Computer Shuts Down During Games

Hey everybody, i'm new to the forum and i need some help.

A while back i started to notice a drastic slowdown in my games. My computer is about a year old and when I started, i could play world of warcraft with everything on high settings and my resolution at 2042xsomething with an average of 50-60 fps

Now I can barely scrape by with everything on low and my resolution at 1024x

I did a little research and minimized some windows processes and decided to defrag my computer.

After about a day of defragging (i have 2 harddrives), I load up company of heroes and am now able to play the game with most settings on medium with my fps at about 15-30, compared to getting 5 at low.

However, i'm facing a new problem that i just started to get after I defragged. I haven't added any new hardware, and I did a virus scan to see if a virus was causing the unexpected shutdowns.

The virus scanner cleaned up a trojan (turns out i had it for a while, related to Frostwire) but other than that, no results.

Now, after I have about 5-15 minutes into a game, it seems as once i complete a milestone in a game (I've tried Company of Heroes and Spore Character Creator, both shut down on me) my computer just gives out and shuts down.

I did some research, and the common problems seems to be the power supply or an overheating issue. I don't know if my computer was always like this, but it seems when its forced shut down that my computer is pretty hot, but i've never really gauged the tempature before.

I downloaded PC Wizard 2008, and all these stats are great, just i dont know whats too high or what exactly is the undermining cause of this.

My main assumptions are:

My computer is overheating (if so, how can i check if this is happening?)

or its something related to my graphics card, as it seems that it only happens when stress is put on the graphics card (in games) (yet i've had the graphics card for about a year now and no problems till now)

Some extra information i thought i'd put out there: the last time i had to get my computer revamped was for the same reason, however my computer is more or less revamped. Had a new mobo, graphics card, ram, and processor all put in



if it helps; COMPUTER SPECS:
Mainboard : Micro-Star P4M890M3-V
Chipset : VIA P4M900
Processor : Intel Pentium XE 925 @ 3000 MHz
Physical Memory : 1024 MB (1 x 1024 DDR2-SDRAM )
Video Card : Nvidia Corp GeForce 8500 GT
Hard Disk : ST340824A (40 GB)
Hard Disk : FUJITSU (60 GB)
DVD-Rom Drive : PIONEER DVD-RW DVR-110D
CD-Rom Drive : PLEXTOR CD-R PX-W1210A
DVD-Rom Drive : ZI5944L LMI651M SCSI CdRom Device
Monitor Type : L2046NV - 20 inches
Network Card : VT82C570 MV IDE Controller VT6102 Rhine II Fast Ethernet Adapter
Operating System : Microsoft Windows XP Professional 5.01.2600 Service Pack 2
DirectX : Version 9.0c (December 2007)



Thanks for the help in advance, and hope to be a lasting member of this community!

Well lol that menu of stuff means nothing to me but:

Try updating the card seems to be a *good card* - Nvidea. Is it an onboard graphics card or not? not sure if it makes any difference lol trying to think here what my comp guru son mumbles as he fixes my machine at times.

Try upping the memory games maybe take more than the normal surfing memory:

Put in extra fans in case its over heating, and..you can buy a case that lets you know whats going on inside the machine (the area at the heart of the machine where you alter everything)

I have a case where it has three dials one is temp, one is vu, other is fan speed. I bought it at Maplins for around fifty quid. Now I know if there re any probs and call my son lolol

There are comp gurus here but this message will get you their notice - eventually.

Pssst..if ATNO catches that sig is 137 high he'll jump on you lolol Knock it back asap to 100 - thanks we're having a lets measure sigs at the minute started by Geeorge.

I too think that overheating may be the problem, especially since you say your computer shuts down when playing games. By "shut down", do you mean that Windows actually shuts down or your system just powers off all of a sudden? If it's the latter, it's most probably due to overheating. Search for "cpu temperature monitor" and you'll get lots of software that monitor both CPU and GPU temperature.

You left out a critical item, what is the wattage of your power supply? I may have overlooked that while scanning through your post. I'm a professional Gaming rig builder and ship my machines all over the US I would be glad to give my 2 cents if you like. Peace.

@suzie: the graphics card is the best one i can afford at the moment, its about a year old and its not onboard. I ordered 2 gigs of ram as well so in about 2 days i'll have 3gigs on my computer

@banG: well, I don't think its possible to check the wattage of my PSU without opening my computer so i'll leave that up to last; and yes it just powers off as if you were holding the button down

@casablanca: i downloaded this program called speedfan and this green box of text is telling me the following:

CPU: ~2999.26 MHz
CPU Temp: 93°C
CPU Voltage: 1.224 V
Core #1 Load: 91%
Core #2 Load: 36$
GFX Temp: 67°C

the only things i have open is an installer and firefox, i don't know but 93°C for the CPU seems pretty high

how do i gauge what exactly is going wrong here?

93°C is VERY hot for a CPU. If that reading is accurate, then you need to look into replacing your CPU cooler.

I echo spork on that one.

so what am I looking for then? a CPU fan then? how can i find out whats compatible with my computer and is it necessarily hard to install or should i get someone to install it for me?

last time i had my computer upgraded i asked for a quiter fan, maybe that also resulted in a weaker one

EDIT: seems as if it was only at 93 when i was installing lord of the rings, now that i just have firefox open its at a mean of 67, but this program is still saying that's hot (i think)

i'll try to run a game and see if it goes up

well i installed some new ram (3 gigs) and cleaned some of the dust on the external fan and now my idle cpu is at 52

im gonna try to play some games and see if it still shuts down, be back with my results soon!

well ever since i installed this new ram its not shutting down anymore, but this high heat issue is really bothering me: my CPU reaches temps of 100+ in games and the AUX reaches about 110

can somebody help me as to seeing what fans are compatible with my other hardware in my computer?

What type of processor do you have ... ?