First post, by dmruschell
I recently bought a “tested working” Voodoo5 that wasn’t. It was a good price, and even better since I got a full refund without needing to return the card. So, I’ve been trying to fix it.
The issue is that with both VSA chips enabled at stock speed, there is striped artifacting in D3D and a bit more random artifacting in Glide. Most of my troubleshooting has been in D3D, but I’m fairly certain the cause is the same regardless of the API.
In D3D, it appears as though the artifacts are missing textures. The background will render, but the object textures will be transparent, allowing the background to show through.
If I select Single Chip Only in the AA settings, the artifacting disappears. If I downclock the card from 166 to 160MHz, the artifacting lessens. If I downclock to 156MHz, the artifacting disappears.
What I’ve done:
I replaced all 4 memory chips around the rear VSA chip (the one nearest the power connector), as I’ve seen in posts and repair videos that the rear VSA is the one that is disabled when selecting Single Chip Only. I replaced them one at a time with no change.
I also replaced a missing 10uf cap, a dented 10uf cap, replaced the missing 100uf cap, and replaced the slightly dented 470uf cap.
None of this changed the artifacting. I did not find any loose pins on the chip near the power connector and pressing on various parts of the card did not affect the artifacting. Though, a loose pin wouldn’t be fixed by downclocking.
So, I’m reaching a point where I’m not sure what else to check or what else the problem could be. Of course, it could be that the VSA chip itself is going bad. I hope that’s not the case, as I don’t have the equipment needed to replace it.
Does anyone here have any suggestions on what to check next? Would failing 10uf caps cause this? Thanks in advance for your help. Here are links to videos of what the Artifacting looks like.
