It's a difficult question to ask

[Ahhdball]

I've built my first system from the ground up, and those of you who have seen me here before know I've gone through hell and back trying to get this to work. This "build yer own" experience is turning out to be a bad one!
Here's what I've got:
KT333 Dragon
AMD 1800+ with a Volcano9 fan
2 (WD 60g)
512 Mushkin! PC2700
Radeon9700 Pro
SoundBlaster 512
It seems as though I can't play graphic heavy games like WC3 or Serious Sam. Every time I try either the game freezes or the monitor shuts off and I have to hard boot the machine. I've troubleshot til me eyes bleed and I really don't know what the problem could be. I've switched the vid card to a GeForce Ti4200 and I get the same result so I'm betting its not the card. I've switched the MB voltage around and got the same result. All the drivers are current and I've installed DirectX 9. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[pillage2001]

Overclocking or not?? What's your PSU built?

 

[Ahhdball]

No overclocking at all, not yet anyway....
PSU? Are you asking about my Power Supply? It's an Antec480.

 

[BD231]

Probably the Sound Blaster, uninstall it as well as its drivers and see where that gets you.

 

[Ahhdball]

I actually came up with that idea lol I think I'll try that next. Could it be they are screwing with the intergrated sound? Why would that cuase my monitor to just shut off? By the way thanks for the help everyone. I'll get this thing built if it kills me! or my wife kills me one of the two...

 

[nick1985]

how are your temps??? it could be overheating and shutting itself down

 

[Ahhdball]

I thought of that too but I have 2 fans (an 80mm intake in front and a 75cfm blower under it) I can't see the card getting that hot. Always a possiblity though and I never assume anything....is there a way to tell? I've checked the processor temp in the BIOS and it's only running around 98f, I don't think thats bad is it?

 

[ozone13]

Take out everything but one harddrive, one stick of ram (if you have multiple), videocard. You need to get to the most basic config you can to properly troubleshoot. If the basic config works, add one component at a time until you find out what is causing the problem. If the basic config DOESN'T work, you've probably narrowed it down already to something already in your computer.

 

[tbates757]

It's not overheating, 98F temps are just fine

 

[Ahhdball]

groovy...think I'll try some of these tomorow.....keep the ideas comin, I'm all ears/eyes and THANKS!

 

[cleverhandle]

Originally posted by: BD231
Probably the Sound Blaster, uninstall it as well as its drivers and see where that gets you.

Agreed. If that works, try installing the SB (Son of a... I mean, Sound Blaster) in the PCI slot furthest from the AGP slot. That's assuming the KT333 Dragon maps interrupts the same as my KT266A version, which I believe is correct.