Persistant pc problems

ben500

ben500

ben500

Associate
Joined
17 May 2009
Posts
15
I'm having a lot of problems, for example this year alone I seem to have killed three pc's, my requirements are a little unusual and very demanding but I don't understand why I'm losing pc's at the rate I am.
The latest to fail on me iss an acer aspire, graphics went a bit iffy and I did hard shutdown and it won't boot back up, I get a red symbol flashing on monitor which is the outline of a square with a triangle segment missing from right hand side, the triangle is there but displaced to the right of the square, the symbol flashes red and is outline only infill is black the same as the rest of the screen, I have tried switching graphics card but no change.

I run approximately 30-50 flash games at once and was wondering if this is maybe damaging the systems.

I'd appreciate if anyone could offer any help.

I generally have around 30+ browser windows open across seven or eight different browser applications, flock,safari,firefox,kmeleon,chrome,opera, seamonkey and i/e. I get a lot of problems with browsers failing and shutting down also, and recently the amount of windows I am able to open before losing browsers is decreasing to an unacceptable level for me.
The latest pc to pack up was being used as a secondary and would have had less strain on it than my main pc, browser problems occur across both pc's though, window mists up and I get not responding message followed by shutdown of browser, I am unable to shut down the stalled window on it's own and the whole browser set has to be shut down.
 
Last edited:
I generally run two pc's in tandem so the work is reduced by at least 50% on one pc, my main pc is an acer aspire x3200 not exactly a tiddler
 
I wasn't claiming it was top end but I'd suggest it should be capable of handling 50% of the decribed capacity. In any event that pc is fine or at the moment it is anyway, does anybody have any idea what the symbol displayed on the monitor represents by any chance?
 
DreXeL said:
But why? I assume for testing puposes?
Click to expand...
No I actually play the games, I know it sounds bizarre but I do have good reason, if the current system is not up to it then I have no problem upgrading if someone would like to suggest what kind of system specifications I would need to sustain such performance requirements
 
I need them all open at same time as games are simultaneuous, the sites all share same server, I am a member of a number of sites of same network and best advantage can be gained by logging in as individual on each account. Essentially the more id's I have logged in at same time the more money I can make. I currently have 4g ram, with 1g graphics, running on a phenom x4
 
I'll be happy to answer any questions you put forward regarding usage and even just to satisfy your curiosity within reason, I am at a loss as to what info you would require, you may well be hitting the nail on the head with software bottleneck can you elaborate on how I would identify this as the cause please?

With respect to browser crashes, is it possible that this is some kind of server rejection as a result of mulitple hits from the same isp perhaps?
 
Last edited:
westom said:
There was a good article in IEEE Spectrum at least one year ago about this. Very interesting article that even described how the user had generated income doing so. Forgot the article name.
Click to expand...

Absolutely Westom, my needs are almost identical to those described in the article if it's the same one I am aware of I don't have a link I'm afraid. But yes I require upwards of 40 seperate windows, and indeed would like to expand this to as much as 75 later, all windows would be running flash programs and may be running on same servers in many cases. I realise I could be suffering from something as simple as browser conflict/compatibility with relation to browser crashes and obviously recognise this as something seperate to the dying pc problem.
 
PhoenixUK said:
Just opened 18 instances of firefox, each one with 3 tabs and flash game running in each tab.

That's on my media PC with e2200 and 2gb ram.
Apart from massive slowdown due to pagefile access ( ran outta ram ) I can't really see any problem.

The CPU is at about 60% load.

I bet its either your power socket as Jon have said above or you just have VERY VERY bad luck. Or your PCs had some rubbish chinese PSUs which couldn't cope with the load ( which most likely is the case as PCs don't just die randomly, it would have been crappy PSU that blew up and took all the components with it ).

If you want a new build I would grab 955BE with 8GB ram and seasonic/be quiet PSU, should be more than fine with that kinda stuff.
Click to expand...

Thanks, power socket sounds possibility, pc is run from extension which I would concede is probably overloaded, I wasn't aware this would have any effect, I do however have a belkin surge and powersave in line. You've certainly given me some things to think about that's for sure.
I normally only open one instance of firefox and run as many as eight or ten tabs each with a related window with flash game running, when the browser's are affected it isn't normally one, they tend to fail one after another until stabalising when I don't re-open dead browsers and run minimal amount of windows. I will repeat the above for seamonkey,kmeleon etc, ie doesn't allow me to have more than one instance of the game running as latest window open takes id of previous window and not new game.
 
Mattus said:
If your PC uses good components and is configured correctly, then it shouldn't crash no matter how much load you put on it.

I would suggest not buying any more crappy prebuilt PCs from Acer and getting a decent system from OcUK. Doesn't matter if you build it or they do, as long as it has quality components in it.
Click to expand...
Again sound advice, problem being is I don't understand enough to know exactly what my requirements are, I bought this latest Acer because I thought it would be able to handle it, so far it has, it is a much lesser specked Acer that has recently died out on me.
 
Ok I'll try and clarify, I have three dead systems, first is a Dell 4700 series which packed up just over four months ago, fan was running nuts for a while prior to failure, now when I switch on the fan runs fast and loud and system will not boot, second is acer which until yesterday apart from browser problems was running fine, yesterday I was not watching system as it is secondary system and was running whilst I was active on main, I noticed that graphics quality had become really poor, the mouse was not reactive and I did a hard shut down, the system will no longer boot up, when I switch on I get the red symbol described above on the screen but nothing else, I have switched the graphics card but no result there, power light comes on and dvd drive appears to start up but no more activity than this that I am aware of, no beeps.

The third is a gaming machine which originally would light up all the flash lighting but not boot up, I have tested the power supply on another unit and it is fine, I suspect that the motherboard and or processor may be the problem with this one, but not sure how to determine which.

Essentially I have two problems one browser based and the other would appear hardware based as I understand it. I have not viewed event logs in answer to that question, as to be honest I don't recall how to.

I will monitor task manager tomorrow when I am due to play another session, is there anything I should be keeping an eye out for by any chance?
 
Last edited:
Looking at your spec pheonix, I suspect between the three dead pc's I have that I have a good deal of that equipment of equal or greater spec, I shall have a look, I'm sure I've got a decent graphics card in the gamer, I have 4g spare ram, and an excellent psu for starters and am wondering if I can use these and water it down to bring down the cost a little, I'll need to check just exactly what I have and compare with your recommendations.

Thanks for all your comments folks I appreciate your time helping.
 
Sorry Westom but what exactly do you require from me? Bearing in mind I am just a layman coming here for help not lectures, I have no idea how to perform diagnostics on a machine to determine the cause of the problem, if I had perhaps I wouldn't be here asking for assistance.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom