PC restarts on its own

[Kryhs]

When I'm playing World of Warcraft or any other game where there are lots of object on the screen at once my PC will restart itself. I turned off restart on system crash to see what error I got on the blue screen but the blue screen is just blank. Any suggestions on what the problem is? I'm leaning towards my video card which is an ATI Radeon 9800xt with the 5.6 catalyst drivers.

 

[Kryhs]

Rolled back to 5.4 catalysts and it is still happening, could there be a bigger issue than just the video card?

 

[RichUK]

is your whole rig standard .. as in have you tried to OC or run out of spec any of your components ?

 

[Kryhs]

Yes it's all normal, I used to OC my cpu about a year ago but it's been stock ever since.

 

[Kryhs]

I swapped my Radeon out for an old Geforce2 I had lying around and it still did it. However, I actually got an error mesage on my blue screen this time:

DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

0x000000D1 (0x00000000, 0x00000002, 0x00000000, 0x00000000)


I have linked that error to a network problem, but that's all the farther I got. Any other help is greatly appreciated.

 

[Jon855]

TIME FOR A NEW SYSTEM, well kidding aside. I would point to PSU as well, test it, there could be problems within the motherboards. There're too many possible factors. Start testing each piece of hardware for problems, evil nasties as well. Just fiddle with the system, all i can say.

 

[KB]

It is most likely a driver and/or hardware problem. Try testing the RAM first: memtest, prime etc.
Remove as much hardware from your system as possible, network card, soundcard etc. and test it then to see if one of the removed pieces of hardware is causing it.

 

[PurdueRy]

Loosen up your ram timings in the BIOS. This usually has to do with the ram overheating

 

[asm0deus]

check out your event viewer and look for errors

 

[fuzzynavel]

is the fan on the GFX card still running.....is it clogged with dust.....

Try running a 3D benchmark such as aquamark or 3dmark......not for the score but to see if the problem occurs under different 3d environments or if it is just WOW

 

[Kryhs]

While I know more than the average person about pc's, I don't know how to test my psu or "loosen up my ram timings" Any help doing either of those is appreciated.

 

[Kryhs]

Ran 3DMark05 and it ran fine (score was 3092) no overheating beeps or shutdowns.

 

[Kryhs]

Still crashing =/

 

[SGtheArtist]

What events or actions have you performed recently at or around the time when this issued started happening?

Did you upgrade to the 9800xt recently or install new drivers. Any hardware or software changes? Just start playing WOW? Bump up the game Resolution?

I guess what I'm saying is any additional information could help the forum members in isolating the problem.

 

[Kryhs]

I installed a couple new ui addons for WoW. I have removed them to see if they were causing the problem an it still happens.

 

[PurdueRy]

Go into your Bios and you should find RAM timings. Take them each up 1. For instance if it says 1T change it to 2T and so on

 

[Kryhs]

Is that something I should do given it worked fine for a year and a half before this started happening?

 

[fuzzynavel]

Forget about RAM timings for now....just try to remember what you changed.....you managed to run 3dmark05 without issue so I don't think you have a driver problem....I think it is more related to WOW than anything else...But never having played the game I can't say much more than that....

Is there any way that you can monitor temperatures and things on the video card eg Rivatuner

Can you put 3dmark05 on a loop for a while.....

Does it happen on any other games...or during any other use of the computer?

 

[hybridvortex]

Might be a 'duh' but could it be a virus? Scanned for it?

 

[hybridvortex]

Add: how about heat? If the XT or proc. get's to warm, you might experience such hangs...

 

[SGtheArtist]

-So the problem persists no matter what graphics card is installed - (Not the graphics card)
-Error code refers to network issue
-3DMark05 runs fine
-Installed a couple UI add-ons for WOW.

It appears as if the WOW add-ons may have changed some network settings. I say this since 3DMark05 (to my knowledge) doesn't require an internet connection & the problem only seems to occur playing WOW or other (online?) games.

Do you have any trouble surfing the internet? Have you changed your LAN?

Just my thoughts.

 

[Kryhs]

Internet surfing was fine. I reformatted (yes maybe it was a little extreme) last night and it seems to be ok now even with all the UI addons I had before. I'll keep you posted if anything bad happens.

 

[SGtheArtist]

While it may have been extreme I find this action to be the best because it isolates the problem to software or hardware.

However I would recommend investing in Norton Ghost 2003 (not the newer versions 9, etc.) and once you learn how to use it, you will never have to troubleshoot software issues again, simply restore an older image of the entire partition.

Ghost will require a fair amount of space to create backup images.

I usually set it up as follows:

HDD1 - Partition 1 = OS & Programs
HDD1 - Partition 2 = Ghost backup images
HDD1 - Partition 3 = Personal files & games files

This way if anything messes up in the OS or Programs (virus, adware, malware, spyware, etc.) I simple have Ghost restore a previously created image from Partition 2 to Partition 1 and it wipes out the entire Partition 1 and writes the image.

Just my method of backing up. Its quicker at getting the system backup and running.

Note: You could use more than 1 HDD to separate these different partitions & even burn the Ghost images.

 

[Kryhs]

I have Ghost actually, it came with my systemworks. Never tried to use it though.

 

[SGtheArtist]

Once you go ghost you dont go back. My first computer was a Windows 98 original edition and I'd have to reformat about 3 times a year when it messed up. With Ghost it takes about half an hour to restore 6.5GB for my W2K & Programs partition. It would take me a whole week when I had to reformat & reload Windows 98 & the programs.

http://ghost.radified.com/

I highly recommend that you use the 2003 version as I tried the v9 and they changed how ghost works (it failed when I tried).