PC crashes due to Video Card

andyvosayslalal · 02-13-2009, 11:44 PM

Hi, im running on a NVIDIA Geforce 7950gx2, and ive been having problems while gaming recently in Fallout 3, mirrors edge, etc. when i alt tab into the game. Even on low-demanding games such as warcraft III, my computer sometimes crashes when i Alt tab into the game. It happens about once every 10 times, and the game freezes after i alt tab then after about 2 minutes my computer restarts. I have the latest NVIDIA driver installed, any thoughts on what could be wrong?

roadsweeper · 02-14-2009, 02:48 AM

I cant answer this one directly, there may be a definate reason for it... but its just a fact that some games dont really like alt tabbing well. When you try and go back to it, the video fails to re-initialise, and crashes. The best way is just to not alt tab. It could be something to do with graphics memory, but I'm really not sure on that, the 7950 has a ton of gfx RAM, so i doubt your running out of that, how much main RAM does your comp have?

If you really need to alt tab a lot, a workaround is to run the game in a windowed mode, rather than fullscreen, ok you get an annoying little bar around the top, but your computer will be a lot more stabile when alt tabbing, with less frequent crashes.

In my past experience, its not really something you can do a lot about, its mainly due to driver instability, later revisions of graphic drivers usually have fixes for this kind of stuff, but thats just something you have to wait for.

Again, there is prob a technical reason for it that I am unaware of, but thats how I've got round it in the past.

andyvosayslalal · 02-14-2009, 12:14 PM

yeah i have 4gb ddr2 ram so i sohuld be fine on the ram part, oh well i guess ill just have to deal with it, the only problem is that my whole pc rrestarts. Usually only hte game crashes..

ech0419 · 02-14-2009, 01:55 PM

You can try a virtual machine if you are worried about the entire system crashing. Only the virtual system should crash if it is a software problem - both the virtual machine and your computer will go down if it's hardware. You may be able to play with a bit more ease but it will kill the performance in comparison to not running virtual machines.

andyvosayslalal · 02-15-2009, 01:51 AM

hmmm ive never tried using that, could u explain in a bit more detail what that is? ive never actually tried about it nor heard about it :p thanks

ech0419 · 02-16-2009, 02:54 PM

Ok well, a virtual system is a system which is emulated under your current operating system. You can run experimental programs, test a new OS, test w/e - Changes will not affect your system, only the virtual one. Only software - I mean if you are running the virtual system and poke a paper clip into your motherboard - it will kill the hardware.

I mean I was just throwing thoughts out there. For gaming it is very impractical unless you have a computer with dual quad core processors and ddr7 (yes 7) memory, and a raid0 with 12 velociraptors. On an average PC and even on my custom desktop I see a lot of lag at times while just fooling with things.

Personally I use it, I couldn't tell you the "this and that's" of virtual systems. I do know that there is some issues with the processor a few others with the virtual system itself (partition, virtual partition) more then likely being on the other side of you hard disk - this causes it to take much longer to seek etc etc.

02-13-2009, 11:44 PM	#1 (permalink)
andyvosayslalal Registered User Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 21 OS: Windows XP	PC crashes due to Video Card Hi, im running on a NVIDIA Geforce 7950gx2, and ive been having problems while gaming recently in Fallout 3, mirrors edge, etc. when i alt tab into the game. Even on low-demanding games such as warcraft III, my computer sometimes crashes when i Alt tab into the game. It happens about once every 10 times, and the game freezes after i alt tab then after about 2 minutes my computer restarts. I have the latest NVIDIA driver installed, any thoughts on what could be wrong?

02-14-2009, 02:48 AM	#2 (permalink)
roadsweeper Registered User Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Dingwall, UK Posts: 45 OS: Vista Ultimate x64	Re: PC crashes due to Video Card I cant answer this one directly, there may be a definate reason for it... but its just a fact that some games dont really like alt tabbing well. When you try and go back to it, the video fails to re-initialise, and crashes. The best way is just to not alt tab. It could be something to do with graphics memory, but I'm really not sure on that, the 7950 has a ton of gfx RAM, so i doubt your running out of that, how much main RAM does your comp have? If you really need to alt tab a lot, a workaround is to run the game in a windowed mode, rather than fullscreen, ok you get an annoying little bar around the top, but your computer will be a lot more stabile when alt tabbing, with less frequent crashes. In my past experience, its not really something you can do a lot about, its mainly due to driver instability, later revisions of graphic drivers usually have fixes for this kind of stuff, but thats just something you have to wait for. Again, there is prob a technical reason for it that I am unaware of, but thats how I've got round it in the past. Last edited by roadsweeper; 02-14-2009 at 02:53 AM.

02-14-2009, 12:14 PM	#3 (permalink)
andyvosayslalal Registered User Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 21 OS: Windows XP	Re: PC crashes due to Video Card yeah i have 4gb ddr2 ram so i sohuld be fine on the ram part, oh well i guess ill just have to deal with it, the only problem is that my whole pc rrestarts. Usually only hte game crashes..

02-14-2009, 01:55 PM	#4 (permalink)
ech0419 Registered User Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: North Eastern US Posts: 172 OS: XP pro ~ Vista Ultimate x64 & x32 ~ os x 10.4 ~ Ubuntu 7.10	Re: PC crashes due to Video Card You can try a virtual machine if you are worried about the entire system crashing. Only the virtual system should crash if it is a software problem - both the virtual machine and your computer will go down if it's hardware. You may be able to play with a bit more ease but it will kill the performance in comparison to not running virtual machines.

02-15-2009, 01:51 AM	#5 (permalink)
andyvosayslalal Registered User Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 21 OS: Windows XP	Re: PC crashes due to Video Card hmmm ive never tried using that, could u explain in a bit more detail what that is? ive never actually tried about it nor heard about it :p thanks

02-16-2009, 02:54 PM	#6 (permalink)
ech0419 Registered User Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: North Eastern US Posts: 172 OS: XP pro ~ Vista Ultimate x64 & x32 ~ os x 10.4 ~ Ubuntu 7.10	Re: PC crashes due to Video Card Ok well, a virtual system is a system which is emulated under your current operating system. You can run experimental programs, test a new OS, test w/e - Changes will not affect your system, only the virtual one. Only software - I mean if you are running the virtual system and poke a paper clip into your motherboard - it will kill the hardware. I mean I was just throwing thoughts out there. For gaming it is very impractical unless you have a computer with dual quad core processors and ddr7 (yes 7) memory, and a raid0 with 12 velociraptors. On an average PC and even on my custom desktop I see a lot of lag at times while just fooling with things. Personally I use it, I couldn't tell you the "this and that's" of virtual systems. I do know that there is some issues with the processor a few others with the virtual system itself (partition, virtual partition) more then likely being on the other side of you hard disk - this causes it to take much longer to seek etc etc.