My tech support friend and I have been trying to resolve a problem on my system, running XP SP2 and an ATI Radeon 9600, that appeared in the last 24 hours. The symptoms are as follows:

1. Certain mouse pointers have a vertical line about 10 pixels to the left of the center of the pointer. The line is about 150% as tall as a text insert pointer and the top lines up with the top of your typical "I" shaped text insert pointer. The affected pointers appear to be any input symbol. Ie: text insert pointer in MS Word, Firefox or IE, MS Outlook, the + in MS Excel and all Photoshop pointers. This list is not exhaustive.

2. Behind or even on top of certain graphics is a pink grid of dots. These graphics include, but are not limited to, MSN Messenger taskbar icon when signed in, behind the monitor preview of a screen saver or desktop background in desktop properties dialogue and even in the xp when it is booting up. The grid appears close to the following:

...

...
...
...

...

But across the whole image.

3. A grid of similar pattern, but much larger scale appears in Win Media Player 10, in the play area, when a video is playing. This does not affect the visualizations when a song is playing.

After a complete virus scan, system restore, software & driver update and thorough web search I can find no solution to the problem. The only positive result is that now the MSN Messenger taskbar icon no longer appears to be displaying the pink grid but it is everywhere else as before. This may be two separate problems but they appeared at the same time without any updates, new software or other significant change to the system.

Any help or suggested course of action would be appreciated

Sounds like an overclocked video card.

It may have been purchased overclocked already, or perhaps you were overclocking it, the past?

An overclocked video card will exhibit no issues for hours, days, weeks, months, years even. Eventually though it will catch up, as you described.

Did you check if the video card fan is still spinning? Also feel the temperature of the video card... very hot?

Your best bet is to borrow another video card to make the determination.

I do not believe it is or was overclocked. The current temperature of it, according to the ATI Catalyst control center says it is running at 39 degrees C and to the touch there is no extra heat. With the ATI Overdrive enabled for a time the temperature did not change.

Of course being in a stinking wheelchair with paralyzed hands isn't helping me resolve the issue. I'll probably have to take it in somewhere. If anyone has other suggestions I appreciate your response. Thanks HVAC888.

The ATI overdrive is ATI's own built-in overclocking utility, try disabling it. Also I didn't think the a 9600 supported this feature. Its probably a 9600XT?

In any case, if you do find the solution, please post back, as a FYI.

Well, I can't get my hands on an extra card so I'm thinking I might just pick one up and give it a try. The other sources I have queried about this seem to think heat damage. I don't know either way. The fan is good, the software reports 38-40 degrees and it is physically normal to the touch. It happened one night during the night while running idle. Doesn't seem like it should be heat damage but it could be electrical failure in the card.

So a system analysis is $50, a new card is $90... I'll opt for the new card because if that is the problem I'll need to spend the $90 on top of the $50 not to mention a week without my puter. The new card won't be ATI though. Probably nVidia since I have a card, now in my dad's comp, that has performed very well for almost five years.

This might not be done until next week some time when I get a chance to dig in but I'll report my findings once the new card is in.

Well, it was the video card. Before my first post I hadn't tested the issue in a more complex program like a game. Well, five seconds into SW: Jedi Academy revealed may more rendering issues. Google Earth had similar issues.

Regardless, I have upgraded to BFG NVidia 7600 GS OC. Went well for my first ever hardware work. I had the concept in my head but had never done anything like that. At least if I had to spend some money we now have a card with twice the power. Maybe a stick of RAM in a year & it'll be a fine machine for another two years.

Good to see the problem fixed. Your first hardware work? Maybe its just the beginning:)

I doubt it. With my paralyzed hands my dear wife did the physical part but I do see that apart from conflicts building a computer from scratch wouldn't be as tough as I once thought. Not going to test that theory though but I'm not afraid to upgrade a part or add a stick of RAM now. :)