Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1

Intel Core i7 960 @ 3.20GHz

12.0 GB Triple-Channel DDR3 @ 534MHz (8-8-8-20)

ASUSTeK Computer INC. P6X58D-E (LGA1366)

AMD Radeon HD 6900 Series (ATI) Driver AMD Catalyst 12.10

1863GB Western Digital WDC WD2002FAEX-007BA0 ATA Device (SATA)

Hi. My problem is that small dots are appearing all over the screen, their colour seems to mimic the colours on the screen at any given time. On pure text screen they arrange themselves in collumns vertically. More disturbing for me is in Second Life where the screen has so much disturbance all over. It is to the point where it is unplayable. There are flashes and streaks all over the screen, constantly flashing like lightening or electricity arcs, Its difficult to describe they are weird elongated triangles and rods all mimicing the colours in the screenshot, radiating out from some objects inworld but not all. The inworld support suggested I have a corrupt or out of date driver

I have done the following, none of which has worked.

Uninstalled completely CCC and used driver fushion premium to fully remove the left drivers and registry keys, Used CCleaner to scan the registry and fix that, rebooted as directed in the process and then reinstalled CCC and rebooted. Log into Second Life and still the same screen disturbances. I hooked up an old monitor I had to check and the same is showing on the different monitor. I have tinkered with the screen resolution , but two months ago with the same settings it was fine.

All this began around the time of the driver update to catalyst 12.8 and did not improve when 12.10 was released. Some days are far worse than others. The CPU temperature is running at 41C and the graphics card at 39C. My whole system was created 20 months ago so is not really "old"

Sounds like a heat issue so I'm having a little trouble believing the gpu is 39c during gaming.

It's good you posted your system specs but you neglected the heart of your system.. the psu.

#1: Phenom II C2 955BE @ 3.6, Antec Kuhler 920, Gigabyte GA-MA790FX-DS5, Asus 5870/V2, ASUS Xonar D2X, 4 x 1gig OCZ2N1066SR2GK @800, Antec Truepower New 750, Arc Midi, Win8pro x64 upgrade
#2: Athlon 64 X2 4200+, AGP 1950pro, Audigy 2, Asus A8V-D, 2gig ram,  Enermax 465P, Antec900. Now on Win8pro cat 10.2

Thanks for the reply. Sorry, I forgot about the psu and the temperatures were when static, not logged into Second Life. So here are the revised details. Any comment or help greatly appreciated as I am stumped and it is beginning to drive me crazy.

PSU: Corsair 650W tx650 v2- 80plus

Cooling: ECO Advanced Liquid Cooler

Temperatures when logged in to Second Life:

CPU: 46C

Motherboard: 34C

Graphics card: 59C

HDD's: 33C

All the drivers in my whole system are completely up to date and "functioning correctly" according to windows. I have run every Virus and Malware detection I can get, including Norton Power eraser and Microsofts maliscious software removal tool. and it comes up clean every time. I am not totally convinced I do not have some kind of virus though.

What happens if you reduce:

1. the frames per second in Second Life;
2. the screen resolution to match the monitor's native resolution, or less; or
3. the color depth to 16-bit, temporarily?  

At what point in the reduction in screen quality do the artifacts go away?