Inordinate Crashes

[fixal0t]

you sure all software is up to date?
check out support.dell.com and get the latest BIOS as well
did you check the thermal compound under the heat sink
I personaly don't think it's a heat issue though
try changing the pagefile to "system managed" size
check your power options in control panel, and make sure you are on 'home/office'
check the specs of your RAM, and make sure it's registering proper config (you can use CPU-Z for this)

 

[Phate]

ok, sorry for the long response time, i had to go to my grandparents for xmas.

i ran the memtest until one pass was complete, will run it longer if you want, but one pass (and 14% of the next) came out with 0 errors.

what else could be causing this?

also, i dont think its a heat issue, because A.) it barely feels warm inside the PC, and B.) it crashes the same ammount of times if i take the side panel off, face it towards the window, and open the window so you have Winter in Chicago air coming in its like 5 degrees farenheit. so it had REALLY cold air, and it still crashed.

and since it doesnt seem like its the memory.....

any ideas? ill try updating the BIOS.

 

[Ste]

Download Memtest 86 and burn to disk run for 6 hours, write down and report amount of errors at completion.


Report Back.

One Pass Is Not Equal to six Hours.
Reinstall wow, update its patch. update video driver and driect X.
IF it still crashes in Wow, format time. Unless its the RAM, which we will never know unless you run for a min of 6 hours.

 

[Phate]

well, i dont think we will ever know, and i know that 1 pass != 6 hrs, i said i would do it for 6 hrs if you think its needed or i did. but after updating the bios, i successfuly played wow for about 8 hrs (left it on while i was out too, just to test) with not a single crash. so i think problem was solved through a bios update thanks to all your ideas guys

 

[MrCoffee]

sounds good, the error is usually a driver doing something it shouldn't but it can be hard to pinpoint what exactly is causing the problem.
If you get any reoccurance then post up a minipump file and i'll try and do a stack trace :-/

Id say its some sort of resource conflict between your nic and sound card which the bios upgrade may well have resolved.