Joined
·
348 Posts
Hey, I have a pretty serious computer problem, and despite everything ive tried, I cant seem to fix it. I wasnt sure where to post this, as I have no idea what so ever as to what is the exact problem, so ill just put it here.
The problem is mostly with games, and other 3D applications.
The older games run a bit better, every few minutes the computer will just 'pause' for 4-5 seconds, and keeps doing it all the time.
With the newer games, after about 5 minutes play, the computer just shuts down. Power light is still on, but everything else has turned off. I have to hold the power button till the light goes on, then turn it on again.
I have thought it might be the graphics card, since it does it mostly in games. I tried a new card, not as powerfull as the one I had, but was easy and cheap to buy. Despite beeing a brand new card, it didnt make even the slightest bit of difference, and the problem continued.
I then tried Memtest86, no errors found. Just to be sure, I tried running with just one of my RAM sticks in, still crashed. Swaped the RAM sticks, tried again, still crashed.
Then I tried a CPU Stress Test, Prime95. Went on for about 30 minutes, no errors or problems of any type.
Tried to clean out the PC, took the graphics card out, and cleaned the heatsink and fan. Did the same with the CPU, and applied some new thermal grease. Also cleaned up and checked the connections on all other parts of the computer, all seems fine.
Didnt help one bit.
I didnt test it, but I doubt its any heat problems, or even power supply.
My 550W PSU is more than enough for these PC specs.
As for heating, the graphics card, CPU, northbridge chipset, and HD all have sensors on them, and I have a readout of two on the front of the PC, with the other two through Windows.
GPU on the graphics card never goes much over 40C, the CPU upto 45C, HD and northbridge are usually around 30C or lower.
I am fresh out of ideas here, what left could there be to check?
If anyone has ANY ideas whatsoever, please let me know!
I have totaly given up trying to fix this myself.
Thanks in advance,
Jamie
PS, these are my specs:
AMD Athlon XP 3200+,
Gigabyte Gefore FX 5950 Ultra GT Edition 256mb,
2x512mb PC3200 400MHz DDR SDRAM,
Biostar M7NCD mobo,
Maxtor DiamondMax Plus9 160GB 8MB Cache,
Q-Tec 550W PSU
The problem is mostly with games, and other 3D applications.
The older games run a bit better, every few minutes the computer will just 'pause' for 4-5 seconds, and keeps doing it all the time.
With the newer games, after about 5 minutes play, the computer just shuts down. Power light is still on, but everything else has turned off. I have to hold the power button till the light goes on, then turn it on again.
I have thought it might be the graphics card, since it does it mostly in games. I tried a new card, not as powerfull as the one I had, but was easy and cheap to buy. Despite beeing a brand new card, it didnt make even the slightest bit of difference, and the problem continued.
I then tried Memtest86, no errors found. Just to be sure, I tried running with just one of my RAM sticks in, still crashed. Swaped the RAM sticks, tried again, still crashed.
Then I tried a CPU Stress Test, Prime95. Went on for about 30 minutes, no errors or problems of any type.
Tried to clean out the PC, took the graphics card out, and cleaned the heatsink and fan. Did the same with the CPU, and applied some new thermal grease. Also cleaned up and checked the connections on all other parts of the computer, all seems fine.
Didnt help one bit.
I didnt test it, but I doubt its any heat problems, or even power supply.
My 550W PSU is more than enough for these PC specs.
As for heating, the graphics card, CPU, northbridge chipset, and HD all have sensors on them, and I have a readout of two on the front of the PC, with the other two through Windows.
GPU on the graphics card never goes much over 40C, the CPU upto 45C, HD and northbridge are usually around 30C or lower.
I am fresh out of ideas here, what left could there be to check?
If anyone has ANY ideas whatsoever, please let me know!
I have totaly given up trying to fix this myself.
Thanks in advance,
Jamie
PS, these are my specs:
AMD Athlon XP 3200+,
Gigabyte Gefore FX 5950 Ultra GT Edition 256mb,
2x512mb PC3200 400MHz DDR SDRAM,
Biostar M7NCD mobo,
Maxtor DiamondMax Plus9 160GB 8MB Cache,
Q-Tec 550W PSU
