Here's my case:

I play several video games, all of them have been looking fine since yesterday night. This morning, I decided to install a sound card, Creative Sound Blaster Live! model SB0200. I tested my sound card out, installed the drivers, and everything went smoothly. Until I started up my game. There were green distortions all over the screen. I decided to restart the computer to see what happened. I couldn't figure it out. I installed the latest ATI driver, Catalyst 6.8, and even reinstalled DirectX 9c. All of course, to no avail. I unplugged my sound card, believing that it was the cause. Unfortunately not? I booted the games back up and noticed that the color distortion is gone, but there is still distortion. I system restored to two days ago and the problem still persists.

Green distortion:
http://www.nihonreview.com/images/TEMP1.JPG
http://www.nihonreview.com/images/TEMP2.JPG

Later distortion:
http://www.nihonreview.com/images/TEMP3.JPGOK that certainly is an odd problem. Shot in the dark... have you TRIED reinstalling a game to see if that works? Do you get distortion on the desktop?

Start > run > dxdiag

Click display and run the tests, and tell us the results.

On the ATI settings thing, look at your current video card TEMPERATURE.Yes, there is distortion outside of the games. I see distortion in the icons, mostly, and my mouse cursor. My desktop seems unaffected but the icons are either invisible or have lines coming through them or are faded.

The tests all went well except for when the tests required full screen. I would be able to see the spinning box and bouncing boxes but the black background is dotted with green lines. And is it normal for the cube to spin so fast? (it spins very very very fast)

I just tried another system restore, to four days ago, and the problem persists. I tried plugging my sound card back in and the problem persists. The card has been removed for the MEAN time.

My spec is:

9600 ATI Radeon
nForce3 250GB LanParty motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 3000+On display go to settings and select advanced. On trouble shooting try moving the slider and testing each mode.

Also try starting up Windows in safe mode. I think you can run dxdiag tests there too. If the problem still persists in safe mode it is probably a hardware issue.Make sure your video card and video cable are securely plugged in, you may have disturbed things while fitting the sound card.The video card is securely in its PCI slot and so is the attached video cable...otherwise I wouldn't see anything in my monitor, I think.

I can't find the "advanced" in the Display of DXDiag. And I certainly don't see a slider.

When I boot up my computer, on the Windows loading screen, I can see lots of dotted blue lines. There's a bunch of strange GRAPHICAL distortions...I was talking about the display properties, where you adjust your resolution. Look in there. Have you tried safe mode? Keep pressing F8 as you boot up.I ran DXDiag in safe mode and I could not test Direct3D. DirectDraw had the same results: first two tests were fine, but the last test, when using fullscreen, green lines appear and some strange pixelation occurs with RED and green (same as before). In safe mode my cursor and icons are fine.

I went back into normal mode and checked the Settings-Advanced tab in my Display Properties, as you had recommended. I tried all 6 modes, the first 3 did not allow me to run World of Warcraft because there was no enable 3D acceleration. The 4th mode allowed it but I saw the same green distortion once again. My cursor and icons are fine in the first 4 modes, but activating the 5th mode brings back the pixelation/distortion of the icons and my cursor. I think it's a software issue.In control panel go to system, hardware, device manager, and look under display adapters. Completely uninstall everything in this list and restart your computer. This will completely remove your video drivers. If it asks you to reinstall when you boot up again say no. Now try using the computer, looking in dxdiag etc (you won't get a game working) and see if you still get the problem. This will show us if it is a problem with the drivers or not..... After that reinstall your drivers, and see if this reinstall method has made any difference.

Aside from that the only thing I can think of is trying this card in another computer and/or trying a new card in this computer and seeing what happens.

You still have not told us the temperature of your card... it's unlikely it's overheating I think, but possible.

Good luck.Quote

The video card is securely in its PCI slot and so is the attached video cable...otherwise I wouldn't see anything in my monitor, I think.