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**bootmeup** · 15 May 2002, 14:39

same thing happen to mine and i rma it and when i got the replacement/refurbished one, i installed a blue orb on it.

**vmark** · 15 May 2002, 15:30

hey bootmeup, when your board was RMAed, was anything actually found to be damaged on your board. Because i am really not sure if anything is actually wrong with the board its self except that its overheating due to the malfunctioning fan.

I wonder if others have encountered similar problems when overclocking without sufficient cooling. The graphics corruptions consists of discoloured vertical bars that appear, some are short while others are the length of the screen. Also the text seems to be scrunched together. I was hoping that a new cooler could correct this. What do you guys think? Oh, and my card is running at stock speeds.

I live in Toronto Ontario Canada, and i was wondering how much it will cost if i need to get this board RMAed.

**bootmeup** · 15 May 2002, 16:26

it only cost me shipping and ins back to Matrox

and yes i found that after i saw my fan was bad and replace it , it still was doing strange things.

you need to make some post on Matrox board, tell them what you have found and a tech will give you a RMA number to mark the box you return it in and address. They will just ship you a replacement/refurbished one, when they get yours.

**SteveC** · 15 May 2002, 17:16

If you replace the heatsink yourself and it looks obvious you've been tampering with the card, Matrox may not accept the card in for RMA....

Point a big fan at the card and see if it gets better.

Remember, anything is possible with a bit of creativity (including putting ANY heatsink/fan combo onto ANY computer hardware!

**Terrafin** · 15 May 2002, 20:31

Originally posted by vmark
I wonder if others have encountered similar problems when overclocking without sufficient cooling. The graphics corruptions consists of discoloured vertical bars that appear, some are short while others are the length of the screen. Also the text seems to be scrunched together. I was hoping that a new cooler could correct this. What do you guys think? Oh, and my card is running at stock speeds.

Yep. gone through that... it was one afternoon... had nothing to do.... thought... what they hey... lets see how far my g400 max can be pushed... got the vertical discoloured bars... tried everything to fix it... turned the computer off... swore for about 3 hours and then came back and turned the computer back on and everything was back to normal... i guess i was lucky that day.

sooo vmark... try repeatedly swearing for 3 hours...

**vmark** · 15 May 2002, 20:43

Thank you bootmeup and SteveC for your help, it is very much appreciated. I have determined that my card does not need to be RMAed. Following up on SteveC's suggestion, i decided to run a little test. I put the video card back in the computer, but this time i held an 80mm fan on one side of the card and another 80mm fan on the other side to cool the card. It booted into windows fine, no visible graphics corruption or messed up text and ran both 3dmark2001 and Sandra. The card completed the test without any problems. No graphical anomalies were seen and i still have all my fingers

. So this appears to be strictly a cooling issue.

Now, i need a little help on choosing a replacement heatsink/fan. bootmeup has mentioned that he is running he G400 with a Blue Orb. Although i would prefer to get a Crystal Orb as there is not much difference in price between the two, i am unsure if it will fit. So as of now, i plan on getting the Blue orb, unless someone else in this forum has gotten the crystal orb to fit without any problems. Any suggestions?
And thanks again guys.

**vmark** · 15 May 2002, 20:55

Terrafin, believe me when i say this, there was plenty of swearing on my behalf. That was pretty much all that i did last night and most of today

. But it seems that my vid card is fine...good thing too, the i810 integrated video card in my back-up comp i am using for now is getting to be annoying

**Terrafin** · 15 May 2002, 21:10

Originally posted by vmark
Terrafin, believe me when i say this, there was plenty of swearing on my behalf. That was pretty much all that i did last night and most of today .

I reckon it was the swearing that helped

Originally posted by vmark
But it seems that my vid card is fine...good thing too, the i810 integrated video card in my back-up comp i am using for now is getting to be annoying

hehe tell me about it... were i work the onboard intel video controllers are nothing but problems... stupid school budget computers...

**Fat Tone** · 16 May 2002, 00:07

I use this http://www.tennmax.com/matrox_g200.htm on my G400 vanilla. It let me get to just about max speeds, and is low enough profile that it doesn't block the adjacent PCI slot.

They've been around for a while now, so maybe things have moved on. It it possible to remove it should you ever need to replace the original for some reason

T.

**bootmeup** · 16 May 2002, 04:18

it look like the Crystal Orb should fit and would be better with its copper base, i see it is a improvement for the blue orb.

**Yannick** · 16 May 2002, 12:53

Re: Will a thermaltake crystal orb fit on a G400Max

Originally posted by vmark
Last night the fan on my G400Max died and all sorts of graphics corruptions appeared on the screen

. I had a feeling that the card was overheating so I immediately powered down the system and took the video card out.

Wow. Without the fan, it must be overheating a lot ! I mean , you can't actually call what's left a heatsink. Especially compared to the large passive heatsinks of regular G400s.

**cjolley** · 16 May 2002, 13:08

This is all too complex.
When my max's fan went out, I just super-glued a 486 fan to it.
Worked like a charm.
chuck

**vmark** · 16 May 2002, 13:41

Wow. Without the fan, it must be overheating a lot ! I mean , you can't actually call what's left a heatsink. Especially compared to the large passive heatsinks of regular G400s.

I agree, with the fan taken off the heatsink, you really do see how little surface area the heatsink has. The fins are not very tall at all.

This is all too complex.
When my max's fan went out, I just super-glued a 486 fan to it.
Worked like a charm.

I guess i may have over reacted a bit, but i dont have much in the way of spare computer part. I do have a 386, but it did not come with any cooling at all, so no luck there. I have to go out and buy a 40mm fan, so i figured that i should just spend a bit more and go for a performance cooler like the orbs. I want my matrox card last for a long long time. This card has served me well and will continue to serve me even after i get the Parhelia....which i intend to do as soon a i can afford one of those cards...and from the look of things, that aint happening any time soon.

**vmark** · 16 May 2002, 15:50

Just got this from Thermaltake...

Hi,
Thank you for your recent inquiry to Thermaltake.
Unfortunately, neither Blue Orb nor Crystal Orb will be applicable with the Matrox G400 video card due to its clearance around the GPU. Please visit us often for future updated information.

Regards,
Thermaltake USA Inc.

hmm...these guy seem to confuse me every time i ask them a question. They said the same thing about the Volcano7 and my CUBX mobo and yet it turns out that it fits without any problems. Well i guess i will go with the Blue Orb, since i already know that bootmeup has got one on his G400.

I would have considered a tennmax cooler, but they are very difficult to find these days. I can not find any store i live near that sells them.

Anyways, i just want to say thanks to everyone who has responded to my post and helped me with my problem.

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Will a thermaltake crystal orb fit on a G400Max

Will a thermaltake crystal orb fit on a G400Max

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