Computer Shuts Down While Playing WoW

[Wubble]

Hey, I'm having quite the problem and I cannot for the life of me figure what is happening...The computer will shut itself off due to overheat, at least that's what it says when I restart it. But when I'm looking at the temp monitor it shows the cpu temp around 30-40C, which is ok. Now the problem, it usually happens after long periods of playing WoW.

Today I went out and got some silver thermal compound and applied it to the heatsink hoping it would work. It seemed to work but after my bro was on WoW for a good 5-6 hours, I logged in and it shut off on me after a good 30 minutes.

Now here's the question, the cpu temp seems to be fine, but I can't monitor it while I'm gaming. So I'll list a few things that may be causing some problems:

Few months back my power supply died on me so I had to purchase a cheap 480W for the time being. It seems to be working fine, so I'm not sure if that would be the problem.

I bought a new stick of ram, but the current on in my computer is a DDR PC2100, while the new stick is a PC2700. I've never had problems running two different sticks of ram with different speeds before.

Systems Specs:

P4 2.0GHZ 400MHZ Bus
Intel D845EBG2 Board
512MB DDR266 Ram
Chaintech Geforce 5200 FX 128MB

 

[JoeCDaMan]

Wubbble - well the last two things that you mentioned concern me, first off a good power supply is a must, I always use to buy the cheapest generic power supply I could find until this past summer while playing doom3 my pc instantly shut down and would not start again. I did OC my machine including cpu, gpu, and ram, but I have several fans and a vaccume florescent display showing all system temps while running different apps, ie while playing D3. and system temp was never a problem. As you know though playing high end games puts a lot of strain on the PSU as all of your hardware require more "juice" to render the graphics for the game. Anyway so that maybe problem area number one.

Second I have never heard of running different sticks of ram with different speeds, it is discouraged to even run sticks from different manufacturers. I would seriously suggest running Memtest86 to verify that your diffent sticks of mem are operating as you think they should/are. Memtest86 performs I/O tests that are a whole lot better and more thorough than the simple bios test on start up. Best of all it is OS independent for computers based on the x86 architecture.

Other than that you might want to try running prime95 to make sure your pc is stable while having mbm running in the background so that you can make sure that your cpu temps aren't at stake.

Hope that helps

 

[Wubble]

Thanks for the help. I've already ran Memtest86, it showed no problems with the memory. This crash also occurs even when I remove the stick of memory. But it only happens when I'm playing World of Warcraft. I can let the computer sit idle for hours on end, or even surf the internet and nothing will happen. Then as I'm playing for a few hours the system will totally shut down. On reboot I get a message saying it shut down due to overheating. As soon as i boot up I check my CPU temp, it's still around 30-40C. So I have no idea, I'm puzzled!

 

[thizz]

im having the same exact problem except mine does it while playing counterstrike.but the only diff is mines doesnt say overhearting or anything it jus shutsdown. the weird this is that when it shuts down the power button and mobo led are still on. im baffled but gonna go buy a new psu today so we'll see what happens.

 

[JoeCDaMan]

thizz, I had the same problem when my PSU went dead, the lights were still on which confused me and freaked me out at the same time, but if you replace your psu I think that will solve your problem.

Wubble, try running Prime95 with mbm and see what happens, cause p95 with put a huge load on your motherboard and I/O devices as well as max out your cpu and force it to do calculations so if your computer is unstable this program will break it. leaving your pc idle or surfing the internet doesn't mean anything because probably at most you will use 10% of you cpu assuming you have a relatively fast cpu. Anyway so run that and see what happens, keep mbm in the foreground so you can see the temps and see if it freezes or shutsdown.

HTH