My PC is driving me up the wall - can someone please help me?

[Daergel]

OK, to start:

I had a GeForce graphics card (128mb - I think it is a 5200), which I recently replaced, as every so often in WoW the buildings would disappear (this also included the bridges in Zangar), this was guaranteed to happen when I went anywhere near Shattrath, and it also happened on occasion in other places, and it wasnt fussy whether it was SW, Swamp of Sorrows, or in Outland.

I therefore thought that I had a graphics card that wasn't up to the job. So I bought a Sapphire Technologies X1650 Pro (512mb DDR2 memory). The textures with the new card are fabulous, especially at maximum everything - it was almost as if I was playing a different game - Azeroth and Outland really are beautiful with everything maxed out!

Anyway, I have had to reduce everything and reduce the resolution to 800x600, but this hasnt solved my problem.

My latest problem is that while I am playing, the game throws up a critical error, and exits, says 'Error' in a dialog box in the middle of the screen, then exits, or goes the whole hog and shuts itself down and restarts. This is followed by my Trend telling me (upon re-entry to my profile) that it has reverted to the last known good configuration, or something similar.

Oh, and sometimes I even get the 'blue screen of death', where either wow.exe or atidvag (or something) are cited as problems.

I used to always get a message about the cpu over temperture (sic) error, but I dont anymore (I ran Everest which recorded a temperature of 47C recently - its an AMD Athlon, btw).

Anyway, one of my mates said that it was likely something to do with the PSU, as the 12v was running at 11.?? (ie low!). £20 and a nice shiny new PSU later, and still the problem persists.

Can anyone help me, please?!

I want to play WoW with better resolution than 800x600, and with some of the video stuff increased.

I also want to play without fear of the game crashing on me every so often - I am sure my computer will suffer damage if this keeps happening (unless I throw it out of the window first!)

Please feel free to ask me for any other information which may help to resolve this problem

[Sidora]

Daergel, thanks for this post.

This EXACT same thing is happening to me and I'm at my wits end as well. It actually ended up corrupting my hard drive some how. A friend of mine checked it out and we replaced the hard drive, he felt this would solve the problem. Alas, it did not! I'm hoping someone can help both of us with this post.

[skinnertor]

I had the missing buildings/low frame rate issue with a Nvidia GeForce 7300GS. The frequency of the issue decreased significantly after loading the latest drivers from Nvidia. I still get the occassional issue (less than once a week now) and either a resolution change or a reboot fixes.

[Thandagny]

I had almost the same problem....drove me nuts...Re-installed windows(xp)..checked and rechecked hard drive...changed hard drive...finally was told to take off cover on puter and put a small fan blowing into it...problem stopped...turned out to be processor overheating...was still under warrenty and replace....worked fine since...

[Mupher]

I would make sure that your graphics drivers are all up to date. Then make sure windows is all up to date. Then turn off any unwanted programs in the background. If you want, I'd clean out the inside of your comp with compressed air. Especially the CPU heat sink and the PSU fan and any exhaust fans you have. Also the GPU fan.

Make sure that your GPU is venting properly, To be safe I would remove any other PCI cards that are right next to your graphics. And install them lower if you can.

Overall though, it sounds like your graphics card may be getting too hot. Just make sure that it has plenty of breathing room. Another option is to buy an after market GPU cooler like Zalman and install that on your card.

I recently built my new comp, but before I was having similar problems. I knew that was because of heat. Don't have that problem any more.

[Kholdstare]

I...agree...with...the...poster...above...me

Even though he types in an incredibly annoying manner.

Overheating is likely the issue, try what he said to do with the fan.

EDIT: Bleh, well he was above me when I last looked. Oh well.

[Kiralyn]

A couple things to use as the basis for troubleshooting your issues.

First, a blue-screen is your friend! It tells you exactly what happened, although not in an easy-to-read fashion. Write down the exact error you get, and hit up google. You'll find a ton of information floating around on the internet about it. This is how I diagnosed a hosed sound-card as the source of one of my issues.

Make sure all your drivers are up to date, for all your components. The big three (chipset, videocard, soundcard) may be the root of your issue. Conversely, if you just updated and problems started, roll back, or keep your eyes open for a new release. These things do go out with the occasional bug.

When testing to see what is causing problems, take out as many distractions as possible. Unplug any non-essential USB devices, make sure no unnecessary programs are loading on start, etc. As posted above, if you think its a heat issue, open up the case and use a normal fan to get some extra circulation. Thats one of the easiest things to diagnose.

On a related note, what PSU did you get for 20 pounds? Thats likely under 40$ US (i think) which is a big warning flag in my mind. a 500W supply can run anywhere from 50-100$ US, with all the differences you would expect in quality. I actually spent over $150 on my current supply after seeing many people have issues with cheap models. If you can find someone with a PSU tester, that might be something to check out.

[connico]

Something to check...

1. Your New video card requires more power than your old one, make sure its getting the full 12v of power and make sure its venting properly.

2. Make sure in game you have triple buffer, vertical sync and anti-aliasing off, enable them one by one to see the impact in performance and stablity. Make sure you have disabled these features on your card before you do it in game.

3. Make sure your using a fresh install of wow, yes i know you need to upgrade but a fresh install might resolved a heap of issues

4. Check your memory modules if you can, ie borrow one of your mates if you dont have spare. Or try running just 1 of the dimms if you have 2

5. Have patience with your machine, look at the motherboard an all the capaciters, make sure non of them are bulging on top, if they are you have found a problem since it means the caps are actually overloaded and need to be replaced...

6. Clean your pc of dust if there is any in there...

[grazloki]

Very similar occurance for me. swapped up to double my RAM, went to an 8600 monster video card. I even went as far as to get rid of 80% of my mod's. I sacrificed 3 chickens, spun around in 4 circles, and threw up 5 times. Spent 6 days researching what else to do, downloaded 7 updates, and hit up 8 freinds for advice. I'm still stuck with a partridge in a pear tree! But my FPS went from 20 to 60 and I am satisfied.

I do have to say taking a vacuum to my pc and a small paintbrush worked wonders to get my cooling under control. Well that and I added 2 $2 fans to my case to pull in more air. Amazing what a local shop would offer w/o going to the GEEK squad.

[Pzykotic]

Sounds to me like a problem with your power supply. Could also be heat related too. What kind of power supply is in there? Do you have the details on it? If not, open the side of the case and check the voltages on it across all rails (numbers at the top of the column)