Help diagnose my computer problem...

[-LiT- Killer_B]

Well whenever I play a game, other than solitaire, my computer randomly shuts off. No power, no warning, just shuts off. The way I get it back on is by unplugging it at the power supply and replugging it back in. If I try to just turn it on without doing this, nothing happens. I'm almost positive it is a power supply problem...but why only during games. Could it be my video card?

[Smurf]

You are probably right... Are games the only thing you do on your computer that puts in under heavy load? If yes, then there you go. Load=more power draw.

[Drayu]

What wattage is your power supply?

[-LiT- Killer_B]

It's 550

[FiLTHY_SNiPER]

Is it possible that ur power supply is too powerful?

[Killerfurby6]

is the fan of your power supply working??
it sounds like a overheating of your power supply!!

[sir_digalot]

what card do you have?

try downloading something like prime95 or BOINC (boinc is good as it has an opengl screensaver) but they will put your system under alot of load ( prime 95 can load do a stress test too which is good for memory and CPU

if your system shuts off without the gfx card being initialised but under alot of load the problem lies with either the power or other things not the card, a 550w should be powerful enough for alot of things, (unless it is flakey) either way a full on test will narrow it down to cpu mobo memeory or psu, if the psu is faulty it should be flakey under full system load, if it is the gfx card then it will flake out on games.

[[W33T] Jetfuel]

take your power suply in to a local tech store and have them run a true power test ....

[-LiT- Killer_B]

I have a GF 6800

[GorroXXII]

who makes the power supply? I had the same issue you are talking about with my last pc, and it wasnt a Power supply, it was the memory. It would work fine in windows, etc. Could even play Guild Wars, but as soon as I loaded say BF2, it would run for say ten minutes, then completely shut off. I tried everything, finally, I took out one stick of memry and tried it, damn thing ran squeaky clean, ran some memory tests and sure enough, one stick had issues. Not saying this is your problem, as I also have encountered power supply problems, numerous times... but never a complete shut down, usually a restart.

Edit: and Drayu was the one that suggested it :)

[Gruthar]

I'm inclined to agree with Gorro/Drayu. Check your RAM. The only other possibility that I can think of is the CPU is overheating.

In my experience. a bad PSU would not quite behave in this manner. You can test it if you like, but I don't think it's the problem. Also, have you tried just letting it sit for a little while after it shuts down, then tried to start it?

[-LiT- Killer_B]

Its a coolmax...I've never had any problems until now. I've had both the power supply and graphics card for at least 8 months with no problem at all...until now.

[LordBeer]

I'd be interested to know what the temp is on the CPU. Is the heatsink clear of dust? Are all the vents clear as well? Never hurts to clean it out just in case.

Filthy - I dont think you can have too much wattage in the power supply. It was my belief that the rating tells you what it's max amount of power output is. It wont always run using up that much juice.

[[W33T] Jetfuel]

make sure all of your connectins are firm .. and a short on a single connection can cause a problem later on ...

[Drayu]

Yes, can you tell what your CPU temps are? Also, make sure ALL (case, cpu, gpu, psu) fans are working and that everything is dust free. Make sure all connectors are connected, even the auxillary one that goes to the mobo. Try one stick of memory at a time, and unplug all unnecessary drives. Run something graphic intensive, have open a program that will allow you to monitor temps...and watch.

[-LiT- Killer_B]

Well Prime95 ran all night for over 10 hours with no errors using the torture test, but I fail to see how BOINC will help find any problems.

[juuh77]

did you try plugging it to another socket on the strip? And it would seem to me that you are having a ram problem as has been stated. My last comp did the very same thing. Only difference was my ram was a month old. I had to take it to a shop cause i had run out of ideas and the tech guys at a shop i go to found it out in 10 mins. I had no problem after the ram was replaced.

[GorroXXII]

What are you running for memory? is it Dual channel? How many slots are available?

[sir_digalot]

Boic has a openGL screensaver, also on mine BOINC highlghted the CPU temps moreso then prime95 but the boic screensaver can make your GFX card work as well as your processor as a point of reference my system ran the rotrue test fine with 2 instances of prime 95 ( one for each core) with no problems but shut dwn due to thermal with 20 mins using boinc... they do things differently i guess

[-LiT- Killer_B]

I thought BOINC was like SETI@home computer networking scientific project software...

Also my board has 3 banks and I'm running 512 in the first and last for a total of 1Gb

[sir_digalot]

yes it is but they made it more "fun" and it uses all cores by default, anyway, since you tried prime95 it seems fine, there are a couple of test that it can perform for more emeory intensive and more cpu intensive.

try moving the memory to banks 1 and 2 and also swapping the 2 sticks around.