Hello, I'm a little stuck at this point with this problem. I am working on my mother's computer and the first problem I was having was that the computer would not boot to XP but was able to boot into safe mode. That is not the problem I need help on but the problem is that just before I could not boot into Windows I would get video corruption when booting up it would be discoloration on the screen and $$$$ and ----- scattered all over. So I ran the diagnostics provided from Dell and I get error about problems writing and reading the video memory. The exact error code is: Error Code: 5300:0119 Msg: Detected a failure while writing and reading video memory. Video Mode: 6h (640x200x2). Address: B8084h, expected to read 0h, but read 4040404h instead. Is the video card gone?

What does Dell's site say about that error? "So won’t you give this man his wings What a shame To have to beg you to see We’re not all the same What a shame" - Shinedown

Well according to the research that I have found it leads to that the graphics card is gone. The only thing is before I wiped the computer I was able to get into safe mode without the video corruption so that what lead me to the fact that it maybe a driver problem. But then I have done a driver update in a while so I dont understand why all of a sudden it would start doing this.

jaymack In simplified terms your graphics is basically two chips in one. The VGA portion which is basic and will work from the BIOS without the aid of any additional drivers and then the other portion, which does require drivers. So, the graphics card/chip could be defective and still look OK in safe mode. You may have noticed, safe mode only gives you VGA or SVGA mode @256 colors. I recommend you try updating the graphic drivers and see if that clears up the problem. If the corruption only occurs after some period of time you may have a GPU (graphics) overheating issue. If the inside of the tower has not been cleaned in a while then blow it out completely using canned or compressed air. Don't forget to do the power supply from both end too. DO NOT use a vacuum cleaner.

You are very right come to think about it about the safe mode and the VGA I'm not thinking. No the video corruption is instant as soon as you turn on the computer which leads me to believe that the card is going bad. I try to clean the computer out at least once a month so it was pretty clean in there. You also could be right about the overheating because when I first started trying to fix the problem I did noticed that the graphic's card fan was not spinning when I opened up the case (yes with it still on) and after I turned off the computer and removed the card it was extremely hot. I guess I already knew my answer just needed to bounce my theory off of somebody else. I'll be buy another card then. Thanks for all your assistance with this.