pc crashes during games - Please Help a noob

petie-b · 2 Sep 2006 at 20:26

Hi

My PC has started crashing whilst playing Halflife 2 episode 1.

it played halflife 2 fine back when that came out.

it did used to have the odd funny moment with doom 3 a little while ago too.

my spec:

AMD Athlon 64 3000
Asus K8V-X mobo
2x512mb OCZ Ram (the ones with gold heat sinks)
Thermaltake Purepower 480W PSU
Ati 9800 Pro (i think its the saphire one)

PC IS NOT OVERCLOCKED

one 80mm case fan at the front
one 90mm ish fan at the back
currently have the side off the case aswell.

the game plays for about 30mins or so, then the PC crashes, and usually restarts, although sometimes it doesnt.

a few weeks back i was running some graphical demos and it crashed a couple of times then too.

Any suggestions?

is there any diagnostics software i can run to help me find whats wrong?

Thanks guys

Pete

petie-b · 2 Sep 2006 at 20:30

it also crashes with sniper elite

thanks in advance

Old Wino · 2 Sep 2006 at 20:39

Graphics card overheating?

Don't know much about that card but, do you know what temperature the cards' gpu gets to when at full load? if so, let us know and I'm sure someone here will be able to tell if it's too hot

robertgilbert86 · 2 Sep 2006 at 20:42

Looks at the fan on the graphics card, it might need a hoover

petie-b · 2 Sep 2006 at 20:45

thanks for the reply,

no unfortunately, i dont know how to monitor temperatures?

any ideas?

KangooVanMan · 3 Sep 2006 at 09:48

I think only XT cards have thermal output.
When you say 'crashes' what do you mean? CTD, system lockup, infinate loop, system reset ect.
Does appear to be heat related, take the card out and blow the heatsink through I bet uit is chocker with fuzz!

t31os · 3 Sep 2006 at 09:58

Heat, memory or PSU instability, or driver issue (check the event log).

Read the faq, use google, and of course read any replies you get here

and it shouldnt be hard to find the fault.

petie-b · 3 Sep 2006 at 16:32

thanks for the replies guys, i have made some progress.

i have tried using a friends 9800 XT card, and all seems fine. Half life episode 1 seems to work with no problems, and sniper elite appears to work too.

so the problem appears to be the graphics card.

what do you think i should do to correct it? would it be worth fitting an arctic cooler to it? or is it knackered?

cant really afford a new card at the moment

Thanks guys

petie-b · 3 Sep 2006 at 23:35

do the arctic coolers come with heat transfer paste? or will i need some of that too?

County · 4 Sep 2006 at 10:33

my old 9800pro started doing this....

it was the fan....

just took the fan off it....gave it a good clean and put it back on....

and all was ok....

cheers

KangooVanMan · 4 Sep 2006 at 18:04

petie-b said:
do the arctic coolers come with heat transfer paste? or will i need some of that too?

I think yes, but it is a long time since I brought an artic cooler for a 9800xt in fact.

petie-b · 4 Sep 2006 at 18:31

thanks again for all the advice so far, I have an update for you.

The fan was full of fuzz, cleaned it out and replaced it but it didnt cure the problem at all.

I tried running halflife-episode one with my friends graphics card (9800 XT) and all seemed well for about an hour. figured we had found a solution....
However I tried running the game again tonight and it crashed again after only 10 minutes or so.

When it crashes it either cuts out completely and returns to windows, or more commonly the game just freezes completely. Sometimes the sound for that frame keeps playing and if you wait long enough it will eventually move on a frame or 2 but will always stop completely eventually.

Again any ideas would be appreciated.

Benny · 4 Sep 2006 at 19:42

Hmmm dunno,

if your Graphics card Fan was full of Fluff, is your HS/Fan for your CPU not in the same state also? give that a clean and see what happens. Who built your system? did they apply decent thermal compound or cheap paste. I think it can dry up in time and become less effective. Stabbing in the dark here....

Does your motherboard CD not have a Hardware monitor on it?

B

t31os · 4 Sep 2006 at 22:44

Make sure the fan is still spinning first, if your current still works it may just need some fresh compound, but if you wanna spend a small bit on an Arctic cooler then thats still a good choice.

My old Radeon 9500 had a 9700 cooler on it, pretty easy when compared to doing my x1800 today, goddamn is the cooler and heatsink big and awkward.

If you have a house fan/cooler, you know like the floor standers or desk one. If it kicks out a fair bit of air then you could pull the side of your case off and max the fan out pointed at the case. By doing this you'll be pushing loads of cool air toward the card, and if it helps then it will enforce your current beliefs. This of course won't really work if the fan isnt working or if the compound is totally dried up but it might help long enough to see if it makes a difference. I did this with my 9500 to help cool it until i got hold of an old 9700 cooler to stick on it.