games recently just crash to desktop

Recently, when playing any game, (mostly oblivion and fear), the game just randomly crashes to the desktop without any error message.

My ram clocks are at stock so there cant be any problem with tight timings.
I just bought a cooler for the cpu (thermaltake typhoon) and put down my clock speeds back to stock ( had it overclocked to 2.4ghz before) so i dont think the cpu overheating is the problem.
my card heats up quite a bit, but its always been hot and i doubt that thats the problem.

please, any help in solving my problem would be much appreciated!

any new background programs? they can sometimes use a bit too much resources. it could be hardware failing due to overclocking but first check for spyware and change all unneccesary services to low priority.

my gpu clock is standard at 490/1300. (XFX7800GTX)
it could be a apyware problem, do you recommend any program for their removal?
How do i change unneccesary services to a low priority?

Good point, stranger. This being a recent development does point to a software problem, though hardware can degrade over time, too.
For the spyware, use the spybot, but also lavasoft's ad-aware. Both are free and both catch things the other doesn't. Hope this fixes things.

thanks guys for all your suggestions, ill try them out as soon as i can and ill be sure to tell you how it goes after tomorrow, cause i got a major exam tomorow and the day after and i gotta revise pretty hard.
I really appreciate your help! THANKS AGAIN!
See you in two days!

Glad you find the cause of your problems!

I'm surprised your card couldn't cool itself properly though - maybe the fan is faulty? Also, does it expel air out the back of the case via a PCI slot, or recirculate it round the case? If the latter, that might explain it - especially if you have a lot of obstructions (cables etc) to the airflow.

Your new cooler should sort the problems out - it will probably be quieter too!

don't suppose you geet a side panel with a fan for the shark like you do the armour. i can't find one here in the U.K but i'd get one if i could.

If there are mounting holes, go for it!

I'd also recommend you tidy up the inside of you case. Get some cable ties and try to tuck away the cables as much as you can. Rounded cables help quite a bit.

It seems a shame to not utilise the full power of your uber-GFX card. Personally, I think the designers made a boob not putting an external vent on a card like that - it's bound to produce a load of heat.
Check the fan on it is working properly - is it making a lot of noise? Fans tends to get noisier just before they die. If it's still under warranty you could send it back.

Otherwise, you may like to install an after-market cooler. These generally do a better job of cooling, and produce less noise too. You could just replace the fan on the card, but to be honest, with a card like that you may as well spend a few extra pounds and get a really good cooler, such as the artic cooling type. Expelling the hot air straight out the back will prevent the card trying to cool itself with it's own hot air, which will help stop the overheating. It'll also help prevent your other components getting too warm.

Stock coolers can easily die in a short time. The northbridge fan on my motherboard only lasted a year.

I was luckier than you - my mobo doesn't really need a northbidge fan, so I just unplugged the 2 pin plug from the mobo. The little heatink does a good enough job at cooling the n/b it seems.

I'm slightly annoyed with Asus for fitting it with a fan in the first place - even when it was working it was the noisiest thing in my PC. A decent heatsink would have been more than sufficient. But they learnt from their mistake and the new models of my mobo are fan-free.

That is very odd though. A graphics card shouldn't be allowed to overheat unless you have very poor cooling in your case, and by very poor I mean close to none. I remember when I didn't know that much about hardware, I had an old case with NO fans in it whatsoever, and it was sealed shut except for the back meaning no air got in, and I was still able to play Doom 3 with my Radeon 9800 Pro, but I did get the artifacts though. That's when I bought an 80mm fan for the front, as it was the biggest size I could fit, and then my cpu temp was at 67 instead of at 75 lol. And that's Celsius by the way

My fans are fine, they came premounted with the thermaltake shark case. Just cleaned them yesterday, so they cant be the problem. Cable management is not that good, but that hsouldnt make that much of a differrence. So yeah, the culprit must be the graphics card fan.

ok ill try to dismantle the stock cooler on the GFX card, but then what, what do i check for apart from cleaning the dust out and mabye applying a new layer of thermal paste?

The first thing I'd do is try running your PC with the side of the case off. If the crashing becomes less frequent, then that proves that it was a heat problem. If you card has a temp probe on it, also check that to see if there is a correlation between the crashes and periods of high temperature.

From what you've described, it seems VERY likely that your problem is gfx overheating, but you should be sure before you start dismantling an expensive piece of electronics!

Then, we need to work out what is going wrong. Chances are your fan is faulty. If this is the case, it will probably be making a lot of noise or spinning erratically. If it's still under warranty, send it back and let someone else fix it for you.
If not, just replace the stock cooler with an arctic cooler or similar. Stock coolers tend to be noisier than aftermarket coolers. I'm also a fanboy of seeing the hot air vented out the back of the PC rather than recirculated. I've never tested what difference it makes, but it just seems to make sense to me thermodynamically - the hotter the air you use for cooling, the less effective it will be. An after market cooler might cost you £20, but on a £200 card it's not a huge amount extra.