Game freezes/black screen

[RedDg]

Just upgraded from an Athlon XP2500 Barton to a Mobile Athlon XP2600 and overclocked it.

I dont think heat is an issue (for the CPU anyway).  Used Arctic Silver and have a Thermaltake Volcano 12 CPU fan/heatsink.    Put an 80mm double ball bearing fan on the back and 1 on the front of the case.  CPU shows around 45-47C at idle with the case back together.  All dust was cleaned when I was putting the rig back together.

Now all of my games will get a black screen or freeze soon after starting them.  I can surf the web, check email etc. with no problems.  But do anything with the video card and get lockups.  I think it's the power supply but wanted to check toi see if I may have missed something.  I had a 350W PS and ran out to buy one last night.  Picked up a 400W and installed it.  After that I could play games for up to 5 minutes or so before it would freeze.  With the 350W PS I could play for maybe a minute.  The 400W was all Best Buy had available and it's going back today.

Any thoughts?  I also read where Skuzzy said something about changing the RAM timings for NForce2 MBs.

Athlon XP2600 Mobile @ 2.4GHz
Asus AN78X Deluxe NForce2 M/B
1 GB Corsair PC3200 Value RAM
9800 Pro with Omega 2.5.90 drivers

[RedDg]

Update:
Just put in a 550W PS and same problem.

[38ruk]

Just upgraded from an Athlon XP2500 Barton to a Mobile Athlon XP2600 and overclocked it.



Was your barton multies locked ?  i ran my 2500 @2.4 for almost a year . 12X 200 fsb. ... anyways , did you bump up the vcore on the cpu at all ? some times that will make it run more stable when u are pushin the cpu .   How are your memory timing set? some times you have to back off the memory timings if you bump the FSB up too far .   How are you getting the 2.4ghz... 12x200?  or 10x 220... ect ect ....... What is your cas latency? if you can back off the cas lat. that will be stabilize an overclock if the ram is at fault .  also you temps seem alittle high for idle . my old barton was @ 51c under load and 38c idle ... GL   38

[RedDg]

Upgraded to new Omegas (2.6.12)
CPU is 12 X 200FSB

RAM timings: 8,3,3,2.5
I hadn't upped the voltage since I put in the new CPU.  Putting up to 1.675V and will see how it goes...

[RedDg]

No help
But idle temp is 47-49C.  Still in the ballpark for this CPU.

[StarOfAfrica2]

Did you check the temps on your video card?  If you only get lockups when your video card is getting a workout, wouldnt that be the more likely suspect?  Especially if the CPU is adding more heat inside the case.

Also, are those the original timings on the memory?  If you changed them at all, I'd put them back to whatever the factory settings were.  Some RAM does NOT take well to adjusting the latency settings manually.

[RedDg]

I didn't change the timing of the RAM.  I think it's the video card as well, but I've never had an issue with it before the new CPU went in.  Any free utilities that measure video card temps?  I can't see one in the Omega driver bundle.

[kamori]

I thought it was my machine also...Its not. Its a game problem...Theres all kinds of complaints...

kamori

[38ruk]

if u think its video card heat then pull the side off the case and point a regular box fan at it and see if it helps .  when i push my cpu too far and it builds heat , i can run regular apps all day long , but until i stress the cpu with a game , i would get the same thing u described . i also had a 9800 pro , first thing i did when i got mine was to pop the heatsink off , cleaned it and the gpu , then put a thin coat of artic silver on it . ATI Tool will show you the temps of your card, just do a google on it .   does it do the same thing when the cpu is clocked at stock speeds?     GL 38


edit ... here is the site for ati tool http://www.techpowerup.com/atitool/

[StarOfAfrica2]

Thats weird, the Omega drivers for the Geforce cards come with temp. monitoring software.  Oh well.  I'd do as 38ruk suggested and try pulling the side off the case with a deskfan blowing in.  If it keeps running, you have a heat issue.  If it fails, you still havent ruled it out totally, but at least you have a good idea its not the heat.

Also, you should be aware that all power supplys are not created equal.  Under a load, even high wattage PS's can drop current.  Quality is very important in a PS, especially when you start getting video cards that plug directly in for juice, couple of hard drives, CD burner, DVD player, USB devices, etc.  The more stuff you plug in, the more power you draw.  The more you draw, the more load is on the PS to keep up with demand.  You get the picture.

