is mid 40s in big WvW battles on auto detect. Most of the time running aroundin PVE the frames are above 100. Zerging groups bring it down to 60s / 70s depending on the area.

It does work on most people’s systems who have a 6xx series card as it should.

This has nothing to do with the game nor your nVidia drivers. I had the same issue myself so I’m pretty sure it was your GPU being damaged.

Why didn’t it happen earlier? Because the card worked just fine until you played for long hours and your GPU might have been fried w/o you noticing it.

I would suggest you to stop playing for the meantime and reapply thermalphase or buy a cooling component for your GTX285.

One test, which ran for roughly 41 min and 3 sec. I followed that up with a 1 min test, and then another 1 min test with “Xtreme burn-in” checked which yielded around 25-26fps.

It’s an MSi card – “GTX 670 (2GB 256-bit GDDR5/OC”
First time using something MSi for me and it’s been very disconcerting
(I normally stand by XFX.)

With all settings maxed out in GW2, i’m usually seeing between 40-59fps.
The first time I hooked this up and logged in, I was dodge-rolling around “Cursed Shore” and it was spiking from 60 down to between 2-7fps.

Amarinth.8534:

(it also seems to be more likely to happen when a high end model like a 670/680 is paired with a more limiting CPU, like any AMD or Core 2 model).

From what I can tell, it’s the exact opposite. I have an i5 3570k at 4.5 paired with mine. From what I’ve seen with others reporting this downclocking issue, it’s almost always those with faster cpu’s. The cpu is doing all the heavy lifting in WvW (by design) and the gpu is literally falling asleep in WvW at times. I can avoid this by forcing the video card to do things like higher af and supersampling, thus keeping it “awake” and at full clocks.