PC crashing while gaming

[blaketx]

First let me start off by saying sorry if i placed this in the wrong area. But anyways, i am having some issues with my new-ish PC. So my issues began about a month ago while gaming i noticed after about a few hours of gaming my pc would freeze up and the audio would choke up with the crash as well (no blue screen). As time has progressed i noticed its becoming increasingly more frequent and at this point i am getting crashes where the power completely shuts off no freeze what so ever just a complete dump. all my drivers and firmware seem up to date. ANY help or advice would be much appreciated.

Mainboard : Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3
Chipset : ATI RD9x0
Processor : AMD FX 8120 @ 3423 MHz
Physical Memory : 8192 MB
Video Card : AMD Radeon HD 6570
Power Supply: 500w 12vATX
Hard Disk : Seagate ST31000528AS ATA Device (1000GB)
DVD-Rom Drive : Optiarc DVD+-RW AD-7200S
Monitor Type : LCD-TV**** - 32 inches
Network Card : Realtek Semiconductor RTL8168/8111 PCIe Gigabit Ethernet Adapter
Operating System : Windows 7 Professional Professional Media Center 6.01.7601 Service Pack 1 (64-bit)
DirectX : Version 11.00
Windows Performance Index : 5.9 on 7.9

 

[blaketx]

update: crashing without gaming now, no bsod. just a frozen screen or a complete shut off.

 

[blaketx]

previous blue screen logs:

120712-21824-01.dmp 12/7/2012 12:30:42 AM KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED 0x0000001e ffffffff`c0000005 fffff800`02ebc7ef 00000000`00000000 00000000`7efa0000

120312-22011-01.dmp 12/3/2012 7:54:01 PM KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED 0x0000001e ffffffff`c0000005 fffff800`031d46ea 00000000`00000001 00000000`00000018


120312-19125-01.dmp 12/3/2012 3:17:48 PM SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED 0x1000007e ffffffff`c0000005 fffff880`01490d70 fffff880`031caa78


120212-34866-01.dmp 12/2/2012 3:04:49 PM IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL 0x0000000a 00000000`4378725c 00000000`00000002 00000000`00000001

 

[daswilhelm]

who manufactures your PSU and RAM?

 

[Lee-m]

Easiest thing to check, and the most common cause of this type of behaviour is over heating. Coretemp and gpu-z can help you monitor them.

 

[djscribbles]

When you say "Complete Shutoff" do you mean the computer turns itself off entirely?

If that is the case, I would suspect the power supply. What brand and model is your PSU?

 

[blaketx]

who manufactures your PSU and RAM?

psu is coolmax

ram is Samsung

 

[daswilhelm]

try another power supply, if you have one for testing.

 

[blaketx]

When you say "Complete Shutoff" do you mean the computer turns itself off entirely?

If that is the case, I would suspect the power supply. What brand and model is your PSU?

coolmax zx series 500w
zx-500

 

[djscribbles]

If you're answer to "Define 'Complete Shutoff'... " is "the fans stop and the room gets quiet" I would absolutely suspect your PSU. Coolmax is a very bad brand, they are poor quality, and it's likely struggling to output anywhere near 500w.

If your within the return period on your purchase, return that PSU, and replace it with something respectable before it does permanent damage.

A few good choices:

(I'd recommend this one, good quality, good price)
550W XFX 60$ after rebate : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817207013&Tpk=xfx%20550

(If you've got a few extra dollars to spend, seasonic a top quality brand)
620W Seasonic 80$ : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151096

(This is a decent quality supply, good price, I'd go for the XFX first, but if the extra $10 is too steep, then this is a good fall-back)
Corsair Cx500w 50$ after rebate: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139027

 

[blaketx]

try another power supply, if you have one for testing.

original PSU is in now.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371033 (one that is in now)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817159124&Tpk=zx-500 (previous)

 

[blaketx]

If you're answer to "Define 'Complete Shutoff'... " is "the fans stop and the room gets uiet" I would absolutely suspect your PSU. Coolmax is a very bad brand, they are poor quality, and it's likely struggling to output anywhere near 500w.

If your within the return period on your purchase, return that PSU, and replace it with something respectable before it does permanent damage. (I'll edit in a few PSUs links soon)

as far as the "complete shutoff" goes, i mean it will crash no video no audio to black screen pc has zero power as in i have to physically push the power button for it to boot.

 

[blaketx]

crashes with the new power supply also.

 

[djscribbles]

You've got your CPU overclocked? Have you tried backing that off? The overclock will cause additional power draw, so if that fixes it, it will be tough to say whether it's the OC itself, or insufficient power

 

[blaketx]

You've got your CPU overclocked? Have you tried backing that off? The overclock will cause additional power draw, so if that fixes it, it will be tough to say whether it's the OC itself, or insufficient power

i was not aware it is overclocked. how ican i back it down.

 

[blaketx]

Set the command rate on your RAM to 2T.

Let me know if that helps or not and I'll provide further instructions.

okay, when i looked in bios it had the command timing set to "auto" so i set it to manual 2T. is that correct?

 

[blaketx]

Set the command rate on your RAM to 2T.

Let me know if that helps or not and I'll provide further instructions.

still shutting off.

 

[blaketx]

another thing i have noticed is when my pc shuts off, the other computers are losing an internet connection. i live with gamers so when my pc shuts off i hear them say they lost net.

 

[daswilhelm]

im confused as to why this situation causes your gamer friends to lose connection.

 

[blaketx]

killing the overclock has greatly increased performance. have no idea why that was on.

 

[djscribbles]

Weird, if you haven't already, you may want to load fail-safe defaults in bios if you are still shutting down.

The fact that everyone loses network connections when you crash makes me suspicious of the motherboard a little, but I still don't trust the PSU either (even though you swapped it out).

You said the computer was new-ish, can you give some history on your computer (what parts are new, what parts are old, what older parts were in the pc with, ages of stuff, etc)?

I worry a bit that your PSU could be out of voltage specs, and causing damage to your components. It's a rather unlikely scenario, but if you've got a multimeter and know how to use it, you could check this out fairly quickly (you maybe able to tell in BIOS), if possible try to check it under load (with a game running).