PSU OR VGA Cant afford to buy both for testing

[kikoscience]

this happened 2 days ago while i was playing heroe of newerth my LCD screen suddenly goes black and you can see the LED indicator blinking which means theres nothing wrong with the lcd screen (i think) capslock and numlock is steady so i cant alt-f4 and use windows key to restart pc so i guess my pc frozed so i had to restart. played the game again same thing happened played prototype 2 still happened.. now i opened the pc and saw that everythhing was dusty so i bought that canned air compressor disassembled everything and blew the dust off everything assembled it back and played the game again samething event happened i have 4 gig of ram 2 on each slot removed one played backed out did the samething with the other so i ruled out RAM

been surfing the web watching youtube videos and watching movies avi(3 full movies from opening to ending credits) the whole day yesterday the error did not happen, awhile ago my brother was playing the sims 3 and he said that h pc did not restart hes been playing for hours, i told him to play heroes of newerth and bam black screen again, I tried playing it on window mode so instead of black screen the pc reboots i dont know whats up but i dont think i have a bad VGA its external btw EVGA GTS 250 and its te energy saving green thingy........... i can afford another video card or another PSU but i not both so if ever im buying replacement i have to be sure its the right one that will fix the fault..............



PS.
Tried video memory test and it passed on all pass i have no idea on how to test the psu for faults

 

[monoproelio]

If you have not yet try playing HON on minimum settings and get back to us before continuing! Does your PSU have any other PCI 6/8 pin cables? If so try those, I assume you don't have a spare video card to try or computer to put in the graphics card. Generally high quality PSU's are pretty stable, so if you know the exact model it would help. Another possibility is that the graphics card might be overheating. I've had that happen before check it's temperature! Hope this helps! Have a wonderful day, if your problem does not resolve easily please give us more information! God Bless!

 

[kikoscience]

wow so i got through a game without the usual symptoms appearing disabled all the checkboxes that makes the game look beautiful medium on shaders cant see anything on my PSU must be using stock this is the 2nd time i had to change my PSU the first one burned out on me :| I dont know what brand this is it must be stock PSU :| so it is possible its my PSU, VGA must not be getting enough power

 

[Rugger]

What are your system specs? The make/model of the PSU? Are all of your hardware drivers up to date? The game up to date on patches? What program did you use to test the RAM? Have you run a stress test on the system using Furmark / Prime95? If yes, then did you get the same lock-up/reboot? Have you checked your system event log to see what error you're getting when the system locks up?

 

[monoproelio]

It might be the card overheating, or it might be a short on the board of the card. Unfortunately the only full proof way to check if it's the card or psu is by using a different PSU or graphics card. First step would be to check airflow.

 

[kikoscience]

E7500 2.9Ghz cpu
ASUS PK5PLAM-SE Motherboard
Kingston 2 GB 800mhz RAM got 2
stock PSU
EVGA GTS 250 1GB

anyway fixed it already turns out my AVR was causing the problem

omg i cleaned my AVR yesterday and the symptoms were gone? what gives dirty AVR caused the problem

 

[Sipko]

yes it does sound like that card is overheating. use programs like aida or siw (sys info for win) and monitor the heat of the cpu chipset and gpu while you are playing a game. and i would not recommend a stress test if you already know that the system is running unstable. but a stress test can be run when you want to make shure that a solution has been found. if its really a overheating problem then you might try (on your own risk and depending on what gpu you have) to apply some new thermal paste on the gpu and a proper cleaning of the fan and cooler. But if you are not confident enough then you can try giving it to a service station.
Before you might try checking if your card still has guarantee. So if it overheats, and if you have guarantee give it to an service.

 

[kikoscience]

Best answer selected by kikoscience.