Friends computer is shutting down abruptly while gaming.

Digito

Hello there! So there's a computer issue I've been dealing with that's been sorta perplexing me lately, which is that my friends computer sometimes just up and shuts off entirely while playing FFXIV. And by that I mean it's actually powering off and does not power back on automatically. It never does this while the computer isn't under a heavy gaming load, so my first thought was that the power supply was acting up. However the PSU has since been swapped out with a known good one and it doesn't seem to have fixed the problem, nor does the abrupt way in which the computer shut off feel like an overheating issue as it can be powered straight back on without issue and there are no artifacts/slowdown prior to failure. Anybody have any ideas? It feels like a power draw issue but replacing the PSU didn't work.

Poketpixie

Could be an overheating issue. Make sure the fans on the CPU/GPU work and neither device is caked with dust. Also make sure any thermal paste used to attach to the heatsink hasn't dried out. I had a Diamond brand video card where that happened. It would abruptly power down under load but same deal as yours, there were no artifacts or other issues and I could power it right back up. I pulled the card to have a closer look and the heatsink came loose. If not for a couple screws holding it in place it would have popped right off.

Digito

Well! Disregard my earlier statement about it not feeling like an overheating issue, I decided to keep an eye on HWMonitor for him and while the GPU stayed within perfectly reasonable ranges his CPU went as high as 77c. Which apparently, the max spec on an FX-8120 is about 61c. The computer got a bit of dusting earlier, but I'm going to take a closer look at things tonight. I can't check the thermal paste at the moment as we don't have any to replace it with, but if it is dried out, how do you remove the dried on paste to replace it?

EDIT: Small clarification, we weren't playing long enough for the machine to power down this time, it's pretty random as to how long it takes. Sometimes it can happen in ten minutes, other times he'll go two hours and be fine.

Poketpixie

No idea how to replace thermal paste as I've never done it. Sorry, you're on your own there.

Donovan Puppyfucker

Isopropyl alcohol and cotton wool balls.

Take off the CPU cooler, spray the iospropyl alcohol on a cotton wool ball, wipe the CPU heatspreader. Repeat until spotlessly clean, then do the same for the mating surface of the CPU cooler.

Apply about a grain of rice sized glob of good thermal paste in the middle of the CPU heatspreader, then carefully refit the CPU cooler.

Digito

After hammering on it something fierce with a couple of torture tests, I noticed the CPU itself peaked at 89c before the power cut out and one of the motherboard sensors was reading damn near 97c, so I'm going to go out on a limb and guess I've found the problem?

Foomy

Digito wrote: »

After hammering on it something fierce with a couple of torture tests, I noticed the CPU itself peaked at 89c before the power cut out and one of the motherboard sensors was reading damn near 97c, so I'm going to go out on a limb and guess I've found the problem?

Yup, that's a little too hot. my guess is that the cpu is hitting it's tmax, throttling down it's clock like mad to stay cool and thus you get a crash when your suddenly running a 100mhz cpu.

Synthesis

If you don't have cotton balls, (unused) disposable coffee filters work well too--bizarre, yes, but they're well-suited to the task and served me well (their a bit less messy to use than cotton balls).

BouwsT

Synthesis wrote: »

If you don't have cotton balls, (unused) disposable coffee filters work well too--bizarre, yes, but they're well-suited to the task and served me well (their a bit less messy to use than cotton balls).

Was just about to suggest this. They are lint free and work perfectly. A much better option than paper towel or similar options.

dav3yb

Also wd40 will really pull old thermal paste off, just spray some on whatever you're wiping things off with, and give it a bit of elbow grease. After you should clean anything remaining on it with alcohol really well, then apply some fresh thermal compound as stated above.

I have noticed that some heatsink that come with amd cpu's are grossly underwhelming. So if you still see relatively high temps, it might be worth considering to replace the heatsink.