New gaming system won't play games

[Harlequin]

Hello everyone,

I'm new here. With regards to computer knowledge, I'm a novice at best. I've built a few systems, but please don't mistake me for someone who necessarily knows all of the in and outs.

At any rate, I've recently assembled my newest (and most potent) rig. However; there's a problem. I can't get it work; not with any stability anyway.

Here's the setup:

Core 2 Duo 6600 Conroe Processor
ASUS Striker Extreme MoBo
EVGA 8800 GTS (Superclocked) 640 GPU
Thermaltake Toughpower 700 Watt PSU
2 gig of Corsair XMS2 RAM
Western Digital Raptor 10K SATA Drive
Windows XP Pro OS

Here's the problem:

Machine runs fine for websurfing and basic funcitonality. Gaming however, is another story. I have a number of programs installed, F.E.A.R., Quake 4, Half-Life 2, and Second Life being my "test" projects for the new system. Everything is updated as current as possible, including the drivers for the hardware. The BIOS for the MoBo is at 1004, I believe.

Anytime I run a game; game will play for a bit, and then the system shuts down. No reboot, just a cold shutdown. This problem has been consistent since day 1 of the build, and unfortunately I can't give an exact time frame as to when it takes place. Sometimes a game crashes in 10 minutes, other times an hour or more.

I'm guessing this is probably temperature/voltage related, or something to that effect, but everything *seems* to be checking out okay, so I'm naturally puzzled.

Please let me know if anyone has had any similar issues or might have a possible solution. Thanks much in advance.

-Harlequin

[doubledragon5]

I would download and run memstes86 I believe it is called and test the ram..

[Harlequin]

I'll do that now and see what happens. Thanks.

[minsonngo]

What are your temperatures?

I sounds like a overheating issue.

[chuck4456]

You need to check your HSF mounting before doing anything else.

[Harlequin]

Temperatures based on the program I'm using (nForce) show the following:

CPU: 40 C
System: 42 C
GPU: 72 C

I'm guessing some extra fans might help.

[minsonngo]

Your temps look fine actually so that probably is not the problem.

I would run the memory test on your system memory. Do it with one stick installed at a time. (www.memtest.org)

Do you have the newest video card drivers installed also?


Is your system overclocked?

[Harlequin]

Yeah, I'm going to run memtest as soon as I get a new floppy...the old one, as luck would have it, is dead.

Video card is updated 100%; that much I'm sure of, and no I do not OC (am not currently, anyway).

Heh...never had any trouble with previous builds...I finally get a computer that can churn out some power and I can't run it. :P

Thank you again.

[minsonngo]

You can actually download the ISO file for memtest and burn it to a bootable cd instead of using a floppy.

[Katreat]

Are your temperatures at load while gaming? Just asking because I have a friend with a 8800 and that big card seriously impacted air flow in his case and was wondering if you might be overheaitng just while stressing the video card in games.

Kat

[LeftyAce]

The fact that it lasts anywhere from a few minutes to an hour before crashing makes it seem like it's not temperature related. I'd try memtest86+....you can get it on the Ultimate Boot CD (www.ultimatebootcd.com). If you have Nero, use the "Make a disk from an image" option. If you don't have burning software, get deep burner; the free version will do everything you need. Windows will not burn .iso files correctly by itself.

[Harlequin]

Okay, for all those helping me...

I finally was able to run memtest86, and here's what I've come up with so far.

The standard test with the standard settings came up with no errors. I ran this test before going to sleep, so it got in a good 10 passes at least.

However, after doing that, I fiddled with the setting a little bit, and here's what happened. I set the Memory Sizing to (BIOS - All), and upon doing so, I received a ridiculous amount of errors. Now, I'm honestly not sure what this means, but I'm guessing that there may be some memory issues afterall. memtest86's website, however, states that some motherboards may be unstable to test with this. So, now I'm even more confused. Is the memory bad, or is the test just not running correctly.

Please, if anyone has had a prior experience like this, advise me on what I'm dealing with. I'm probably going to test one stick at a time next, but this is what I've discovered so far.

As for the video card, I did order up some additional fans, so if that is the case (or part of the problem), I hope that this will solve it.

Thanks again, everyone.

[LeftyAce]

Just to be safe, test 1 stick at a time, but stay with default settings. I'd imagine the change you made is what caused a whole bunch of errors. (sounds like it might have walked off the end of your ram and started testing memory that wasn't there).

[Harlequin]

Update:

While I'm not 100% confident that things are perfect, the system has been running with some stability since I installed the new heatsink, thermal grease and fans.

While the RAM may still be an issue, I think it was more temperature related than anything. Still, I will keep monitoring this thread just in case, and keep troubleshooting. Like I said, I'm still not convinced that everything is perfect.

Thanks again, everyone.

[LeftyAce]

If it runs stable, you've got nothing to worry about. Sounds like you fixed the problem.

If something comes up, give us a shout.

[Harlequin]

LeftyAce,

Just an update, but it seems to be running fine. Definitely thinking it was a temperature issue.

Thanks to all on this thread...I really appreciated the help and i learned stuff along the way as well. If anything creeps up...I'll necro this thread :P

[LeftyAce]

Well, I'm glad it's working!