computer freezing

[animalshack]

i built my comp a while back ago, and whenever i play counter-strike on it, it freezes after about 1 hour of playing... also, sometimes when it freezes it wont want to turn back on and will give me 3 beeps, then stop, then 3 beeps again and just keep going until i turn it off....if this happens ill have to go turn it off for about 10-15 minutes, then turn it back on and finally it will boot up

anyway, got any idea why?

heres my specs:

• mobo - ecs p4vxasd2+
• bios - AMI bios (not sure what version)
• video card - geforce 4 mx 420 64 mb
• integrated sound
• integrated lan
• case and power supply - enermax mid atx case w/ 350 watt enermax PSU
• processor - p4 2.4 GHz w/ 533 MHz FSB
• hdd - maxtor diamondmax plus 9 series 60gb w/ 2mb buffer
• ram - 256 mb pc133 sdram
• cd-rom - 24x hp-cd-rom

yeah i guess thats it, by the way, i also used to get a blue screen sometimes when it freezes saying that it had to shutdown windows because of a failed something, and it listed my nvidia drivers, but when i updated the drivers i havent had this problem....so i guess thats ok

but i still need to know why it freezes so randomly and only when i play counterstrike

[Confused]

Sounds heat related to me. The P4 will automatically throttle down to keep from locking up so I would suspect the video card. Try running with side off and with a fan blowing on video card if you have a small fan.
Chas

[fredwest]

Hi Guys,
Confused, that was my thought exactly! Heat...
Pentiums are great at the 'keep going' lark even when things get tough. However their does come a point when even the Pentium says 'enough is enough''.

What I would suggest is to uprate your fan and heatsink combo to something more in line with full-on gaming.

Alternatively, blow out your current heatsink/fan regularly and increase the number of fans in your case.


Regards,

Declan (aka fredwest)

[animalshack]

so your telling me to try and buy a new "heatsink/fan" for my Processor or my GPU?

o and by the way, my case already has two fans on it, one on the side panel...one in the PSU, oh yeah and one on the processor....i only have a heatsink on my Geforce because, mx420 only comes with a heatsink and no fan unles you buy the MSI version....mine is visiontek

anyway, could it be because of the 12V Blue Cold Cathode Light i have in my computer? i suspect this, but kinda dont think thats it because everytime i use the comp, i dont even turn on the fan...so i dont think its hogging any power, anyway ill go buy teh fan later

[animalshack]

and by "small fan" do you mean any regular faN? for like a room..or a real computer fan?

i do have a little fan about 4" diameter i can try with
but its not made for a comp

anway plz help soon

[animalshack]

i checked temperature for cpu, and some other stuff and it came out about 40 degrees Celcius 100 degrees Fareinhiet

[Confused]

I didn't make myself very clear. I don't think it is the P4 having problems because of the design to throttle down if heat becomes a issue.

I do think it may be possible that the video card is overheating because it appears from your post to only happen when you are playing CS.

Therefore try cooling the video card by my suggestion. Remove case side and use a fan to blow on video card. A small room fan would be great.

If problem persist and you are running XP, check out this thread. I believe XP has a problem. http://www.windowsxpuser.com/forums/...rum=7&start=10

Chas

[Mick K]

If, when you you reboot, all you get is the beep code (Nothing appears on your display) the culprit is more than likely your video card. Most BIOS's will give you an error code on the screen when booting unless it is a video problem and then it will produce a beep code instead. (For obvious reasons, if your video ain't working, you can't see the code)!

[andyms18a]

on the AMI website it says 3 beeps is loose or damaged ram
as the error takes an hour to appear you shoud remove the ram
clean the contacts with a rubber ereaser and refit if it still keeps going wrong try some moor ram

[Lost Prophet]

I would have to agree with the video card theory. I used to have a Visiontek GeForce 2 MX that always locked up my computer after a certain amount of time due to overheating. I checked the internet for support and it was very hard to find GOOD support for Visiontek products. I don't know if anyone else has these problems with Visiontek products, but I personally wouldn't recommend them.

[glc]

There is no support for Visiontek Nvidia-based products - the company went out of business and the "new" Visiontek is a different company and is only doing ATI now.

Other things to look at - that's an ECS board, which is not exactly top quality, and it's a Via chipset. The northbridge may be overheating or something like that.

[animalshack]

i reformatted (not for the heating, just for me)

i still have the problem, but now its not as often. i put my fan right next to the videocard plus my other fan. but i dont think its helping...

by the way, does intel make good motherboards for a gaming rig? and what are good videocard manufacturers