Thanks for the help guys. I will try the tests later tonight. Now, I forgot to mention, when I say 'reboot/restarts', I mean, it does that before it even gets to the F.E.A.R. menu, same with FarCry. Call of Duty still crashes like it did before too. So, as usual, FarCry isnt secure anymore either, so FarCry, F.E.A.R., both restart before menus and Call of Duty plays game within 10 seconds then locks up. Its not a heat issue, my watercooled temps idle at 36 and after playing some Doom 3, its around 40's. I have 2 gigs of Ram, so I dont know if its a Ram issue, but I will try the tests. Im seriously thinking its not my PSU. Its either my video card, or motherboard are my best guesses. Im going to switch video cards tomorrow probably and test that.
Hey guys, new update: I downloaded the MemTest thing and I slept overnight with my pc running, and it got 2000%, thats right, 2000% with 0 errors. This doesnt help me, well, a little, knowing its not my ram. I cant download the video card programs and stuff bc Im on dial-up which take forever to download. I downloaded a PC performance one, but it didnt work for some reason. Any help is appreciated.
well i would test it on the games it would seem to be consistently crashing. also i know my 6600gt has a temp sensor maybe your cards HSF as come the slightest bit lose and is still provideing suffcient cooling but when things really heat up it causes a reboot.
Doesnt make sense to be a heat issue because whenever F.E.A.R. DOES work, it never hangs, when I say the games reboot, its before they even load the company logos and menus, not during the gameplay itself. And when I run Doom 3 and RoE, it doesnt have any problems at all. So its not a heat issue. Here are the problems I ruled out that I know for sure isnt the problem: Memory, PSU, heat issue Im guessing and leaning more towards my motherboard or video card. Will know if its the video card or not until later this weekend. I will keep you updated as I rule out some more things. Please stay and help me!! Thanks!!
Ok, very new UPDATE: Changed my video card with my brothers, he has a Rosewill Geforce 6600, 256mb, 128-bit AGP 8x video card. I put it in, installed the drivers for it, and NONE of my games play! This tells me its something wrong with the motherboard, correct? Now, heres the list of things I have tried. 1. Changed PSU from my bros into mine, he has a 350 or something watt PSU, it played F.E.A.R. first try and thats all I bothered trying, so I bought a new one, a Thermaltake Silent Purepower 480watt PSU. I put it in, nothing changed, my games still dont play or lock up. So its not the PSU. 2. I changed video cards. Games didnt even play at all, not one. So I put my video card back in. I didnt bother deleting old drivers or anything, I just installed his video card drivers on, and tried to play a game but nothing happened except reboot or error pops up. So, Im guessing its not the video card, because MINE runs on my brothers with NO problems. 3. I tried the MemTest program to test my memory, and it got no errors at 2000%. Its not my memory since it has no problems. 4. NOT a heat issue because Im running Idle at 38'C and its watercooled. No problems. Not a heat issue. Cant be a defective CPU because everything else in my pc is running fine and fast. Cant be my hdd because hdd's dont cause that sort of problems. That leaves my motherboard. I seriously think this is the vandal and scammer b!tch that caused me problems with games for over 6 months. I will buy a new one tomorrow if you guys tell me and agree that that is the reason. All I await is your opinion, help, and answers. PS: I installed Half-Life 2 on my pc to see if that game runs, and for some reason it does, without problems. So Doom 3, RoE, Half-Life 2 and Commandos 3 all run, except restarting in FarCry and sometimes F.E.A.R.. This is very odd, Im guessing it has something to do with the motherboard though. Also, I dont know if I mentioned this or not, but 6 months ago when I ordered all my pc parts and stuff, I got the XFX Geforce 6800gt AGP card, and it wouldnt work right, it kept locking up and stuff in games, so I RMA'ed it thinking it was the card. But maybe it coulda been my board all along causing it problems. I RMA'd that card for a cheaper 6600gt. If it was my board that caused the problem, I will be so mad because I had a 6800gt which is like twice as good as a 6600gt, dammit! lol Please help me out though, please. Thank you.
wtf? XFX gave you a 6600GT in return for a 6800GT? i'd be right on their ass about it and demand a 6800GT replacement...
