Quick question about overheating

Benzino

I have noticed that my computer is restarting due to overheating. I am using everything as standard (no overclocking) and it is overheating in oblivion cause it is so demanding. Is it safe to put an office fan (quite big) beside it to help cool it down?

HelterSkelter

I had this problem, turned out my hard drives were overheating. I installed a fan inside the case and it sorted it.

8T8

Sure but it would probably be a better idea to check the CPU cooler and temps it gives off, if it is quite high then you should a) replace the CPU cooler or b) at least re-seat it and re-apply a layer of thermal paste between the CPU and the heatsink.

When playing games check the GPU cooler as well to make sure the fan is spinning through a visual inspection but realistically you wouldn't last very long in game if their was a problem with the GPU coolers fan.

If none of the above work I would suggest investing in some new coolers for either the CPU or GPU or add some sort of exhaust fan to the system.

Alkers

You could give us a better description of your system, case fans etc.
A pic would help too.

Benzino

Sorry about late reply. I can't post a pic as im in college at the moment and don't have one, i'll try to do that tonight.

Here's the story:
Got oblivion the other day, and my computer crashed about 2 hours into play. And when i say crash, i mean the monitor truned off, followed by the game's music a few seconds later, and then a system restart. I went in to play the game straight away after the restart, and the above crash occured after 20 mins in.

I have been told that this is due to overheating. This makes sense as the computer is new (home made) and oblivion is the only demanding game that has been played on it for more then an hour. Overheating also explains why the second time i went ot play the game it only lasted 20 mins, as the computer wasn't given time to cool down.

Here's my specs:
CPU: AMD ATHLON 64 3200+ 2.0Ghz (standard fan and heatsink)
GFX:XFX GeForce 7800GT 256MB GDDR3 eXtreme
MOBO: Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe, nForce4 SLI X16
RAM: Corsair 2GB DDR XMS3500LL Pro TwinX
PSU: Hiper Type - R 580W
HDD: Western Digital Raptor 74GB SATA X 2

I have not overclocked anything. I have a 120mm case fan at the back of the case, sucking air out, and an 80 mm fan at the front sucking air in. I also have an 80 mm fan on the side, blowing air in on the mobo.

I tried using the office fan blowing into the case, but yet the oblivion still crashed (restart pc). I even touched the GFX, CPU heatsink, Ram, northbridge and HDD and they weren't that hot, not hot enough to crash the system, although it's hard to find the temp of the ffx by hand.

The thing is, if you don't know already, oblivion has many problems and many people are suffering from similar problems like me, so it could just be the game. I'm just trying to narrow the scope of possible causes.

P.S: I'm not really on for buying another fan as i have a water colling kit at home, that will be used in the summer when i have time to design where it is going to go.

8T8

After playing the game for a while quit before it crashes and check what the CPU temp is with Asus PC Probe in Windows.

Other suggestions:
Update graphics card driver 84.25
Update chipset driver 6.85
Install AMD CPU driver 1.2.2

Change power cable running to GPU so no other devices are on it's daisy chain.

If you can [though I think you need the pro version] run 3DMark 06 in a continuous loop for several hours and see if it crashes.

Benzino

8T8 wrote:

After playing the game for a while quit before it crashes and check what the CPU temp is with Asus PC Probe in Windows.

Other suggestions:
Update graphics card driver 84.25
Update chipset driver 6.85
Install AMD CPU driver 1.2.2

Change power cable running to GPU so no other devices are on it's daisy chain.

If you can [though I think you need the pro version] run 3DMark 06 in a continuous loop for several hours and see if it crashes.

Cheers,i have just downloaded those updates, i already have the gfx driver, i'll give them a try as soon as i get home and try oblivion out, and tell you what happens, thanks.

zilog_jones

Also try running the "torture test" on Prime95 for a while - this will put a full load on your CPU (and RAM depending on how you set it). Check the temps while running that, and if there's nothing out of the ordinary (PC shouldn't shut down till it gets to 60-70 degrees) then you can take CPU/RAM overheating out of the equation - then there's your graphics card, which is what 3DMark (like what 8T8 said) will take of.

Try running other games for a while as well. It's *plausible* for the game crashing to cause the PC to reboot, but by what you said (crashing after only 20 minutes the second time) it sounds more like a heat issue.

Or maybe it's a power issue? Did you get a decent PSU?

Benzino

Well this is my power supply, i think it is very good, what do you think:
http://www.xcase.co.uk/acatalog/copy_of_A-Top_X-Blade_deluxe.html (scroll down a bit).

I'm downloading Prime95 as i type, and will try that tonight as well. I ran UT2004 for about 4 hours and it didn't crash, but that's not very demanding, I'll try it with FEAR after i run 3d Mark 06, but i don't have the pro version. Thanks for your help, i'll post later on tonight saying how i got on.

