Just when I'd grown comfortable with the stability of my system (after about 6 months following the initial build), I'm experiencing problems that should not happen with my PC.

If I try to play a game of any type for any period of time, I will get a system reboot. It is highly annoying. So far this has happened in a few games, including Grand Theft Auto and recently Freedom Force.

I have:
Athlon XP 2100+
ATI Radeon AIW 9700
Western Digital 80GB SE HDD
1GB DDR Samsung RAM

The onl y other factor I can think of would be the PSU, but it's a 550W Antec, so that should be more than enough and the company seems reliable.

What I can't figure out is that my system should be capable of running these particular games at extremely high detail level, and do, in fact. But for some reason the lower the detail the longer I'm able to play. The crash is inevitable, but playtime is extended with lower settings. Normally, I'm able to keep my computer on 24/7 without such a crash (I've never seen one when not playing a game).

Also, it doesn't seem to matter what else is open. To test this I started the games when my normal amount of programs were loaded, and compared it to a fresh boot but with all non-essential processes eliminated. The result was the same.

Can anyone help me here? I just can't figure this one out...

Video card temp?

That could be the case, but I've experienced the problems before and after I installed this (with the fan), so unless I installed it incorrectly (I don't think I did), the video card should be much cooler now. The heatsink on the back side of the card does feel warm to the touch, but before, the back side of the card was very hot to the touch.

Does anyone know if there's a way to check an ATI card's temps?

Wow...still problems? I'm almosted tempted to get one of these games just to see if I can crash mine. What game do you reccomend?

Have you tested your memory (I know long shot)? But I had a pair of bad corsaires (1GB) and I could almost load windows before it would suddenly crash <yeah, I know you're beyond that point...but anyway>. I found a free program on the web (wish I could remember what it was) that I loaded on a floppy, rebooted the machine and after about thirty minutes or so it started reporting errors. I went to Microcenter to get a couple of new sticks of RAM, came home and it was STILL reporting errors. I guess it couldn't hurt?

I had that program. I can't quite remember which one, though...

You may be right. It's just annoying because these were actually replacement sticks already. I went from no-name memory to slightly brand name generic (Samsung, so at least these had a manufacturer on the chips), but I'm thinking that eventually I'm just going to load some Crucial in there and forget about it.

I went from the ddr matched corsair name brand stuff to whatever they had at Mircrcenter and the noname stuff worked fine (although I'm not sure the difference anyway.). Bad memory seems to be more of a problem these days the best I could tell.

If you're willing to try out the heat question again, what about underclocking everything for a while? Granted the game fps performance will suffer... If it happens often enough (say once a night), then perhaps trying this for a week will tell you what's up.

I'm thinking underclocking (if successful) may lead to two things: 1) You have a heat issue when at normal speed 2) Your RAM is a lot happier.

You'd have to go from there to see which it was. Or if that doesn't help at all, you may have narrowed some of the possibilities out. Just an idea...

http://www.memtest86.com/

That's it!

PREESH!

The thing is that the issue is not how often it happens. It never happens if I'm not playing games. I can have 10 programs running from the task bar and be downloading 4 files and my computer won't crash. Inside the general OS my machine has been rock solid since I replaced the motherboard, which was the original culprit.

I'll try memtest again first, then possibly try underclocking. I've never down under/overclocking before though...

Dammit, beat me to it. Memtest86 definitely rocks. Especially the bootable CD image part.

Hehe, I'm running mt athlon 1.4G at 1050M. Very very cool, and with a much slower (and quieter) fan to boot.

Hehe, I'm running mt athlon 1.4G at 1050M.

But now you can't do this.

Oh my goodness.... Reminds me of cooking on your engine block while driving. Cooks great, but everything is coated with a thin layer of oil and dirt. Blech.

That's just awesome

Well, I remembered that I had run memtest when I replaced the RAM, and found no errors then, and I find no errors now.

I still don't think it is a heat issue, though. The fan on the Zalman setup blows directly across the board and leaves it very cool. I wish there were a temp sensor there that I could get a reading from.

Anyway, I'll try the game again and see if it changes any. I was looking forward to playing this game, as it came highly recommended. (Freedom Force, it's a superhero RPG)

Nope, still crashes, only this time I ran it at a lower resolution, and just as expected, it took slightly longer to crash.

I guess I'll try the underclocking suggestion. I've also been trying to find out how to upgrade my BIOS. I'll try that tomorrow night.

I've also been trying to find out how to upgrade my BIOS.

Oh, good idea. Both the motherboard and the video card (if it's got an upgradeable BIOS, some do).

Fantastic

So I upgrade the BIOS, and I boot fine into Windows. I think everything is working. I then try playing the game again. 2 minutes and I get another crash.

But then I reboot and I see that the computer thinks I have a slower processor (a 1500+). So I go into the BIOS and change what I thought was the correct setting (to what I thought it was before the reboot), and I try to save and restart. Well, the screen goes black and nothing happens. The monitor LED turns from green to orange, and the computer sits there. No reboot, no beep codes, no nothing. I have to flip the switch on the PSU to restart. I go back into the BIOS and the change I made is still there, so I'm able to save my settings, just not reboot following them. But now I can't get beyond the POST because it says my CPU speed is set incorrectly. "Duh!" I think. But nothing I change seems to affect the speed.

I don't know much about the chipset values in the BIOS, so I don't really know what I'm doing.

Please help!!

Hold down the Insert key while booting up (hold it down and turn on the computer).

You are wise, my friend. Mind explaining what that does? I'd love to know!

On most modern boards it clears the CPU settings. On some it clears almost all BIOS settings. Either way it should get you back into the system so you can fix whatever went wrong.

Or if that doesn't work then usually there is a clear CMOS jumper on the motherboard somewhere. It's a pain to use though as it's normally situated in some stupid position that requires you to rip out half the cards in your PC. So try the Insert thing first

Nah, I've used the jumper before, and it's in a pretty good (open) location.

Mainly, I was just suprised that when the machine restarted, it was recognizing the CPU correctly. I didn't have to enter any settings, which was the case when I first pieced the machine together.

I suppose I'll try the game again...

Hooray!!!

I've been agonizing over this for nearly a year now, and finally everything appears to be fine. I just played for about 30 minutes at 1280x960x32 without any problems!! Huzzah!

I'm not sure why this made a difference, but perhaps the settings in the BIOS were simply incorrect, and needed to be resent to defaults

So, thanks to everyone here! It's nice to be able to talk through it.

And by the way, I recommend that people take a look at Freedom Force. From what I've played so far, this is a very cool game. I only checked it out because Electronic Gaming Monthly mentioned it as a very overlooked game (and they don't mention a PC game - usually - unless it's very good). I tried the demo, liked it, and hell, it was only $15 at Electronics Boutique.

So, if you've ever thought "hey, you know what would make a good game? If they took an RPG, added Warcraft-style control, and threw in a bunch of superheros in a very stylized manner" then this is the game for you!

So holding down the insert key while powering on did the trick? I'll have to remember that; could come in handy one day.

Congrats!