Hello, I'm running a system with the following specs:

Windows XP Pro SP2
Mach Speed Viper K8M8MS /w Athalon 64 3000+
120G IDE Maxtor HD, 400Watt PS, 1Gig DDR333 Ram(2 chips)
128mb ATI Radeon 9700 TX(from old Dell system, works fine)
Dell M782 Monitor and Santa Cruz soundcard(also from old system)


I play World of Warcraft and Guildwars, two fairly nice games. However, I repeatedly run into two very frustrating errors. The first happens in both games, where occasionally my system will stop responding temporarilly, my screen will blank, and then I'll return to the game either with or without a monitor signal. The second error only happens in Guildwars, and is more severe, where the system freezes, audio stutters and the video goes to power saving mode. I have reinstalled and updated the OS, the Drivers for soundcard/chipset/motherboard, and turned the video settings to every conceivable setting to try to troubleshoot this. All has failed. I can only assume that the video card is working fine, as it always has, and one of the new components I was sent(motherboard, maybe?) is faulty and shutting down on me. The system internal temperature, while not as good as I would like it, peaks below 55C on the processor. I plan to install another fan, but I don't think thats what is causing this issue.

Did these games ever work on this computer?

Have you checked your settings via: start/run/ dxdiag

Under the display tabs are your Acceleration Features Enabled?

Also check the Device Manager: RT click My Computer then click Manage then Device Manager or go to start/run/ devmgmt.msc for any "!"

Also: look in your Event viewer: rt. click My Computer then click Manage then Event Viewer.
Or: Administrative Tools/Event Viewer or Start/Run/ eventvwr
Open the system as well as the application tabs & look for X errors. Click error line for details.
Post back the source & event id especially of errors that seem to coincide with these issues.

Thanks for the reply Jephree, and since this system is out of the box new as of two weeks ago, this is as well as they have ever run. Hopefully you can help me get it in order, or shipped back for replaced parts.

On suggestion one, I ran the dxdiag and everything worked fine with one very confusing issue. The directdraw and direct3d tests ran at super fast speeds, faster then they have when I run them on other system. The only exception to this is when I ran the second directdraw test, and their was a temporary lag in which the bouncing white square moved slowly before going back to the breakneck pace.

Already checked number two, everyone is working fine on that angle.

I went into the event viewer and found the following events.. Posting them with with their error messages. The W32Time, but was a recurring warning that troubles me. There are in the order I found them scrolling down the lists.

(application)
Application Hang / 1001 - Fault bucket 126637809.

(application)
Application Hang / 1002 - Hanging application iexplore.exe, version 6.0.2900.2180, hang module hungapp, version 0.0.0.0, hang address 0x00000000.

(application)
Application Error / 1001 - Fault bucket 07918338.

(application)
Application Error / 1004 - Faulting application svchost.exe, version 0.0.0.0, faulting module unknown, version 0.0.0.0, fault address 0x00000000.

(application)
Application Error / 1000 - Faulting application , version 0.0.0.0, faulting module unknown, version 0.0.0.0, fault address 0x00000000.

(system)
W32Time / 36 - The time service has not been able to synchronize the system time for 49152 seconds because none of the time providers has been able to provide a usable time stamp. The system clock is unsynchronized.

(system)
ati2mtag / 108 - The driver ati2dvag for the display device \Device\Video0 got stuck in an infinite loop. This usually indicates a problem with the device itself or with the device driver programming the hardware incorrectly. Please check with your hardware device vendor for any driver updates.

Thats all of them.

The W32Time warnings are usually benign. Go to Control Panel | Date & Time | Internet Time | uncheck "Automatically synchronise ... "

Everything else is pointing to your graphics card (or less likely your RAM).

Do you have another card you can try?
Noting "128mb ATI Radeon 9700 TX(from old Dell system, works fine)"
Do you have the card that came with the new computer? (or did it just have an on-board chip?)

When you installed this card did you uninstall the previous drivers before installing the new?
If the original computer only had on-board graphics did you disable the on-board chip?

I've tried alternating between this video card and an ATI Radeon 9600 Pro I recently purchased for a second system I set up. This issue occurs regardless of which video card is installed, but seems to happen less when the current card is in. While I wait on your next reply, I'm pretty sure I only have the current, up to date drivers for the Radeon 9700 installed right now. As for built-in video.. If theres one there to disable, I am unable to recognize the bios setting to do so.

All I note is that the system installs a secondary copy by default, but I am pretty sure thats standard.

After some thought, decided to go with the Radeon 9600 Pro for diagnostics, to see if it reacts to the dxdiag tests the same way. This should not take me long.

The Radeon 9600 Pro reacted somewhat more reliably to the DirectX tests. The direct draw tests moved at reasonable speeds, but would slow, as though data was loading, repeatedly. As for the Direct3D, all tests were flawless. No artificial speeding up or slowing down at all.

This is your most relevant error:

"ati2mtag / 108 - The driver ati2dvag for the display device \Device\Video0 got stuck in an infinite loop. This usually indicates a problem with the device itself or with the device driver programming the hardware incorrectly. Please check with your hardware device vendor for any driver updates."

It is also reflected in some of the other Application Hangs.

Is this a system that you built?
Did it come with a card?
In general it is advised to remove all software & drivers from one card before installing another.
Just wondering if this could be an issue.
Although you seem to know what you are doing.

The system was barebones from TigerDirect, but did not come with a video card or monitor. I always build my own systems, so this one not working as it was intended to, and my not being able to point at a faulty part as the cause, is, well.. Embarassing for me. I'm going to run a few more diagnostics and let you know if the issue is still there.

Just by the way you will find an ATI driver update via Windows Update (Custom Select). It is only advised for problem machines.