[SOLVED] Installed new soundcard, now PC freezes while playing graphics-intense games

[Synder4786]

Hello,
My first post here, I usually lurk until I find a solution for these things, but I've failed to come up with one so far, so here it goes...

I recently installed a SB audigy in my PC.
At first, I had several problems with the card, attempting to get the actual surround sound feature to work.

After I remedied that, and started to play some games. (CoD4 and others) my computer would freeze randomly after a time, and to top it off, the computer would REFUSE to boot after that. (I got power, keyboard indicator lights, but didn't get the keyboard indicator "flash" indicating that the system was actually booting) The computer could refuse to boot for a time of anywhere between 5 and 30 minutes.

Then I formatted.

I reinstalled some basic programs, downloaded latest drivers.
Same issue.

So I updated the firmware for my Mobo, and that cut down on the "refusal to boot" problem I got, but my computer still froze.

I also added an 8800 graphics card to the mix, which further complicated things. The freezes occur more frequently now, and on occasion, I get crackling in my speakers when I scroll too fast through a webpage. (I presume it's due to the close proximity of the graphics card and the sound card, but those are the only two slots I have to work with, so separation can not be done)

I can run star wars galaxies indefinitely, hours on end. However, when I play CoD4, I crash/freeze in under an hour. Civilization 4 crash/freeze within 3 hours. LoTRO crash/freeze under an hour.

Here are things I have tried to fix the problem.

I thoroughly cleaned my system.
I re-applied arctic silver thermal grease to the heatsheild of my CPU.
I formatted.
I updated all possible firmware/drivers.
I ordered (not received yet) a better PSU (700w) and a better CPU fan (hope that fixes the problem when I get them)

My speculations are... Insufficient power from PSU, heat issue, or crappy mobo... As I've ordered the two former, I hope and pray it's not the mobo.

So I guess in order to rule out the PSU issue... Does a soundcard really require THAT much power? I mean, enough to actually show symptoms from a PC that worked otherwise perfectly before?

My rig, in summary has..
AMD Athlon X2 CPU
2x1 GB sticks of RAM
8800 GTS gfx card
Windows Vista
a 550 watt PSU. "sunbeam" I believe
4 case fans
2 PSU fans
1 gfx fan
1 cpu fan
Micro-ATX mobo, Microstar T-series I believe.

I'd appreciate any help offered on this issue, it's a nightmare sitting on a decent gaming rig that's incapable of even playing CiV4 for any amount of time.

[pharoah]

so the addition of a sound card is causing crashes?did you disable the onboard sound in the bios?that may be causing a conflict with the soundblaster.

[Synder4786]

Update.

Turned out to be a PSU issue.

I installed a newer, higher wattage one.
The 700 watt recommended by the stickies.

I still have speaker crackling, but I'm pretty sure that's because my sound card and gfx card are about 3 mm away from one another.

[pharoah]

glad ya got it fixed.