Gibberish at boot, Screen Distortion?

Computer: about 2-3 years old maybe older
Asus AM2 SLI-deluxe
AMD 5200+ dual core
Nvidia 8800 GT
Windows XP




What I was doing: I was playing DOW2 when my game crashed to a black screen it then flickered for a moment as some blue pixels at the top of the screen showed through, then it went solid black with a lighter black bar across the top, I force restarted. This is the 3rd time this happened to me recently (had not been doing it) but this time when I started up the computer my motherboards logo looked funny, lower quality with misplaced pixels in it. Then on the next screen just gibberish letters randomly placed littered the screen for a bit and it took me to the black screen where I could make out

"Start windows normally"

"last known good configuration"

etc. everything was gibberish letters.

I start it in safe mode, screen feels up with gibberish, starts in safe mode. I pick administrator and my background where it would normally be solid black is like blue wiggly lines across the screen horizontally.

Needless to say I have never seen this before now, I goggled this for a while and found nothing. I assume it's hardware related. I am leaning that my power supply or video card hit the dust. sadly I don't have spares around to test it with.

Could it be system corruption?

Any help would be nice thanks.

Edited by begone77, 04 June 2009 - 05:33 PM.

First thing to do is try uninstalling and reinstalling the videocard driver. Get the latest version for your card from nvidia's website, go to device manager and uninstall the old driver. Then reboot and install the new driver. If that doesn't help then it's possible your videocard has bit the dust.

First thing to do is try uninstalling and reinstalling the videocard driver. Get the latest version for your card from nvidia's website, go to device manager and uninstall the old driver. Then reboot and install the new driver. If that doesn't help then it's possible your videocard has bit the dust.

Uninstalled drivers and ran chkdsk but still the same. I don't think its the video card because how would that effect the default windows text? Ill see if I can test the PSU soon.

Thanks for the help.


*edit: Also i can only boot to safe mode it hangs on normal windows load.

Edited by begone77, 04 June 2009 - 05:52 PM.

Replaced PSU and still does it, the gibberish is also in the bios screen of the motherboard.

Turn it off
Unplug it
Press the on button to discharge any residual electricity
Open the computer
locate the jumper to clear the CMOS [if it has one, usually by the battery]
Use the jumper to clear the CMOS
[Don't forget to put it back in the original [default] posistion]

Try the unit

Ah I stand corrected, got my friend to bring over his 8800 and it did the trick. Funny that a video card can effect the bios screen like that but whatever.

Sounds like a fried video card. Do you have enough ventalation? Video cards can produce the same if not more heat than some CPU's

Sounds like a fried video card. Do you have enough ventalation? Video cards can produce the same if not more heat than some CPU's

Thanks for the reply.
It was indeed the video card. I sent it in for repair so let us hope for the best