At my wits' end... [UPDATED]

[SantiClaws]

I have issues with several games that crash to desktop - Battlefield BC2, America's Army, Dirt3. My system is more than good enough to run these games; as a matter of fact, Metro2033 and Arma II which are really resource intensive chug along without a problem. Battlefield crashes to desktop without any warning, AA gives me a quick error message before crashing and Dirt3 often full out locks my computer. AA and BABC2 are Steam games, but other Steam games run fine. I suspected Punkbuster, but Dirt3 doesn't use PB and BABC2 crashed on single player as well.

I've uninstalled and reinstalled drivers for the video card, using both Revo uninstaller and driver cleaner, and I've tried various catalyst drivers. I've uninstalled and reinstalled the audio drivers and even installed a different sound card. Uninstalled and reinstalled the games themselves. Tried a clean boot with virtually no services running, no go. Nothing helps. I really don't want to reinstall the OS so I'm wondering if there's anything else I haven't tried.

HD5850
Phenom II 920 Quad
4GB OCZ performance RAM
Antec HCG-620 PSU

UPDATE:

It appears the CPU is having issues. Prime95 won't run for more than a few minutes, even though the temps are still low. I ran the CPU overclocked for several months, with very decent temps and very stable - Prime95 and any other cpu-intensive app ran with no problems. A few weeks ago, I got Metro2033, which would not play nice with an overclocked CPU, so I rolled it back to stock. I went out and got a digital multimeter, all the rails seem to be well within spec under load, so it doesn't seem to be the PSU. It seems weird the CPU would all of a sudden go south on me, particularly when it was at stock speed.

Ran memtest, no errors.

Any ideas?

 

[denis280]

What Os are u running

 

[SantiClaws]

What Os are u running

oops. Win7 professional.

 

[denis280]

OK! fist of all.probably your PSU starting to give up.but let's not panic here.you did uninstall drivers and reinstall.but there is always crap left in the system.So formating and clean install the OS would be the best.and by the way is your MOBO bios up to date.

 

[Zargon]

are you OC'd at all?

 

[SantiClaws]

OK! fist of all.probably your PSU starting to give up.but let's not panic here.you did uninstall drivers and reinstall.but there is always crap left in the system.So formating and clean install the OS would be the best.and by the way is your MOBO bios up to date.

I've thought about the PSU being the issue, but why would games that are relatively easy on the system, like AA, crash but not Metro2033 or Arma II? The PSU is close to new and according to a few calculators I've used, should be more than enough for my system. Interesting thought on the Mobo BIOS, I'll check it out.

 

[SantiClaws]

are you OC'd at all?

Yes and no. The CPU is stock, the GPU I've tried both OC'd and not OC'd, it doesn't seem to make any difference.

 

[darkewaffle]

There's really no mystery to why BFBC2 crashes.

It's because it's BFBC2.

Seriously I think these are more likely to be game specific issues than some underlying cause. My PC has been very solid for me under nearly all usage cases, however that didn't stop BFBC2 still BSODing me, Bioshock crashing, and a few others. In spite of this I can play other games without issue for weeks on end. I would look for information regarding causes of crashes in those particular games and see if you can find any sort of common denominator.

A good place to start would be turning down graphic settings in those games and seeing if you still crash, then re-enable them one by one and see if you can narrow it down.

 

[SantiClaws]

There's really no mystery to why BFBC2 crashes.

It's because it's BFBC2.

Seriously I think these are more likely to be game specific issues than some underlying cause. My PC has been very solid for me under nearly all usage cases, however that didn't stop BFBC2 still BSODing me, Bioshock crashing, and a few others. In spite of this I can play other games without issue for weeks on end. I would look for information regarding causes of crashes in those particular games and see if you can find any sort of common denominator.

A good place to start would be turning down graphic settings in those games and seeing if you still crash, then re-enable them one by one and see if you can narrow it down.

Heh, yeah, it seems BFBC2 has a lot of issues. I've tried all the fixes I could find online and I've been going back and forth with their tech support, they've had me try a million different things and none of them have worked. What made me wonder whether it's the computer and not BFBC2 itself is the fact that these other games are crashing. Of course, others I play have no issues at all.

I'll try turning down the eye candy, thanks.

 

[SantiClaws]

Turned down settings and resolution, no good.

 

[Quiksilver]

Are you using the latest motherboard BIOS?
Have you ran memtest86+?
How are the temps while gaming?
How are the PSU voltages? (Check using a digital multimeter and not software)

Too me though this sounds like a video card slowly dying, I'd pull it and swap with a spare and see if it works without it.

 

[SantiClaws]

Checked, and the BIOS is the latest version. Will run memtest, although I don't think that's it. I don't have a multimeter or a spare vid card.

I'd be more suspicious of hardware components if not for the fact that the games that are not crashing are ones considered hardest on a system and the ones that are crashing are considerably less taxing. I've also run Prime95 and Furmark, the system is stable and temps are well under max under full load.

 

[SantiClaws]

Now the new and improved thread! See first post for update

 

[SantiClaws]

No one with any ideas?

 

[Quiksilver]

Isn't much to suggest... your overclock has either degraded the motherboard or CPU as you suggested in the update.

Replacing one of the two could fix your issues the question is which is it.

 

[SantiClaws]

I think I figured it out. I think the problems started when I upgraded from a 5770 to a 5850 GPU. I have 1066 memory and it required higher voltage (per spec) than MB default to run at that speed. Well, apparently the new GPU, which draws more juice, required another bump in the memory voltage plus I bumped the NB voltage from default, which I should have already done too but it ran without issues before. No more crashes.