PCI-e Cord Damage and Stuttering/Stopping Video Playback Perhaps Related?

Xenogear_0001

Hey everybody, I wanted to know if it was possible that damage sustained to the PCI-e cord going from the power supply to my GPU could cause playback issues on video? Whether it's streaming online or a video file on my harddrive, it's stuttering, halting, and forcing me to skip forward and back a bit to get it running again. It seems to just hang if left alone.

This just seemed to start quite recently. Since I took the side off my case some time ago (for cooling purposes--the old card ran hot as hell) and lost the screws to put it back on, the guts are exposed. Now, my pet rabbit who's basically free-range, a decision I'm regretting and reconsidering, decided that the PCI-e cord sticking out looked tasty, and so nommed on it enough to cause some damage. The inside of the cord is partly exposed, essentially.

Now, there's no sparking or anything, and games seem to run fine so far. This has led me to believe that it's possible there's a driver conflict or a codec problem. It's worth mentioning that driver installation said it had some problems, but wouldn't tell me what they were, and games never had any problem running.

Basically, I'm asking if one of the two PCI-e cords being damaged could cause problems like what I'm seeing. Any thoughts?

minor incident

That would definitely be odd, but when a rabbit chews on your video card power cables, anything is possible. The first thing I would do is replace that cable. It'll cost you 5 bucks and it'll either fix your problem, or eliminate a possibility. Either way, you should absolutely replace that cable.

Xenogear_0001

The thing is, it seems integrated into the PSU. Damn thing is like an octopus, with cables going this way and that. To my untrained eye, they just seem to sprout out of the PSU, so I'm not sure how I'd replace it. :\

Here's what I'm talking about:

Spoiler:

That's a Corsair tx650, by the way.

minor incident

Right. Just stop using that power cable, and go buy a molex-to-PCIe power adapter cable, then use that attached to a spare 4-pin molex plug to replace the chewed one.

Like I said, it very well might not be the issue, but you should never use exposed power cabling.

Fake edit: like this - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812198022

Xenogear_0001

Thanks! Didn't know about those and I have spare Molex wires just dangling about. This saves me the trouble of having to buy another PSU and go through the trouble of trying to fit it all in the shitty case I have. I appreciate the quick response!

minor incident

No problem. I'd also suggest wrapping the damaged one up in electrical tape to ensure it doesn't short due to some freak accident.