[RedDg]

Well, I'm at a loss.  I pulled the card and blew out all the dust and wiped the dirt from fan/heatsink.  I removed the heatsink and used arctic silver between the GPU chip and heatsink and carefully reassembled everything.  My case has both sides off and the power supply is only plugged into the MB, 1 HDD, video card, and a CD burner.  Nothing in the PCI slots.  There is no way a 550W PS is going to be strained by this setup.  At idle, the CPU is now at 43-44C so I don't think heat is really an issue inside the case.

Fired up Aces High and I sat in the tower for about 5-6 minutes and then black screened again and had to hard reboot.  This is happening in all my games, not just AH.  I had set my monitor refresh rate back to the default 60 Hz as well.  I think this card is toast, which is a shame.  Everything in 2D is sharp and clear as ever.

Where in ATI Tool does it give you temps?  The only place I could see reference to temps was in the log file, and it couldn't read one for my card:

2005-04-18 21:44:09   ATITool v0.0.23 started.
2005-04-18 21:44:09   Detected GPU Chip: R350 (4E48), 8 Pipelines, 128 MB
2005-04-18 21:44:09   Temperature monitoring: chip not detected
2005-04-18 21:44:09   Profile 'Default' loaded.   Clocks set to: 378.00 / 338.00
2005-04-18 21:44:10   Application terminated.
2005-04-18 21:44:22   ATITool v0.0.23 started.
2005-04-18 21:44:22   Detected GPU Chip: R350 (4E48), 8 Pipelines, 128 MB
2005-04-18 21:44:22   Temperature monitoring: chip not detected
2005-04-18 21:44:22   Profile 'Default' loaded.   Clocks set to: 378.00 / 338.00
2005-04-18 21:46:34   Application terminated.
2005-04-18 22:06:13   ATITool v0.0.23 started.
2005-04-18 22:06:13   Detected GPU Chip: R350 (4E48), 8 Pipelines, 128 MB
2005-04-18 22:06:13   Temperature monitoring: chip not detected
2005-04-18 22:06:13   Profile 'Default' loaded.   Clocks set to: 378.00 / 338.00
2005-04-18 22:06:14   Application terminated.

[38ruk]

if you look at the screen shots in the link i posted , the temps should show on the opening page of ati tool , sorry to hear about the card , what drivers do you have loaded now? if i were you id be running the 4.12's     GL     38

[Skuzzy]

You will want to run the 4.12 drivers.  ATI re-introduced a very old bug in the later Catalyst drivers.

Most problems seem to be related to people over-extending thier system resources.

[Roscoroo]

id go to the 4.12 cats and reinstall DX 9.0c
then run dxdiag do all the tests ..

also what mainboard drivers ?

ive got the 4.27 international drivers on my a7n8x-e deluxe
 2500 MBarton oced at 12 X 200 = 2.4ghz
(41c idle 46-49c underload on air)70F room temp
420 watt enermax
9600 pro 4.7 cats dx 9.0c
win 98se (sp 1.5 and all the tweeks)

mine had a problem running the kingston ram originally .. i had to switch to crucial to get it stable .(this may be your problem )


Amd's (bartons , morgans ,tbreds) ussually wont have a problem with heat  until they get above 55c ..

you may have to try a different oc setting 11 x 200 / 12 x 166  ect just to test its stability . i ussually do a burn in at a stock clocking for the 1st week then i start my overclocking . its not uncommon for a cpu to run 5-9c hotter the 1st few days  

Also you want boot memory test enabled (quick boot OFF ) on any over clocked pc . beshure you hit the tab key so you can see the boot dos screen.

also check your video voltage settings go back to stock here .. 1.5 v

[gunnss]

I was having the screen freeze, and was reluctant to open the CPU box as it is is installed deep with in my sim pit.  I verifyed it was a heat problem by recording the time it took to lock-up the program, starting with a "stone cold" system through about 8 lock-ups.   I found that it was 12 mikes before the first lock up with a cold system and the time reduced to 30 seconds at the 8th lock up.  Also AH is the only program I run that was causing the lock ups, but it is also the most Graphicly demanding program I run.  Having decided it was a heat problem, I bit the bullet and yanked the CPU box from the simpit........It was a pain, ending up with the simpit on it's side and the case coming out the bottom of the "pit"... the Commie Dust bunnies had clogged the heat sink fan of my card and after cleaning and reassembly, no futher problems have happened.  Sometimes it really is the hot chip thing.

Gunns