gallopingwanker

I just got a custom made computer, and i've been having problems ever since i got it put together....i'll be playing a game, and maybe 10 minutes into it, the computer will just restart, it's happened 4 times in a row now...some people say it's the video card overheating, some say it's the mother board, what do you think?

my system specs are..
amd athlon xp 3200+
ati radeon 9800 pro
80 gb hdd
nforce2 400 ddr mobo
1 gb ram
400 watt psu

soopafreek

first step's first: Operating System?

if XP, uncheck the "automatically reboot after system failure" and see if it gives you an error message or blue screen.

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Wyodiver33

What kind of cooling are you using? I mean for the CPU and for the case.

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Bamrak

http://mbm.livewiredev.com/ This program will give you case and processor temps, that may help you figure out which of the two it is.

gallopingwanker

the only cooling i am using is the fan that came with the cpu and another fan that my friend installed the other day...i opened the side and rested a actual ground fan on it to see if i could play the game longer and what not, i probably played 2 or 3 times longer with the big fan blowing in it...but it still rebooted.

goddfather40

Did you properly place the thermal compound on the processor core?

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Bamrak

Give us some Processor temps. it sounds like you've got seating issue between the heatsink/ fan and the processor.

MooseMan3000

WELL. I think we may have found the problem then.

If this happens every time, chances are something is fuxed up. Whoever custom built your computer is an ass hole and deserves to die, because he didn't give you enough cooling on SOMETHING. If I had to guess, I'd say the processor, though it could be NEARLY anything. If your motherboard supports it (it should, since it's new), go into bios (usually press Del during startup) and look for temperatures. If your processor gets really hot after a few minutes, then the computer shuts down, I think there's a pretty good chance that's a problem. If you find that's the problem, I would go talk to this guy, demand that he either fix your existing heatsink/fan setup or buy you a new one and install it PROPERLY.

Johnny Rotten

An intake fan on the front of the cast and an exhaust fan in the back (*not* the fan on the back of the power supply) is standard operating procedure these days. You have to have both fans. Just having an exhaust fan creates a slight vacuum that will raise temperatures, and just having and intake fan is useless, because you want to move hot air out, instead of just adding more air. I also suspect that the heatsink was not properly installed (flush with the CPU and glazed carefully with compound).

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panbert

My two cents:

I'll take on a different approach than temperature issue. If after adding in more fans and running your PC in a fridge doesn't fix the problem, I recommend looking into your BIOS. I've had problems in the past where I've run either the CPU or the memory faster than they can handle.

So go into your BIOS and make sure your CPU clockspeed and memory clockspeed aren't set too high. Remember your Athlon CPU clockspeed iS *NOT* 3.2 GHz!!!

For your memory speed, try setting it to 166MHz (which is effectively 333MHz as you're using DDR) instead of 200 MHz (effectively 400MHz).

Hey! I could be totally wrong. Just giving you another angle to solve your problem. Good luck.

Jolt

If you're crashing only during games...there is one more possibility...does your nice whizbanggy video card take a lead from the power supply? And if so, is it daisy-chained with your hard disk? If so, separate them, put them on separate leads from the supply.

The video cards that need the extra juice suck it down hard when the 3D effects kick in...

Bamrak

Not a bad angle, however I found this:

His card also has a fan on it, so unless he has it seated next to a card that restricts a lot of airflow, I don't think the card is running hot.

Keep us posted

I'm thinking he's cooking his processor every time he loads a game since AMD tends to run hotter than Intel chips.

gallopingwanker

wow...i'm overwhelmed with the intelligence, lol......last night after my computer rebooted in the middle of a game, i went into the bios and checked the temps, and the 2 temps it gave were (first) 28ºc and the second was around 49ºc...i forget which temp was what but that's the 2 in the order it said...i heard that 49º isn't too high and about normal, so i don't know.....

i'm a n00b to pc's so, i don't know what the thermal compound/ processor core deal is, i could ask my friend all this stuff....

i believe my cpu clock speed is set at 2.19 GHz, i didn't try setting my ram to 166 MHz, but i can try that after work today.....

