Possible Cooling Problem

[stikes]

Greetings,

This is my first posting to the Anandtech Forums so please be gentle.

I have recently assembled a new PC (please see the specs in the sig). It's been up and running for a couple of weeks now. However, it appears that after prolonged use, HL2 starts crashing. Also, my wife likes to play Zoo Tycoon 2 and it has some real problems loading up, sometimes freezing completely during loading. Just today, it started running very sluggishly when switching from my user profile to my wife's. Once I restarted the machine that problem went away.

I have run the burn in test in Sandra several times (overnight even) with no problems. I have also run the memory test utility that the Corsair memory guy recommends several times with no problems. In addition I have run 3DMark06 a couple of times (with pretty good scores I think) and it also did not have any problems.

The fan in the lower section of the P180 sometimes is finicky and doesn't spin up. I wonder if perhaps the power supply is getting too hot. The cables coming out of the power supply really block any air-flow from that fan anyway.

If anyone has any suggestions, I would be most grateful to hear them.

Thank you in advance,

s

 

[Jotho]

Originally posted by: stikes
The fan in the lower section of the P180 sometimes is finicky and doesn't spin up. I wonder if perhaps the power supply is getting too hot. The cables coming out of the power supply really block any air-flow from that fan anyway.

Not sure about what could be causing most of your problems, but this fan "issue" could occur because it's powered by one of the TruePower's Fan-Only connectors. I personally don't care much for them, since they only seem to power the fan when the PSU's internal temperature sensors reach a certain value. I tried using them, but found I needed the regular airflow provided by either the 3-pin connector to the motherboard or a regular 4 pin molex.

 

[stikes]

Even if it doesn't solve my particular problem, that's good information. I'll definitely make that adjustment.

Thank you

 

[Wentelteefje]

Originally posted by: stikes
The fan in the lower section of the P180 sometimes is finicky and doesn't spin up. I wonder if perhaps the power supply is getting too hot. The cables coming out of the power supply really block any air-flow from that fan anyway.

Make sure your airflow is good... Tuck away all the cables that could be obstruant... And like Jotho said, connect it to a "real" fan header or Molex... Maybe it's a driver issue... Try switching 'em... Nice system :thumbsup:

BTW Welcome to the forums!

 

[stikes]

Do you think that looking at cooling is the right approach to this? Could it be a failing component?

s

 

[zagood]

Originally posted by: stikes
Do you think that looking at cooling is the right approach to this? Could it be a failing component?

s

Definitely sounds like you're on the right track. When you have different 3d games that crash midway through playing, and it's stable the rest of the time, it's usually a cooling or PSU problem. Very doubtful that it's your PSU, so start with changing the fan connections.

If you plug the fans directly into the "normal" 4-pin molexes, they're going to run at full speed the whole time. The noise can get annoying. Try plugging them into the 3-pin connections on the motherboard, then using something like SpeedFan to control their speeds.

http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

Depending on the motherboard it doesn't always control all fans, so you might look into getting a hardware fan controller.

-z

 

[stikes]

Friends,

Thank you for your advice. As soon as I got home from work I attached all my fans to standard molex connectors and it does appear that this corrected my finicky fan problem. However, I immediately started Zoo Tycoon 2 after booting up the machine and right away it was very slow to start. When I shut ZT2 down the machine was running very sluggishly. I have not tested HL2 tonight. It usually runs pretty well until it's been on for a long period of time.

I'm running Sandra right now and it appears that the Power / Aux Temperature reading is pegged. This is generally been the case from the beginning.

Two questions:

1. Does it sound like maybe this is a PSU problem?

2. Is there another "burn-in" type utility like Sandra (maybe AmiDiag) that any of you recommend?

Thanks again,

s

 

[zagood]

Where are you getting your Power/Aux temp reading from?

Things to check:

1) Hold your hand back behind the power supply, see if any air is coming out, and how warm it is.

2) Your PSU has voltage and fan speed regulators. Check those to make sure they're not at low settings. See Appendix B of the manual: http://www.antec.com/pdf/manuals/truepower2.0_En_Manual.pdf

Give that a shot.

EDIT: If programs are taking a while to load up, might be a memory problem. Run memtest86 on your machine.

http://www.memtest86.com/

-z