I believe my video card is failing, what should I do?

Question

Recently I have been noticing my video card on my late 2009 iMac (nVIDIA Geforce 9400 GT is the card) has been performing poorly. I am usually on a Windows 7 partition and I someitimes recieve BSoD when playing graphics intensive games and video playback has been terrible. As I start up my iMac to perform some test, my system has a kernal panic. About an hour later, this happened again. I know that this is not a virus as I have 3 anit virus programs on each platform (iAntivirus, Sophos and ClamXav for mac, Norton, AVG and MS Security essentials for windows).
As I perform a test on my iMac, the program detects that the video ram is failing and needs repair. The program is called TechTool Deluxe and it came on an Apple Care disc I've had for a few years. My computer is no longer under warranty. Is there anything I can do or do I need it repaired by Apple? I am also wondering about how to protect my data too, as it is a dual  boot system. I have a backup for both partitions, but they are on different drives.

Answer 1

If you've run the AHT in extended, you now know how long it can take. Depends on the amount of RAM it has to check. That is the most time consuming part of the test.
The only reason I asked you to confirm with the AHT was that I've never used TTD (although, I have it on disc), and don't know how reliable it is. My thinking was that if both TTD and AHT find the same error, that would certainly remove any doubt. The usual problem with the AHT and, I suppose, TTD as well, is that if it finds an error, it can be trusted that the error is real. But coming up negative isn't all that meaningful.
With the symptoms you are describing, as I've already said, I'd just bring it in.
You might also try running on the OS X partition, with all that AV (unnecessary and completely overkill) uninstalled. You can leave the ClamX alone; it is not known to cause any problems.