GPU Issues?

[GeordieMagic]

Hi I have recently completed a new PC build for my dad and it went smoothly, but for some reason we are getting crashs during games. The computer works fine while watching hours of video or playing music, just when he starts gaming he gets about 20 mins into a game and then they crash out. During the crash we cant use Ctrl/Alt/Delete we have to do a hard reset with the restart button.

I've gone through the usual troubleshooting stuff, new drivers, old drivers fiddled with games setting, checked for error codes and there nothing pointing me to what the problem may be. I do however think it may be graphics related.

Any ideas or what to try next?

Thanks.

His build is -

Intel CPU Core i7 3930K
MSI X79A-GD65 (8D)
Frio Advanced CPU Cooler
Corsair Memory Vengeance Red 8GB DDR3 1866 Mhz CAS 9 XMP Dual Channel
Win 7 premium 64bit

 

[ricardois]

Are the temps ok? no overheating?

What is the power supply?
Are you using any dedicated video card?

 

[GeordieMagic]

Temps are good, CPU is around 35-45 centigrade under load its around 50. GPU is a Nvidia MSI GTX 570 1.2GB, its temps are also around 30-40 centigrade.

Its definitely not a heating issue, he has an awesome case for keeping PC cool. Coolermaster Cosmos, it has 5 fans in it. Not to mention the new frio is a good cpu cooler if a little noisy.

Next step im considering is clean install after reseating Ram, GPU and HDD's.

 

[ricardois]

what is the Power supply unit? sometimes if the psu is too weak, you may suffer crash when the computer is using much power (gaming for some time) i assume that your psu is at least 700W from a good brand, what is the brand? some brands sell 700w and deliver 500w, so that is important too.

it can be a driver problem, try using stable graphics driver, download the nvidia beta driver 290.53 BETA they are working good for me, the gpu temps are very low, is this under stress? 40 centigrades in gpu under stress is very cold. are you using aftermarket coolers for the gpu too?

 

[boju]

hoping for your's and dad's sake its nothing hardware related that’s faulting/dying Could be the graphics/ram/psu, hopefully not the cpu.

You could try doing some diagnostics with memtest98 to test your ram and perhaps prime95 as well to test overall system stability.

Is it possible something could have been altered in the bios by accident, without being aware of the impact it may cause? Try resetting the bios to default and see if it helps.

Good luck.

 

[GeordieMagic]

his psu is a corsair enthusiast 1200W, the msi GPU comes with their own twin frozr cooler which are really good, my 580 has them.

I will try the drivers you suggested and give those diagnostic tests ago tomorrow. If they don't yield any info i will re-seat everything and run a clean install again.

 

[GeordieMagic]

heeeellllloooooo!

looks as though i have cracked the issue, i did lots of stability testing with various software. The hardware has no flaws in them, I had them running on 100% load for hours, temps never went over 55, and GPU was cool around 45-50.

Did a clean install, installed all the driver from CD's (made sure we had no internet connection during this) after that did all the usual updates with windows then I did a BIOs update and the computer is now working a charm, he clocked 1.5 hours on skyrim last night with max setting with no crashes and today he's been playing darkness 2 for a few hours no crashes or visual bugs thus far.

I'll be 100% confident once he has tested a few more games and has played all day without crashing.

fingers crossed.

 

[ricardois]

heeeellllloooooo!

looks as though i have cracked the issue, i did lots of stability testing with various software. The hardware has no flaws in them, I had them running on 100% load for hours, temps never went over 55, and GPU was cool around 45-50.

Did a clean install, installed all the driver from CD's (made sure we had no internet connection during this) after that did all the usual updates with windows then I did a BIOs update and the computer is now working a charm, he clocked 1.5 hours on skyrim last night with max setting with no crashes and today he's been playing darkness 2 for a few hours no crashes or visual bugs thus far.

I'll be 100% confident once he has tested a few more games and has played all day without crashing.

fingers crossed.

to speed up this process i reommend you use prime95 for the cpu, Msi Kombustor for GPU you will be able to run stress tests that will use 99% of both, because some games don't use 100% of gpu, and no game will use 100% of your cpu so with stress test you will know if it Really is stable.