Get onto XFX and get a 6800GT back. The fact that some games run and some dont kinda rules out it being a mobo issue too imo. Think theres summit else at fault. Have you re-installed your OS, Graphics drivers, chipset drivers and DirectX at all?
This is screaming drivers to me. Doom 3 which uses OpenGl works while others which use DirectX dont. Did you make sure that you removed the old drivers and put the correct ones on for your brothers card? If it was a mobo issue it would be crashing all over the place. mobo issues are usually very easy to identify. DO NOT BUY A NEW MOTHERBOARD!
I noticed Doom 3 runs on OpenGL while others run on Direct X9. Im sure something has to do with it maybe. I forgot to clean uninstall my drivers when I put in my brothers video card and installed his drivers, which might explain why nothing worked when trying to run a game. In fact, I will uninstall my videocard drivers and reput my brothers card back in and install his drivers, all freshly. And see what happens. Next, for those assuming XFX screwed me over by sending me a 6600gt instead of a 6800gt, they didnt, I RMA'ed the 6800gt for money instead of another card like you guys assumed. I simply ordered a 6600gt instead. So its all good with XFX. Like Lynx said, I will not buy a new motherboard now until I figure out more stuff. What do you guys recommend I do? Like, in steps.. Thanks
backup any user data on your harddrive (s) and blow away the partitions. then do a fresh sp2 install of winxp and the latest nvidia drivers, sound card, etc. also check to see if there have been any firmware updates for your mobo. install of the security patches for windows. install the games and their latest patches or possibly prime95 to tes the cpu/mem. other than that i am fresh out of ideas.
Dang, I dont know if I can install SP2, because of...eh. I reinstalled the newest Chipset drivers for my motherboard and nothing changed. I reinstalled DirectX9c, and my video card (my cd version) drivers and still nothing. If I remember correctly..I remember I was over my friends house playing FarCry lan, everything was good, we took a break (turned off pc or shut out of the game) then tried again, but then its where the problems screwed up, it kept crashing back to the desktop, and Call of Duty gave me a error about the colors and stuff, and that was the beginning of my problems. I installed latest chipset, directX9c, evga cd drivers (not latest, but it worked), aaaaaahhh!!! I seriously am getting p!ssed about this, I will probably end up buying a new motherboard to start fresh. Because I doubt its a PSU, Memory, HDD, CPU, or Video card problem, which leaves the motherboard. Ill probably end up buying the P4P800 Deluxe version and just install the latest crap for that and see if it works. If it doesnt then Ill have wasted money on that too. Wasted money on a motherboard and psu. (dont tell me to just rma it bc my system is watercooled, meaning i have to take the cpu bracket off the motherboard, and i cant do it well, so i end up ripping/cutting the bracket off so i can install my waterblock, thus, screwing my warranty.) Grr. Im hating pc building bc of crappy problems like this. If I cant figure it out by the end of this week, Im ordering a new motherboard, rma'ing my thermaltake psu and put my old aspire back in. Too many damn problems.
Alright guys, heres the deal. If I buy a new motherboard, would that automatically clear up issues? If I order it, I will download the latest drivers for Direct X9c, Open GL 2, motherboard chipset, and video card. In fact, I downloaded the graphic card drivers, the latest ones, and it tells me that the file is corrupted or something, I downloaded it twice! Im on dial-up and 20mb sucks for me. Whats the deal with that? Please help some more.
if you are going to get a new mobo get a different one then the one you currently have perhaps something better. in regards to the corrupted download since your on dial up i would suggest something like getright download manager or the like that provides protection against corruption by using some sort of checksum or hash feature. or maybe someone close by could download it and send it to you on a cd.
