A video card is an essential component of any computer and laptop, responsible for processing and outputting information (images) to a monitor screen. But, like any complex device, the video card is prone to breakdowns, and the most common of them is overheating of the video card, which causes it to burn out. And so, how do you understand that a video card is burned out?
Signs that the video card is burned out
The first question that needs to be addressed is as follows: how to understand that a video card on a laptop has burned out? To answer this question, you should refer to the items discussed below.
- Various stripes, image distortion in a different color palette, a lot of extra characters, etc. appeared on the laptop monitor.
- There is no image on the monitor screen, or the entire image is displayed in a monotone color.
- When installing the drivers for the video adapter, difficulties arise, or installation is not possible.
- When working with complex graphic editors or three-dimensional games, the device automatically reboots.
The second question is as follows: how to understand that the video card on the PC burned out? To answer this question, consider the following points:
- The monitor is working properly, but there is no image (on some models the message “no signal” appears).
- The operation of the coolers of the cooling system and the backlight of the video card are working, but the image is missing.
- Artifacts appear on the monitor, that is, the image is distorted or has horizontal (vertical) stripes.
- Video adapter drivers do not update or do not update correctly.
- When installing drivers, a blue screen appears.
- While checking the video card for performance, it does not appear in any of the programs.
- When the device starts up, sound signals generated by the BIOS appear. To determine what the computer system is trying to report, you need to read the instructions for this version of the BIOS.
Now that we have figured out how to understand that the video card has burned out, we can move on to the following points.
Verification Methods
After we answered the question: “How do I know if a video card is burned out?”, We need to find out if the problem lies in it.
It is necessary to check the operation of the power supply. To do this, find out if it is connected to the motherboard or not. Next, when you start your computer, you should pay attention to the cooler. In addition, it is worth checking whether the power supply is connected to the processor, as well as the video card.
It is also worth checking whether the LED lights on the system unit light up when starting up the equipment. When the device starts up, it makes the usual sounds of Windows.
You also need to check if the monitor light is on, which notifies you about the health of the equipment. To do this, connect the monitor to another computer or laptop.
If Windows boots, as before, and the power supply and monitor are working properly, you must contact a service center.
Possible reasons
Having fully answered the questions about how to understand that the video card on the computer burned out, we will analyze the possible causes of this situation:
- The main reason is that the video card could not cope with overheating due to the fact that it had a lot of dust, or the thermal grease was not replaced on time.
- The cooler bearing became unusable, so the cooling system could not cope with the load.
- The video card could not cope with the interruptions in the mains voltage: this situation can occur even for those users who use an uninterrupted power supply (but this is only if the ground bolt is incorrectly installed or the user forgot to install it).
- The video card firmware has flown: in this situation, the video card is physically intact, but its internal component is damaged.
- The device was turned off incorrectly (which is the cause of many computer and laptop breakdowns).
- There is also a reason not related to the video card itself, but to the PCI-E slot, as it could become unusable.
How to choose a new graphics card
To begin with, we’ll deal with the option in which the user does not need a powerful video card, since he does not work in serious graphic editors, does not engage in photo or video editing, and does not play computer games. In this situation, the user can safely buy a video card of the lower price segment and not worry about the speed of the computer. But before you go to the store, you need to find out the bus of the video card (the format of the motherboard slot for the video card). To do this, you need to look at the characteristics of the motherboard in the Everest program.
Now we will analyze the parameters of the video card for advanced users:
- GPU The speed of moving the image on the screen will depend on it.
- You should pay attention to the firmware version, since the higher it is, the more new games the graphics card will pull (it is impossible to update the firmware version).
- Video card memory. Here the role is played by the model (GDDR3, GDDR4 and GDDR5) and the amount of memory. It is recommended to take not one memory chip (for example, 8 GB), but two 4 GB each, and install them not one after the other, but skipping the slot, then the memory will fill up two times faster and not separately for each, but for both at once.
- Bus bandwidth. The higher the bus bandwidth, the faster the video card will exchange information with memory.
- It is also worth paying attention to the cooling system and the ability to connect two video cards at the same time.
How to replace a video card
After the user has selected a new video card, it remains only to learn how to replace the video card.
You must remove the old video adapter drivers. To do this, go to the device manager (to open it, you can use the search bar in the Start menu).
Now you need to remove the old video card: to do this, turn off the computer and turn off its power. Then we wait a few minutes and begin to open the side panel. After that, you should completely disconnect the video card from the rear panel of the system unit, and also disconnect all the wires connecting the video card and the motherboard. When removing the video card, you must remember that most often in the motherboard slot, the video card is fixed with a clip.
After the video card has been removed, it is necessary to clean the motherboard: for this, we take out the system unit to the street or balcony, and with the help of a hairdryer (the hair dryer is put into cold mode), we blow off the system unit from dust. To better clean the system unit of dust, you can use a soft brush to draw.
Now, carefully install the new video card, not forgetting about all the necessary wires.
After the video card is installed, you need to download drivers for new equipment.
Finally
To minimize the risk of overheating of the video card, you must monitor the internal cleanliness of the device and pay attention to the slightest malfunctions in the computer.