All games crashing, Is this a PSU error?

are you overclocking?

nope, i don't even know how. could it be PSU?

Swapping PSUs is a good way to check, it might be, but your 9500GT doesnt use much power so its unlikely that its overloading it but your PSU might be dying so the load doesnt matter.

I would also suggest running memtest to confirm that it is not a memory issue.

Are you getting any blue screens?

im not getting any blue screens, everything works fine on windows, adobe. just games crashing after a minute or two.

yup, i hope it's the PSU cause i bought it very cheap not knowing by that time that it's important.

I would suspect the graphics card. If it is games only that cause the PC to crash then it is most likely the GPU giving out when it has to do 3D Rendering. The PC seems to hold up when only 2D is required. This could be the PSU failing to deliver when the card gets under load and or the card itself.

Download this:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/System-Info/PC-Wiza...

And check out the temperatures.

@ wamphyri

we already tried my graphics card to my buddy's pc and it's running smoothly with his games, capacitors are still ok.

@ mosox

i have it installed already and here's my current stats:

cpu temp: 48 degrees c

cpu voltage : 1.392v
core #1 load : 7%
core #2 load: 6%

gfx: 57 degrees c

Thats pretty toasty for a CPU at that load level. Get prime95 and see what your CPU temps are at full load.

what do you mean pretty toasty?

by toasty i mean hot, since the max safe temp on the pentium D is 64C
http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=27511

months ago it's reaching 65+C, opened the case and cleaned the processors fan, then it dropped down to 49%,

i just opened the case of my cpu for now and positioned a fan straight to my pc.

All games are crashing, or only just the 3D ones? By "crashing", do you mean BSOD's and hangs, or do you mean reset/reboot cycles?

If only the 3D games are crashing, it could be either drivers or the power supply cannot support the higher 3D loads.

Even 49 degrees is still warm. My AMD Athlon x2 5200+ idles around 38 degrees with stock cooler and I don't think it reaches 50 under load when gaming and all. What is airflow like in the case?

@jsc, well all my games installed here are in 3d, and ragnarok online is still technically a 3d game right?. they're cabal online, battle for middle earth 2, torchlight...

just after i logged in to the game affter the main menu, my monitor turns black and the sound flickered so it hangs, all i can do is to press my restart button in my cpu.

@ohiou_grad_06

i have a fan on my case and then another one for the hard drives, but for now im leaving the case open and positioned a fan straight to my pc.

**************

we already tried swapping a branded i master 500w power supply and still no luck, games still crash, also tried a new ram.

we bought a thermal paste and we'll try it later if it will do any good. harddrives also ok, so we're narrowing it down to motherboard or processor.

57 degrees c is the temp of your video card on idle?

@mosox yes with only firefox on.

That is way too high. Clean the dust on the cooler. It's a passive card or it has a fan?

hayyys  

tried the thermal paste but still no luck. games still crash.

@mosox

already cleaned all parts. no more dust on fans. the video card has a fan.


i guess we narrowed it down to motherboard and processor. need to find someone who has socket 775, any more suggestions please?

You know what else you might try, check out on newegg, they have pci slot cooler fans for about 5 bucks or so. You might grab one and put in a slot just under your video card to help pull the hot air out of the case. Could help. That's what I've got on my rig, as well as a large side fan and one under the power supply. Running firefox while defragging the hard drive, my temps are....

Here's what I'm talking about, I think this is actually the one I have too.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

If I'm not mistaken my video card fan only runs at like 20% speed by default, using a 9600gt btw.

GPU 41 degrees celcius
CPU 38 degrees---keep in mind stock speed, stock cooler, stock thermal pad for my amd.

@ohiou_grad_06

will definitely buy cooling stuffs after everything's fixed. right now the cpu case is opened and a fan is directly positioned towards my pc.

Things to check - not in any particular order, just do whatever is easiest for you to do first

1 - make sure you have free hard drive space
2 - run memtest86+ and check for errors
3 - run HDD Regenerator to check for bad sectors (if you can't find that run seatools or som other hard drive diagnostic tool)
4 - if you can swap the psu with another do that
5 - run cccleaner to check for registry errors
6 - run virus/malware scanner
7 - clean windows install - you may have corrupt files or something (do this as last resort)
8 - re-seat all hardware components

@iam2thecrowe

thanks, i already tried all of that.

im now looking for a socket 775 motherboard to check if it's the one causing the crash.

nyayks, tested a 9400gt on my pc and it worked.

playing cabal online for an hour already without crash.

so there's a difference between trying a gpu on your pc and trying your gpu to another pc?

What's your GPU temp on the other PC?

thanks ohiou,

we tried my 9500gt to a pc with an hec raptor 500w psu althought it worked with my generic psu for months.

replaced my generic with imaster 500w psu and the 9500gt still didn't work. so now we tried the 9400gt on the imaster 500w psu and i'm playing for 3 hrs straight with no crash and smooth gameplay now....

@mosox,

we weren't able to monitor the temp on the other pc using my 9500gt since we're thrilled that it worked.

Still sounds like a PSU issue with it not supplying enough power. The PSU's you are mentioning are cheaper units, and no offense, but they are dangerous. If one of those things would fail, it could potentially take your whole system with it.

I once had a weak/cheap power supply fail on me, and ended frying a motherboard, and that is not fun.

Even this PSU would likely be better than what you have.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

It can push 30 amps on the 12v+ rail, which is more than even a lot of 500 watt cheaper units. To give you an idea how strong it really is, I used to have an old generic unit that I swapped out for a better power supply, but the old power supply was 550 watts, and could push 24 amps on the 12v+ rail. So really, the 400 watt I'm showing you would even be stronger than that 550.

One thing to realize is that Power Supply performance degrades over time. That said, that's likely why your old power supply pushed it for a while, but as it started to age, it wasn't able to produce quite enough power, thus giving you the black screens and shutdowns. And it could be that your new power supply cannot push that voltage period.

When you tested your card on your friend's machine, I notice you said he has an HEC which may be why it worked. Because on some of the HEC units I've read about they are rated on paper to produce more power, but I can't say they are well known as good power supplies, which could make using one iffy.

To be honest, I just googled iMaster 500 watt power supply and didn't get that much, newegg does not even sell them, so I would say the power supply you have is questionable at best. Do what you want, but I've run cheap power supplies and been burned before. Never again. I would not trust my system to a power supply that is too cheap.

thanks ohiou! appreciate your replies.

i realize that could really be the problem. i'm going to upgrade my psu as soon as i can.

thanks to all those who replied!  

Best answer selected by elytista14.

i think you should get a PSU with a higher wattage output (600w-up).
That's what happened to my sisters rig with Pentium d 820 (2.8G)
The rig would only start from the bios then stops while loading windows everytime i inserted the Vidcard (FX5500 AGP) but would normally load whenever i remove the card.
Thanks God it happened that my brothers pc wants to upgrade his windows so i borrowed his 600w psu (Dynamo brand) & presto! Everything works fine & smooth.
It seems that the +12v rail is the culprit. The 5000w psu of my sisters rig only rated as 17A while the 600w rates at 22A.