Hey I hope you guys can help me out here. This is my first post.
So here's the problem. Lately whenever I start up a game, including Team Fortress 2, a demo of Left 4 Dead, a pirated copy of COD4 and Spore, all the title screens and menus load up fine, but once I get to the actual game part, where 3d graphics are rendered, my computer loops the last stuttering fraction of a second worth of sound for about 10 seconds and simply goes blank. It doesn't shut off, it doesn't restart, there are no error messages or blue screens, my monitor just displays the "no signal input" and goes to sleep mode. My keyboard basically has no response; num lock and caps lock no longer cause the indicator lights to toggle, and my mouse no longer responds. As I said, it doesn't actually shut off, it will just stick in this state until I hold down the power button. Also, this so far has only happened with games that display 3d graphics. For a control I've tried worms world party and it plays fine. =P I want to download some kind of non-game program that requires rendering of 3d stuff like google earth and see what happens.
So I start it back up and it happens again. There's nothing obviously indicative of a software crash in the event logs. I can leave it on and do other tasks for hours with no problems, so I'd imagine its not overheating or anything but I plan on giving it a good dusting as a part of my troubleshooting. I just updated my graphics driver. I just ran a full virus scan with avg and spybot. I'm pretty sure I have all my important updates and drivers installed. I'm actually at the university right now but when I get home I'll post my specific tech setup. Also, I haven't tried rolling it back to a restore point but I figure I'll give that a try next.
Any suggestions? If I left something out that may be relevant let me know and I'll post it. Thanks!
Edit: Sorry, I just realized this totally violates the guidelines for new posts. I'll add all my tech specs asap.
Alright, here's the system summary straight from Everest:
--------[ Summary ]-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer:
Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
OS Service Pack Service Pack 3
DirectX 4.09.00.0904 (DirectX 9.0c)
Computer Name ALEX-A49D36A3CC
User Name Alex
Motherboard:
CPU Type AMD Athlon 64, 2400 MHz (12 x 200) 4000+
Motherboard Name Unknown
Motherboard Chipset nVIDIA nForce4, AMD Hammer
System Memory 2048 MB (PC3200 DDR SDRAM)
BIOS Type Award (09/30/05)
Communication Port Communications Port (COM1)
Communication Port Communications Port (COM2)
Communication Port Printer Port (LPT1)
Display:
Video Adapter NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX (256 MB)
3D Accelerator nVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX
Monitor Plug and Play Monitor [NoDB] (PU3053402492)
Multimedia:
Audio Adapter nVIDIA MCP04 - Audio Codec Interface
Storage:
IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce4 Serial ATA Controller
IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce4 Serial ATA Controller
IDE Controller Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller
SCSI/RAID Controller Virtual CloneDrive
Disk Drive ST380817AS (80 GB, 7200 RPM, SATA)
Optical Drive _NEC DVD_RW ND-3540A (DVD+R9:8x, DVD-R9:4x, DVD+RW:16x/8x, DVD-RW:16x/6x, DVD-ROM:16x, CD:48x/32x/48x DVD+RW/DVD-RW)
Optical Drive ELBY CLONEDRIVE SCSI CdRom Device (Virtual CD-ROM)
Optical Drive HL-DT-ST DVD-ROM GDR8163B (16x/52x DVD-ROM)
SMART Hard Disks Status OK
Partitions:
C: (NTFS) 76308 MB (38467 MB free)
~~~
I'm running the 178.24 nVidia driver. I installed the new driver after getting the crashing and it didn't fix anything. For whatever reason, Everest didn't recognize the name of my mobo. It's an EVGA. Also, my power supply is a Raidmax 450w.
I was running speedfan for a bit and it looked like my GPU ran right at about 55-60 degrees c just typing this post. I'm not sure how high it gets during gaming as I can't game right now and didn't take note of the temp when I could. =/
So I started up tf2 with the case open after dusting things off and I didn't get past the valve load screen.
