Multiple PC Games that I am playing - Farcry, KOTOR, but mostly Doom3 have been freezing up on me and posting the microsoft error report window and then crashing to windows which seems fine. Could the card simply be overheating? It doesn't feel all that hot to the touch (the passive heatsink which I've screwed a thermaltake chipset cooler onto). Wouldn't that cause the whole computer to lock up or just the game I was playing? I don't get any artifacting or distortions of any type - the game just all of a sudden hiccups and then crashes to windows after popping up the error report.
I've installed latest catalyst drivers (including doom beta) tried omega drivers, tried reinstalling DX9.0B&C, tried underclocking Video Card using Radlinker (card is locked), tried two sound cards and latest drivers, tried absolutely lowest game settings, tried flashing the bios of my card to another 9600NP and 9600 Pro (an entirely different problem) and probably other things I can't even think of.
I am also having trouble flashing the bios of my Sapphire 9600 NP 256MB. I wanted to flash a 9600 Pro bios or even a 9600NP bios but every time I tried ATIFlash kept giving me Error 0FL01. I tried flashing 5 different bios's for either pro or non-pro models of the 9600 and I kept getting the same result. Is this because the card I have is 'locked' or am I just doing something wrong. The command I was typing from DOS was: atiflash -f -p 0 xxx.bin
I'm very close to giving up and purchasing a FX5900XT but I sure don't want to drop the $175 so any help would be greatly appreciated.