what, what in god's name is wrong with my computer?

[PSUstoekl]

Everything about my build is perfect...450W Antec PSU, AMD 64 3200+, 2GB OCZ Performance RAM, eVga 7800GT, 250 Gig Seagate HD, Creative X-Fi, MSI K8N Neo-F

Newest versions of all drivers (do HDDs have drivers?), windows xp home.

and yet, games will not play. literally everything else runs fine, but games do not. in battlefield 2 (version 1.3), it loads to 46% on every level, then completely freezes. can't even ctrl-alt-del out of it, mouse completely stops. in mafia, it doesn't even load fully, just a black screen. haven't tried any others yet for fear of similar results.

any ideas?

 

[CraKaJaX]

does it reboot itself or do you do it manually?

 

[Cheezeit]

Probably your video card. Sometimes its bad ram. You might need to swap it. Dont worry with EVGA though, they are a great company

 

[PSUstoekl]

yes, i do need to reboot it manually when it freezes. and bad ram? could that be it?

 

[GonzoDaGr8]

I am assuming that this is a brand new machine you just built?? I would get and run Memtest 86+ to stress-test the ram and something like super-pi to stress test the cpu.. maybe si-soft sandra to burn test the machine for a while too .

 

[Cheezeit]

Originally posted by: PSUstoekl
yes, i do need to reboot it manually when it freezes. and bad ram? could that be it?

I ment video card ram, sorry. but PC ram is just as possible. Like gonzo said, try memtest 86.

also, do 3d mark for the video card. It might be overheating. Have a fan blow on it to rule that out.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

sounds like a video card problem

How is the power to the GPU ? native 6pin? dual molex to 6pin adapter?
What kind of temps is the GPU running? How's the airflow around the GPU?

Are you able to run any video benchmarks? 3dmark, Aquamark, etc..

 

[Bozo Galora]

disable auto restart after error in bios settings
make sure error reporting is enabled with logging - in adm tools recov/advanced
look in event viwer logs for HW/apps/sys after crash reboot

 

[PSUstoekl]

Originally posted by: GuitarDaddy
sounds like a video card problem

How is the power to the GPU ? native 6pin? dual molex to 6pin adapter?
What kind of temps is the GPU running? How's the airflow around the GPU?

Are you able to run any video benchmarks? 3dmark, Aquamark, etc..

interesting that you say that...i have an Antec Sonata II, with a big air duct over the video card (there is a hole there, mind you). the power is a native 6-pin. i'm gonna try the memtest, and if it checks out no problem i'll get some 3D mark action going, see what happens.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

I'd also ensure your DirectX is up to date. Seen that happen as well.

 

[Mik3y]

how are temps for your vid card? i've had that happen to my cuz before cuz he ran his 9800 pro on passive cooled.

 

[eXx08]

3200+ may be bottlenecking

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Originally posted by: thekillerjks
3200+ may be bottlenecking

Meh, that wouldn't cause it to not play though...

 

[Mik3y]

Originally posted by: thekillerjks
3200+ may be bottlenecking

wrongo.

 

[PSUstoekl]

well, the nVidia tech demos seem to be working all right. i tried the "Luna" one, which is mind-blowing by the way, and it ran beautifully, with almost no slowdown whatsoever. I also ran memtest for about an hour, and it didn't come up with anything.

nTune says that the GPU is running at 46 C. shouldn't be that bad...

I'm gonna try 3D mark, and see how that goes. yes, I have the latest driver and forceware versions, and DirectX 9.0c

 

[daniel49]

dumb question? I assume you patched the game?

 

[Skyhanger]

I have a sonata II as well. I've heard the duct does nothing. Only blocks airflow and make things hotter.

Get rid of the duct and see if your case temps are cooler.

 

[LxMxFxD3]

Most of these replies are bull ******.

First, your 3200+ is not a bottleneck. I play BF2 on my old XP 2100+ with 1GB & 5700 ultra no problem!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I also play it on my the rig you see in my sig with everything on high @ 1280x960 and get about 50fps.

So, I use way more power on a lesser power suplly (431W versus your 450W)

The only thing I can tell you is - Do you run folding@home? That caused me serious instability and I had to uninstall it. Otherwise, I'd think maybe you have a short on your mobo to the video card or something. You should not be having any issues with the rig you have explained.

Good luck

 

[tyborg]

My reccomendation, before you start buying new parts to test and switch out, or RMAing everything, find a friend or a computer shop nearby with a professional diagnostics board or software. In the shop I work at, we use Ultra-X's PHD PCI and Quicktech pro. These will tell you pretty quickly if there are any motherboard failures, and if you know how to use the extended test options, can test your other hardware (addin cards, HDDs, etc.)

 

[VertigoLabs]

to me this sounds like a driver issue
when you installed drivers in what order did you install them ?
are all your drivers the newest ? bios? is your heatsink pasted and seated properly ?

as to some of the other replies 3200+ is NOT a problem sheesh its good

have a wonderfull day

 

[PSUstoekl]

could it possibly be the hard drive? for some inexplicable reason, windows recognizes my seagate as a removable device, which perturbes me slightly.

i did actually install the nforce drivers AFTER the video card drivers...does this make a difference in some way?

i'll re-post with a full 3dmark report...

 

[PSUstoekl]

BIG UPDATE!!!!

ran 3dmark 05, and it crashed during the third test, the one with the giant fish jumping over the airship. the computer rebooted immediately.

when i got back into windows, i was directed to a page that looked like this...

http://static.flickr.com/24/54161586_7c35c3b4a0_o.jpg

 

[rise]

your HD should read as a removeable if its sata. thats no problem.

if you installed the nv ide drivers though that could definitely be the problem. uninstall them and use windows drivers.

if that doesn't work, i'd pull that soundcard and see if it works.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Reinstall the latest nforce drivers from nvidia website, and the latest video drivers from the EVGA website, should fix your problem.

 

[PSUstoekl]

Originally posted by: rise4310
your HD should read as a removeable if its sata. thats no problem.

if you installed the nv ide drivers though that could definitely be the problem. uninstall them and use windows drivers.

if that doesn't work, i'd pull that soundcard and see if it works.

that sounds like it may be the problem. how would i go about doing that, though?