Reverse overheating problems

[viridiancity]

Hi, I've basically been having reverse overheating problems of late.

Basically, I'm running a 3.4ghz 2x 1024 DDR2 ram 7800gt on 350 watts on power. I used to have a 6600 and everything was peachy when I was using that.

When I play a game, if I have the case panel open, it will randomly stutter and lag like crazy. If I close the case and let th e temps of my pc go up to 70-80 degrees both core and gpu, it runs smoothly.

What is my problem? =S

By the way my case is the antec lanboy 350(I think).

I calculated how much power I need using a power calculator and I only need 279watts to run what I'm using now. So I think my 350 cuts it. All my parts except the 7800gt(that's about a year younger) are around 3 years old.

 

[Redmo0n]

Probably not enough power, then when you put the case panel on and it heats up, it will reduce the cpu (or other(s) performance (under clock) and then it will run fine.

Suggestions:

Clean all the dust out of the computer and reapply thermal.

Get a new PSU maybe just something cheapish ($50) but a bit more than 350

 

[viridiancity]

Sounds reasonable. . . I was sorta confident the psu would hold after using the psu calculator.

Thanks for the help.