Jolt, i don't know what taking a lead from a power supply is, all i know is that my video card is the only thing in a pci slot right now, and theres really nothing next to it restricting air supply......

This thing is really confusing me because it could be so many things and it's hard to get it down to just one thing....

thanks for all the help, you guys have insane knowledge....

theburner

That is the problem with computers.. You just have to start eliminating the most obvious causes and keep working through the list until you find the fault. Usually I start with the easy ones first!

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Bamrak

Th first was case temp and the second was CPU- those are normal/warm but the fan may have cooled the processor back down. Once my processor comes out from under a load, my temp drops fast. Anything over 60 getting to the point of being hot. you're not far from it at all.

The reason I suggested the motherboard monitor is that you can set an alarm that will go off once you hit a certain temp. Mine is set for ~160F which is about 60C( my cpu runs about ~90F but will hit 155 or so during long gaming sessions-I need better venting myself) That may help you eliminate that aspect of it and move to something else, such as video card or power supply voltages ( MBM also shows voltages going through the motherboard, which could possibly show if you're having voltage spikes causing the failures).

gallopingwanker

i ordered a cooling attachment for my 9800 pro, so if that doesn't work, i'll know it's not my vid card....so, we'll see...if you have any more ideas of the problems, let me know! even though you guys pretty much have covered everything...haha

R3d

is the card in the pci slot or the agp slot?.. should be the agp.. i doubt it would be that but who knows.. hopefully the guy who made the comp didnt make that mistake..

mikec

heh, if an agp card was plugged into a pci slot I think the least of his problems would be reboots during gameplay heheh.

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nothingx

If its Windows that's crashing, you might be able to find out why in the Event Log viewer. There's also a tool you can get from Microsoft that will let you analyze the dump files that Windows creates when it crashes. I had to use it once when my computer was doing the same thing. Turned out it was a buggy soundcard driver.

rocinante2003

I have a system that has a ATI 9600XT and it was rebooting every time I started playing games. The only solution was to increase my AGP voltage a tiny bit in my bios. It is now rock solid. You may want to see if your bios allows you to choose your AGP voltage. Dont up it too much.

gallopingwanker

haha, yea...you know what i mean! i told you i'm a n00b.....

but anyways...i downloaded a cpu temp monitor and it said my cpu was getting upwards to 70º while playing painkiller....so, i ordered a new heatsink and a new bigger case....hopefully this will fix all my problems

mikec

70 is pretty warm, even for an AMD.

as mooseman said before, in bios, if you have a good mobo, there could be a thermal safety setting for CPU temp. typically I've seen it at 90 degrees where it'll shut down automatically, but it could be 70. you definitely want to see if that setting is enabled, and what temp it's set at. if you give us the mobo model we can find it in the manual.

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gallopingwanker

this is right off my order information.....

MB NFORCE2 A7N8X-UAY 400Mhz ASUS RT

hope that's what you need...

mikec

I looked at the manual for the 400-VM, that doesn't have auto protect shutdown feature, but maybe the other boards to. if you have an A7N8X, this is the list of those types of boards....UAY isn't one of 'em..

http://usa.asus.com/prog/p_search.asp?kp=A7N8X&langs=09

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gallopingwanker

i don't know where the UAY came from...but the A7N8X is what i have....

mikec

I know and love asus boards. I could swear these was a configurable setting in bios, but I'm not seeing it in the manuals!!

poke around and see if you can find it.

asus C.O.P. is shutting down your pc, I'd almost guarantee it. and how I could tell is by watching the video linked on this page... http://www.asus.com.tw/support/engli...tures/cop.aspx

their temp guage shows about 70 degrees when it shuts down hehe.

also means that you probably don't have adequate cooling in your case, or thermal paste/grease wasn't applied properly. sorry dude.

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gallopingwanker

yea, 70 is about where it is when it shuts down...so, at least you narrowed it down for me, hehe....like i said i bought a new heatsink and fans and a new case, etc....time will tell.....

thanks everyone for your help!