-= Gametoast.com =-

Good day, GT! I have here a computer issue for your inspection:

Recently, my computer has been losing video during games- it happens usually after an hour or so of extended play. I can still hear things, the computer is still on, and the video card is still running (fan is going)- there just isn't anything on the screen.

I'm thinking that it's a problem with the card overheating, since the area in the back where the fan blows out is usually quite hot to the touch. The card is an ATi Radeon X1900, which apparently has a max operating range of 95 degrees Celcius. (it is currently running at 76 while doing nothing at all, according to the ATi control panel.) Obviously, I could just get another card, but I'm not sure what the best I can buy for this old system will be. I guess another solution is to place a fan on it at all times, but it's rather unsightly to just leave the side off all the time.

Perhaps it isn't a GFX problem at all though, and is rather a PSU problem or something similar.

I suppose another cause of the issue could be the fact that the room the computer is in is usually about 10 degrees hotter than the rest of the house (Texas being as hot as it is, the house is usually at about 80 degrees and the computer's room is about 90 degrees Fahrenheit). Would this be an inhibiting factor should I choose to purchase a new graphics card?

Any ideas on a good graphics card to purchase that would be good for the system, or any solutions that may decrease the chances of this happening again?

If you need my system specs, they are in this spoiler tag below: Thank you for your help!

Buy more fans... If its running at 76 idling, you NEED MORE FANS. You could also try liquid cooling.

Also, is the tower in a small contained space? I know our family computer used to get pretty hot because we kept it in a little cubby-type deal.

Make sure the tower is nowhere near any carpeting (at least a foot off the floor is best). Go to Wal-Mart and buy a can of compressed air. Remove the side of the case and spray short bursts into all fans and crevices. (If you can see the stream of air, the can is too cold, set it down and come back to it later) Sometimes just getting out all the dust bunnies can help with heat. It's certainly the cheapest solution, and should be done regularly anyways.

swbf_lase wrote:Buy more fans... If its running at 76 idling, you NEED MORE FANS. You could also try liquid cooling.

Buying more fans sounds like a good idea, but I have no idea where one of those goes or if I can even install one more in the case. I'm pretty inexperienced with these things. Although, would this result in anything more than simply taking off the side of the thing and directing a small fan into it?
I would probably prefer installing another fan, but if that isn't possible I have no idea.

@Teancum- I have opened up the case and sprayed off the components. There didn't seem to be that much dust in there, but I got the majority of it that I could reach. I never had a problem when the system was at about the same temperatures in my old house. Is this related to its elevation off the floor somehow? (it was on the desk previously)

@Dohnutt- It's on the floor, to the side of my desk. To the right of it, there are the desk supports, and to the left there is empty floor. Behind it is the wall, about a foot away.

jedikiller32 wrote:Buying more fans sounds like a good idea, but I have no idea where one of those goes or if I can even install one more in the case. I'm pretty inexperienced with these things. Although, would this result in anything more than simply taking off the side of the thing and directing a small fan into it?
I would probably prefer installing another fan, but if that isn't possible I have no idea.

how many fans do you have now?

I believe I have four, counting the CPU fan, GPU fan, PSU fan, and case fan in the front. It's a standard XPS 400 case, so you can look that up and check it out.

is it a laptop or a desktop? (sorry if i didn't catch it in your post)

jedikiller32 wrote:I believe I have four, counting the CPU fan, GPU fan, PSU fan, and case fan in the front. It's a standard XPS 400 case, so you can look that up and check it out.

does you pc sorta look like this,

if so does your motherborad kinda look like this, i dont think you cant add one, because i dont see an extra plug-in for a fan. unless they dont show it in the picture.

here is the link i found this at: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/s ... techov.htm

It does not (the case anyway).

This is my manual. clickme
Alternatively, either of these will work.

@obiboba3po It is a desktop.

ah i see.
The manual says you can have 3 fans, one for the memory, cpu, and the front/back fan. I dont know if you can put another in. also is all the fans working? and is the computer blowing out hot air?

All the fans seem to be working, and the graphics card is certainly blowing out hot air. I can place my hand on the back portion of the case where there is an opening and feel that it is warm, but I'm not certain if it is actually blowing anything out. Perhaps the case fan is simply not blowing strongly enough.

how log have you had this computer? Since the graphics card is blowing hot air and if the system idle...? thats not good.

Roughly three years. It's pretty old. I got it sometime in late August 2006.

As I mentioned in the first post, the graphics card runs at about 76 degrees Celsius at idle, for some reason. I have no idea why the thing is so hot all the time when it's about 85-90 degrees Fahrenheit in the room. That's almost twice the temperature. There is absolutely no reason it should be running that hot at idle. The threshold for it is apparently 95 degrees Celsius, so I assume it is getting to about that temperature during gaming.

I plan to get a new system entirely at some point, but I don't have enough cash to afford anything resembling adequate for running new games at this point.

the graphics card sounds bad. You might want to get a new one if you what to keep the computer you have now.

Get it off the floor for sure. Carpet or no carpet, computers just can't breathe on the floor as well.

Try to see if you can put your comp in the flow of the airstream in your house (like the window). I've got my desktop pretty close to the window and I've got absolutely no overheated parts. (whilst in my old setup, some parts got *hot*)

I had similar issues before (I am situated in Arizona), and I fixed it with a few things:

*I made sure my case was free of dust bunnies
*Made the fans in my case run the coolest air from the bottom and the heat escape from the top (better circulation)
*I replaced the default thermal paste on my GPU and CPU heat-sink with arctic silver (preferred)
*I replaced the heatsinks on my GPU and CPU with Copper

^doing the above i got my 8800 GT from 85 degrees C down to 53 C at high loads...

I hope this helps