Bad CPU or motherboard?

[MadDogRacing]

A buddy of mine has a weird problem. Last night he was in a middle of a Joint Op online game, and all of a sudden his framerate dropped in half, almost unplayable. So he got out, rebooted and still the same problem. He only has NASCAR Racing as another game on his system, so he tried that also with same results...FPS half of what he use to get.

His system:
P4 2.8GHz (533) on Asus P4C800 Deluxe
2x 512 MB Kingston DDR
ATI 9800XT
Enermax 350w PSU
Catalyst 4.12s

Now I told him to install Sisoft Sandra Lite 2005 and after a few CPU benchmarks it doesn't look good. His CPU is reporting only 4400 on the Dhrystone but it should be in the 8000s for that 2.8. But the Whetstone score is where it should be. I also got him to run the Memory Benchmark and that score checked out good at 3300 which is about right for that setup.

We also looked at the voltages which showed something a little fishy also:
The negative voltages are REALLY off.

-12v rail: -9.9v
-5v rail: -1.2v

All the + rails where fine. Are the neg. voltages used for anything and could this mean the voltage regulators on the motherboard are messed up? The system is stable without BSODs, lockups or slow downs(other than the obvious game slowdows) which is what is weird.

Which do you think? CPU or motherboard?

Ray

 

[ScrapSilicon]

nm

 

[LTC8K6]

Temps?

 

[Uncle Bob]

virus/spyware/hijack?

 

[MadDogRacing]

Temps are fine: CPU at 45C, and GPU 65-69C which is about normal for a 9800XT with stock cooling. This machine is not used for anyhting but gaming..no web or email. He only has 20 processes running on WinXP Pro so no virus/hijacks going on.

No overclocking either.

 

[Firetower]

Could be a memory issue if he has more than 1 stick try one, then the other

 

[daveybrat]

With voltages like that, i'm more apt to say his power supply is taking a dump. I'd look into getting a good quality replacement power supply for his rig. My negative rails don't look like that. Those look very weird.

Good luck