EL WOG

My system is a 3700+ and have a bfg 6800gt, one gig of ram, and 480 psu, i have one 120 fan on back and one 80 on front close two two hard drives.
Similar system when it comes to watts or heat generated, and i have no problems with heat.
your mobo should have come with a hand program to monitor heat but there is a program called motherboard monitor(avalible on the dvd disk of PC gamer each month) than you can use and set up alarms if your board gets too hot anywere, Also u could see if cool and quiet feature on all AMD 64 bit chips has any affect or help.
check your nividia details to get info on your temps on your 7800gt, but as far as i know, they can reach as far as 78 deg with out problems, and your CPU should be whats holding back your system, so you card should be 60-65 max.
One suggestion above is a good one, check your harddrives for over heating, but with 2 gigs of ram, they should be ok.
The last thing to keep in mind and is rare, Bad termal paste on the 7800, but on the ram not GPU.
finally, i blew a PSU because i could control the PSU fan speed and just had it too low to keep noise down, put your hand over the exhaust and fell how hot that air is underload
EL WOG

Benzino

Well i installed asus probe 2 and those cpu and chipset drivers but the computer restarted again.

There was no alarm from asus probe to warn me of overheating, however i started my computer up straight after the restart and opened up asus probe.

The temp of my ram was 44, while te default theshold was 45, so that could be my problem, although i did run a torture test on the ram for an hour and 11 mins using prime95, and it passed. I should try the torture test for about 2 and half hours.

the air coming out of the psu is petty hot, but the case of psu is only warm. I also blew an office fan into tyhe case and it reduced the case temp by alot, but yet the computer still restarted.

How do i check the temp of my harddrives, is there any software for that?

Is there anway to check this?

I feel it might be the ram or gfx, i'll check out the temps of my gfx tonight and run longer torture test on my ram.

Although the whole problem could just be the game's fault. Oblivion has alot of problems, memory leaks been one of the major ones, although i don't suffer from slow frame rates before it restarts, so it couldn't be due to memory leaks, could it?

Benzino

I have just been told that my problem is my xfx 7800gt, i've been told it has a design flaw. I could turn the clock speed down to 400MHz form 450MHz, and i will to confirm that it's the card, then i'll be forced to return it. I hope it's not the card though:(

8T8

I have heard recently of certain overclocked XFX parts being recalled they were too aggressive in their overclocking out of the box and the GPU just cant take it.

It's not widely known but the GF7 series GPU's partially overclock themselves, different parts of the GPU run at different frequencies and if the base clock is 450Mhz in games it could jump to 470Mhz, this may be what pushes the XFX part over the edge now XFX are aware of that dynamic clock system but it looks like they may have pushed it to far.

Try Rivatuner and use it's own overclocking tool to keep the GPU at 400Mhz. Under driver settings click customise->system settings, the first tab should be the overclocking tab so tick the box to enable it and it will prompt to reboot or detect choose detect.

From the drop down box were it says "standard 2D" select "performance 3D" and you should see the core clock come up as 450Mhz, dial it back to 400Mhz then tick the box to apply settings upon Windows startup press okay and reboot. Fingers crossed it should be okay after this if not RMA it.

You could of course dump the bios edit it so it stays at 400Mhz then flash it back but that is perhaps a bit too risky if you can get it replaced and you wouldn't want to lose your warranty : )

DemonOfTheFall

EDIT : misread.

Benzino

Yeah it's the 7800GT. I underclcked it to 400MHz and played oblivion for 3 and a half hours, the longest i have played the game without a crash.

Now i just have to email XFX and say them to refund me, i hope they will instead of repairing it as that'll take ages!!

Thanks for all the help guys/girls

8T8

Benzino wrote:

Yeah it's the 7800GT. I underclcked it to 400MHz and played oblivion for 3 and a half hours, the longest i have played the game without a crash.

Now i just have to email XFX and say them to refund me, i hope they will instead of repairing it as that'll take ages!!

Thanks for all the help guys/girls

Although you are entirely within your rights to demand a replacement (or refund not too sure on that) there is nothing wrong with the card per say just that they have set the clock speed too high in the bios.

If the system has remained stable you could continue to use Rivatuner to keep it in check though I sympathise on how annoying the situation is & you paid for faster card so you should get what you paid for.

Twist their arms a little bit and see if you can rangle a 7900GT or something out of them you never know it might work.

zilog_jones

Benzino wrote:

<HDD temps>

Is there anway to check this?

SpeedFan will give you all the SMART readings from your hard disks, and can compare them online to other disks of the same model.

Benzino

8T8 wrote:

Twist their arms a little bit and see if you can rangle a 7900GT or something out of them you never know it might work.

You read my mind!!!! After all i don't think i'll be able to get over the trauma of this whole incident;)