What's wrong with my new computer?!

[Akaikami]

I just bought this system:

Intel Core2Duo E6400
Gigabyte DS3
2GB Corsair DDR2 PC-6400
Seagate Barracuda 320GB SATAII 3mb/s
eVGA Geforce 7600GT KO

and it seems it likes hard crashing while playing games. I have no idea what the problem is but I have a feeling it's the video card. Idle the video card sits at 65C and at load it can get up to high 70's.

It first started in Battlefield 2 but now I been playing Rise of Legends and it did it once during that playtime (it worked fine through the whole first campaign which takes like 10 hours) and that was not a straight playthrough. My system just freezes and starts studdering whatever sound it was playing. At first I thought it was the motherboard but I don't think so.

I'm thinking I should get rid of the stock cooler on the card and on the processor and put on something a little better.

If any of you know what might be happening and can help me, either reply to the thread or let me know on AIM: TheAkaikami

I'd greatly appreciate any help.

[joshd]

well, it could well be heat related. it sounds like that to me.

have you also tried changing your drivers? maybe to an newer (or older) version?

[Istasi]

70C isn't nearly hot enough to overheat a video card. OC'd X1900XTX's can run around 90C when overclocked.

[Major_A]

eVGA 7600GT cards are known to have problems, just look at the reviews on Newegg. I had problems with my eVGA 7600GT and keyboard and mouse lag. Download Coolbits, install it and open up the control panel. From there change D3D frames to render ahead from 3 to 0. This fixed my problem, don't know if it will help you though.

[crspyjohn]

Did you run prime? Maybe it your psu?

[[XC] moddolicous]

Yea, what psu do you have in there. Maybe try re-seating the cpu heatsink, as it sounds like either a psu problem or a heating problem.

[Akaikami]

The case is an Antec SONATA II so the PSU is the one that came with it (450W Smartpower).

Let me try testing the cpu. Edit: What's the best way to use prime to test my CPU? Run it overnight?

I just ran it for 5 minutes and it found no problems.

[Akaikami]

Is there any kind of program that will log all temperatures of my components until the system freezes so I can see what's going on and what's causing the crashes?

:(

[xlink]

DL orthos and leave the system on overnight.

[Akaikami]

DL orthos and leave the system on overnight.

Orthos is the SP2004 program with GO - 0 and GO - 1 right?

If so, I have 2 of them open and I started both of them with different CPU's assigned...yet only one core reaches 100% (50% total CPU) usage in process manager.

What does the priority need to be?

[xlink]

either run one instance of orthos or two of SP. with SP set diferent core affinities one on 0 the other on 1.

[Major_A]

That computer isn't pulling anywhere near 450W. Just to check I went to http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculator.jsp to see what it said. With the CPU, motherboard, 7600GT, RAM, and HDD it recommended a 186W power supply with a 100% TDP CPU rating and a 80% efficient PSU.

Captain obvious here but have you checked for a BIOS update?

Here are a few shots of my 7600GT temps, I do have a 80MM intake fan on the side of my box blowing on the card. It is the same card you have with the stock cooler.
Idle (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v634/ssb2121/Idle.jpg)
Load (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v634/ssb2121/Load.jpg)

[Akaikami]

That computer isn't pulling anywhere near 450W. Just to check I went to http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculator.jsp to see what it said. With the CPU, motherboard, 7600GT, RAM, and HDD it recommended a 186W power supply with a 100% TDP CPU rating and a 80% efficient PSU.

Captain obvious here but have you checked for a BIOS update?

Here are a few shots of my 7600GT temps, I do have a 80MM intake fan on the side of my box blowing on the card. It is the same card you have with the stock cooler.
Idle (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v634/ssb2121/Idle.jpg)
Load (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v634/ssb2121/Load.jpg)

Just updated my BIOS from F3 to F4, think that might solve my crashing problems? I'll play some BF2 to find out.

[Akaikami]

Guhhh did it again, but this time during Dark Messiah multiplayer demo.

I have a feeling it's my graphics card.

[perkam]

Classic stability issue.

Start putting hardware back to stock one by one. As in...put the cpu back to stock...see if it happens.

If it doesnt, the cpu's the problem. If it does, put the vga back to stock and see what happens etc. Do this memory, cpu and vga...if they're already at stock...

For ram: increase the volts by 0.1 or 0.2 to what it already was. see what happens
For cpu: increase vcore by ~0.025...see what happens
For vga: downclock mem and core by 50mhz...see what happens

See if it goes away.

perkam

[Akaikami]

Classic stability issue.

For vga: downclock mem and core by 50mhz...see what happens

See if it goes away.

perkam

Did the VGA so far (there was a newegg comment on the video card product page where a guy had to underclock to get it from freezing, I underclocked it up to 100mhz core and 50mhz mem still to no avail.

Is there a way to test all 3 of them in concession? I've been using ATITool, and SP2004...all with no errors (need to run it longer I assume)

Testing them by playing the games isn't really fast and efficient (usually takes 30-45 minutes for them to crash)

[Akaikami]

Any other suggestions?

[Akaikami]

Hmm, just found out something bothersome.

When I update my nvidia drivers to the latest one (and 2nd latest) after the Windows loading screen it just stays black and does not continue from there. Not even a cursor.

Anybody know what's going on here? Please help!

[Major_A]

Can you boot into safe mode and see a screen? If so unintall the drivers from there and try again.

[Akaikami]

Just totally uninstalled the CD version drivers and put the new ones on and it works fine. The freezing problem during games still exists though!

Damnit! :(

[Ron 61]

Perkam gave you good advice. Process of elimination is key when you have all of these variables. It just takes some time to narrow it down to the problem. Good luck.

[Akaikami]

Hmmm been logging the temperature and it doesn't seem to be heat, something else is wrong for some reason. Here's the temp log during freezup on a game:

2006-09-07 19:29:27 Temperature: GPU: 62.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:28 Temperature: GPU: 61.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:29 Temperature: GPU: 61.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:30 Temperature: GPU: 62.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:31 Temperature: GPU: 61.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:32 Temperature: GPU: 63.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:33 Temperature: GPU: 64.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:34 Temperature: GPU: 62.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:35 Temperature: GPU: 61.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:36 Temperature: GPU: 61.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:37 Temperature: GPU: 60.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:38 Temperature: GPU: 60.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:51 Temperature: GPU: 57.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:51 Temperature: GPU: 57.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:52 Temperature: GPU: 55.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:53 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:54 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:55 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:56 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:57 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:58 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:29:59 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C
2006-09-07 19:30:00 Temperature: GPU: 54.0°C GPU environment: 0.0°C

64C isn't enough to cause it to freeze like crazy.

Could it be the processor? How do I log the temperatures of the processor?

[Akaikami]

Got a new BSOD not even in a game or anything:

Win32k.sys - Process BF816579 Base at BF800000 Datestamp 43446b4e

How do I decode this?

[Major_A]

I would do this, format and reinstall Windows. See if this cures up any issues. I've had fresh installs that were screwed up from the beginning. If you want to speed up the process get nLiteOS and slipstream some updates and programs into your install.
http://www.nliteos.com/

Try Everest Home Edition to monitor temps. From there go go File, Preferences, and the Logging option. I don't know if Everest Home Edition does this, I have Everest Ultimate Edition.