I just removed my graphic card fan for clean-up (RADEON 9600SE). During that time, i turned on the computer to see if it will work without the graphic card fan, it did work but at some kind of low resolution mode. Meaning that i had vertical lines in some video mode, for example, while watching a video ou during the windows xp logo starting sequence. Letters during POST were also affected but in a different way, some letter are more "highlighted" than others. When i saw that, of course i reput the fan back on and restarted the computer, same thing happened. Am i doomed ? I thought at first it might be a "dirty contact" problem so i removed the card again and gently clean the contacts with air. No difference. The display problem that i never had before re-appeared. Is there a way to reset the graphic card (i mean by dong something to the hardware) since it's not windows related. Thank you.

What was the purpose of seeing if "it will work without the graphic card fan"? You definitely damaged the video card. Some CPUs don't last even a second with the fan not working, GPUs are no different. There's nothing you can do to get it to work normally again. WinSimple Software

Simply because a salesman told me that some of todays graphic card don't even have a fan so i could buy one if i want a silent card. Besides, the chip on the graphic card while i was doing this was not even hot at all. The problem appear AS SOON as i turn the pc on. It was obvious on the POST writing. Don't tell me 15 or 20 sec without getting hot are enough to fry a graphic card. I completely agree with you for a CPU but i find that strange that this happen to agraphic card. POST text is really not very demanding.

do you think, there is a possibilty, that while removing the fan, you also loosened the heatsink.? Maybe that is why it was not hot? So in effect you were running without a fan or heat sink? larry

Nope, There were no heatsink. Just a metallic case to protect the fan, but hardly a heatsink. I found some pictures on the net of 9600se with heatsink, but not mine. I found this photo of a 9600se similar to mine. Please take a look: http://www.hardwareoc.hu/cikkek/Roa...

"Just a metallic case to protect the fan, but hardly a heatsink." I suspect that the metallic case might really be the heatsink. Small fans like that are normally all plastic.

Other pictures i saw with the heatsink really look like heatsink. The case on mine is made of a very fragile plastic. Here is a pic of a one with a heatsink: http://www.techpowerup.com/gpudb/im... Anyway, i have to completely remove this "case" to have access to the fan. There were 3 screws for the fan on the case and 4 screws for the 2 parts case itself.