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I've been having a problem with my computer freezing completely when playing games like LA Noire or SW:TOR (yay early access!). Basically, what happens is I will play for around an hour or so (depending on the game) and when the freeze happens, the entire computer locks up and any audio that was being played glitches out and stutters broken-record style (only much shorter. Very techno).

I think it might be heat related and thought it might be my video card overheating, so I have been setting my video card (Nvidia Geforce 260GTX 216-core) fan to highest setting, but that has little to no effect. Now I'm beginning to think it's either my FSB or CPU overheating.

Can anyone provide some insight or similar experiences? I'm really at a loss and don't wanna damage my rig beyond repair.

UPDATE:

I found a bent pin on my hard drive. Once I fixed that, no more errors. Don't as me why, it just did.

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    Is it only these games or is it other applications/games as well? It sound more like the game is running out of resources (memory leaks etc.) than anything else to me.
    – ChrisF
    Dec 16, 2011 at 9:54
  • @ChrisF That would be perfectly fine for one game, but not for two different ones... Dec 16, 2011 at 9:55
  • @AlexanderGalkin - why? Unlikely, but perfectly possible.
    – ChrisF
    Dec 16, 2011 at 9:57
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    So far it's only in games. I have had EVGA Precision open (monitors graphics card memory usage, core clocks, shader clocks, fan speed, and temps) while the last 3 crashes have happened, and it's never gone above 700MB memory usage (the card has 828MB memory).
    – Wes
    Dec 16, 2011 at 9:57
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    @Wes: Why not just check the temperatures and report them here to be sure? Something like HWMonitor (cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html) should do the trick. I also recommend testing your memory in case it is faulty (memtest.org). Let us know how you get on. If neither of those turn up anything then I would suggest updating your drivers as their could be a conflict. More information about your computer would be useful.
    – James P
    Dec 16, 2011 at 10:59

3 Answers 3

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This sounds to me like your CPU's thermal paste may have dried up and is causing your CPU to overheat. Was this problem getting progressively worse as time went on or was is just fine one day and terrible the next? How old is the PC?

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I had the same problem. Thought it was my video card or what you mentioned, but it appeared to be the built-in audio card (asrock x58 motherboard) Try to disable your audio card through Control Panel. See if you will still have freezes. If not, i bought a dedicated sound card and it is now fine

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    For me a dedicated sound card was the problem. I'm back with an integrated sound card and it works fine Jul 20, 2012 at 15:49
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Not sure why your computer is crashing. The cause could be any number of things. It could be an overheated component (CPU, GPU, etc.) as you suggested, buggy software (i.e. the games you are playing), or maybe your settings are not right if your rig is overclocked. Checking your temps is a good place to start. If you are overclocked go back to default settings and play the games again and see if you get the same results. As far as the "techno" sounding audio stutter goes, that is common to all types of crashes.

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