I would add a fan even during tests to avoid damaging it even more. A case fan near the card should be enough. No need to attach it to the card.

Memory issues generally don't prevent the driver to load. This just cause graphics corruptions. So memory is not my first suspect.

The error at driver loading make me think that the GPU itself may have problems. BGA cracks ?
You can try some hot air on the GPU.

As a last resort, I got one of mine to work again at fourth reflow in my oven. But it's quite controversial and not recommended. I didn't had an hot air station back then.

I did a reflow (adequate flux, chip floating). Windows detects it mut cannot initialize it, but giflash does not find it anymore.
No post either.
Bummer.
A known working bios-file sure would be handy.

oh2ftu wrote on 2023-08-16, 15:46:

I did a reflow (adequate flux, chip floating). Windows detects it mut cannot initialize it, but giflash does not find it anymore […]
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I did a reflow (adequate flux, chip floating). Windows detects it mut cannot initialize it, but giflash does not find it anymore.
No post either.
Bummer.
A known working bios-file sure would be handy.

I have two GeForce DDR, only one with DVI but not a 3D prophet.
I can upload the bios if you want.

That looks eerily similar. I'd appreciate an uploaded bios.

oh2ftu wrote on 2023-08-16, 18:09:

That looks eerily similar. I'd appreciate an uploaded bios.

I just had a look and i'm afraid i did not dumped the bios when i tested the card.
I will definitely save it the next time i will use it.

By the meantime, if this can help, there is the bios from vgamuseum here : http://www.vgamuseum.info/index.php/companies … dia-geforce-ddr (bottom of the page) Direct link : http://www.vgamuseum.info/index.php/companies … 697e26bdd571e3b

You can also find the creative 3d blaster bios on the driver disk available on archive.org.

Well. Did a reball. The GPU-chip is warped and does not lie down flat. And yes, I was gentle (preheat to 100°C etc).
That's that then. For spares.

Ouch, that's unfortunate. 🙁
What kind of temperature were you using for hot air?
Also, I wonder if the chip from an SDR card would work on a DDR card or if they're different chips.

oh2ftu wrote on 2023-08-20, 15:28:

Well. Did a reball. The GPU-chip is warped and does not lie down flat. And yes, I was gentle (preheat to 100°C etc).
That's that then. For spares.

Really unfortunate but did your best.

Thermalwrong wrote on 2023-08-20, 22:55:

Ouch, that's unfortunate. 🙁
What kind of temperature were you using for hot air?
Also, I wonder if the chip from an SDR card would work on a DDR card or if they're different chips.

I think they are all the same. But i ll be curious about how it's done. Because the chip seems to support different type of memory : SDRAM, SGRAM, DDR SGRAM
-> https://www.tomshardware.fr/comparatif-de-gef … oire-graphique/ (French)

oh2ftu wrote on 2023-08-20, 15:28:

Well. Did a reball. The GPU-chip is warped and does not lie down flat. And yes, I was gentle (preheat to 100°C etc).

you need to bake old chips for several hours, not just preheat the pcb. Bend chip means it popcorned inside.