So I got my new motherboard today. An asus m4a78-e. Many of you know how long I've been without a pc, tearing me apart.

One long beep followed by 3 continuous beeps.

No vga detected

My 4870 spins up, slows down, spins up really fast, then I get the beep code.

My graphics card must be dead.

I've waited a month to get my pc up and running, spent hundreds, and not one step further ahead.

Feel like getting away from pc's altogether.

Just get yourself a 360, oh wait, they've got the RRoD problem.

Didn't MB indicate the problem was just the mobo and that the card was fine? (I'm to lazy to look up the last thread)

this issue you are having with your new board?

Mb said it was the pcie slot. They didn't have my gcard for testing.

Therefore I bought a new m4a78-e while I waited for my m4a78 plus to be rma'd.

And a PII 965 BE...

Never thought my gcard was the problem, but it must be. I tried it in both slots, used the vga switch card just like the manual describes, still no vga detected.

Minimized power consumption, still nothing.

No other pcie card to test to ensure it is the card..

Very upsetting...

I got a 1650 PCI-E if ya need to try it out, I'm sure MB has some PoS card you can test as well.

Thanks once again, I live in NG though.

The onboard video works however, so it must be the card, but man, when can I afford a new gc....

Does anyone think it could be a PSU issue?

This PSU is only a few months old, and previously ran this card fine, along with a very similar mb.

I don't know, I'm stumped, puts a halt on things once again...

well one way to eliminate that as the weak link is to unplug it and either test it, or test a different psu that you know is functional.

Fustrating it is, hang in there and you will get the issue figured. Post issues are the easiest normally to nail. Should only be one of 5 things that are the cause.

I got my hands on another vid card.

It worked.

Doesn't rule out psu, but its pretty obvious its the card.

Not sure how sapphire rma works.

Gonna need a new vid card I guess. If income tax is in tomorrow I might have to grab something in the 250-300 dollar range, any suggestions?

My boss said I can take whatever I want from the office, I think the best card there is an hd2400 pro, not sure if that will give me better performance than my onboard hd3300, but if so then I can use that for at least til I get a new powerhouse.

Help me keep calm here and make the right decisions boys..

well glad ya worked that out. Partial good news is even tho the 2400 blows - that board will auto crossfire the HD3300 with it to give it a little step in the right direction.

I would suggest a 5850 for the 300 range. If that's too steep Then perhaps the ATI 5770 - or two hehe - the dual slot cooler type.

Just ordered a Sapphire 5850 today. Should be here Mon or Tues. Give me assurance that I'm not going to be disappointed with this build:

Phenom II X4 965 BE
Asus M4A78-E 790GX
Sapphire HD 5850
4gb PC2-8500 @ 1066mhz

If it's not alot faster than a X2 7750BE + 4870 then I'll be pretty disgruntled. This has turned into a big upgrade...

I also want to RMA my 4870 to Sapphire, anyone have any experience with a Sapphire RMA? Do I have to ship it all the way to Hong Kong at my own expense ($$$$$) and wait a year for it to come back?

If that's the case I might as well just throw it in the trash...

Just load up the Unigen heaven benchmark after you get Win7 loaded up and you'll like what you see.

I ran that on my old hardware with meh results so hopefully with a dx11 card i can see some ssao and a performance boost as well!

I purchased this card based on your reviews of the 5000 series Steve-o. I'm holdin ya to it! lol

Correction: Tuesday or Wednesday it will be in, sick of waiting though lol

You'll get your free copy of DiRT 2 and you can enjoy AvP in all it's DX11 glory.

Oh really? Well I bought it through an HRM retailer so god knows if those game keys will be included we'll see I'm sure.

I keep hearing AVP is terrible...