So here's the problem. Lately whenever I start up a game, including Team Fortress 2, a demo of Left 4 Dead, a pirated copy of COD4 and Spore, all the title screens and menus load up fine, but once I get to the actual game part, where 3d graphics are rendered, my computer loops the last stuttering fraction of a second worth of sound for about 10 seconds and simply goes blank. It doesn't shut off, it doesn't restart, there are no error messages or blue screens, my monitor just displays the "no signal input" and goes to sleep mode. My keyboard basically has no response; num lock and caps lock no longer cause the indicator lights to toggle, and my mouse no longer responds. As I said, it doesn't actually shut off, it will just stick in this state until I hold down the power button. Also, this so far has only happened with games that display 3d graphics. For a control I've tried worms world party and it plays fine. =P I want to download some kind of non-game program that requires rendering of 3d stuff like google earth and see what happens.
So I start it back up and it happens again. There's nothing obviously indicative of a software crash in the event logs. I can leave it on and do other tasks for hours with no problems, so I'd imagine its not overheating or anything but I plan on giving it a good dusting as a part of my troubleshooting. I just updated my graphics driver. I just ran a full virus scan with avg and spybot. I'm pretty sure I have all my important updates and drivers installed. I'm actually at the university right now but when I get home I'll post my specific tech setup. Also, I haven't tried rolling it back to a restore point but I figure I'll give that a try next.
Any suggestions? If I left something out that may be relevant let me know and I'll post it. Thanks!
Edit: Sorry, I just realized this totally violates the guidelines for new posts. I'll add all my tech specs asap.
Alright, here's the system summary straight from Everest:
--------[ Summary ]-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer:
Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
OS Service Pack Service Pack 3
DirectX 4.09.00.0904 (DirectX 9.0c)
Computer Name ALEX-A49D36A3CC
User Name Alex
Motherboard:
CPU Type AMD Athlon 64, 2400 MHz (12 x 200) 4000+
Motherboard Name Unknown
Motherboard Chipset nVIDIA nForce4, AMD Hammer
System Memory 2048 MB (PC3200 DDR SDRAM)
BIOS Type Award (09/30/05)
Communication Port Communications Port (COM1)
Communication Port Communications Port (COM2)
Communication Port Printer Port (LPT1)
Display:
Video Adapter NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX (256 MB)
3D Accelerator nVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX
Monitor Plug and Play Monitor [NoDB] (PU3053402492)
Multimedia:
Audio Adapter nVIDIA MCP04 - Audio Codec Interface
Storage:
IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce4 Serial ATA Controller
IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce4 Serial ATA Controller
IDE Controller Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller
SCSI/RAID Controller Virtual CloneDrive
Disk Drive ST380817AS (80 GB, 7200 RPM, SATA)
Optical Drive _NEC DVD_RW ND-3540A (DVD+R9:8x, DVD-R9:4x, DVD+RW:16x/8x, DVD-RW:16x/6x, DVD-ROM:16x, CD:48x/32x/48x DVD+RW/DVD-RW)
Optical Drive ELBY CLONEDRIVE SCSI CdRom Device (Virtual CD-ROM)
Optical Drive HL-DT-ST DVD-ROM GDR8163B (16x/52x DVD-ROM)
SMART Hard Disks Status OK
Partitions:
C: (NTFS) 76308 MB (38467 MB free)
~~~
I'm running the 178.24 nVidia driver. I installed the new driver after getting the crashing and it didn't fix anything. For whatever reason, Everest didn't recognize the name of my mobo. It's an EVGA. Also, my power supply is a Raidmax 450w.
I was running speedfan for a bit and it looked like my GPU ran right at about 55-60 degrees c just typing this post. I'm not sure how high it gets during gaming as I can't game right now and didn't take note of the temp when I could. =/
So I started up tf2 with the case open after dusting things off and I didn't get past the valve load screen.