Unknown XP crashes

[Keider]

Hi all
Recently I have been having problems with XP Pro crashing out on me when playing any kind of game, weather it be old or new. At first i thought it was some bad RAM but when i put my RAM in my friends computer it worked fine with no crashes.

Sometimes it just crashes and restarts and other times it just crashes to desktop. It usually crashes after about 30 or so minutes of playing on a game, up to then it runs fine. Iam getting really frustrated with it at the moment. I reinstalled XP Pro aswell but that didnt help. If there are any suggestions of what it might be I'd greatfull.

My specs are:

AMD Athlon XP 2000
G-Force 2 MX/MX 400
256 DDR (266) RAM
C-Media onboard sound card

My graphics drivers are up to date with the latest ones and nothing is overclocked.

Thanks if u can help
Kei

 

[neb1211]

What games have you tried playing?

 

[Keider]

It happens on every game i play Alien vs Predator 2, Day Of Defeat, MOHAA etc etc.
Like i say its fine for about 30 mins or so untill it just crashes to desktop. Everything else works fine its just games.
I thought it might be a direct x 9.0 problem so i re installed 8.0 but i still had the same problem.
I have no idea what it is

Kei

 

[Keider]

It crashes to the desktop only when im playing any game that uses my graphics card. Everything else is just fine (browsing internet, desktop, windows media player etc)
My RAM is DDR PC2100 (PC266).
My graphics card is as you can see very old now so i dont know if i just need a new one.
But i just dont understand why it plays my games for 30 mins and then crashes.

Kei

 

[microsoftne]

bad graphics card, sounds like when the die on the card heats up it causes itself to shut down....try a known good graphics card

 

[devlish96]

happens to me too,...but on selected games only. hitman 2 and sim city 4. Never happens when I play unreal, c & c generals, and others. probably just bad installation or corrupted files. it never really bothered me...as long as its just the games and not the program and system files. do you keep a different partition for your games?

 

[Keider]

No everything is on my C Drive i dont have any partitions. I dont think it is selected games because i have played Day Of Defeat for 2 years now and i have never had that problem untill recently (unless its the latest upgrade that has done it)
But still i dont think its that.
I think its probobly like microsoftne said with it heating up. My card just must be to old these days, but i dont know for sure.

btw do you think it would help if i did make a partition just for my games?

Kei

 

[microsoftne]

i always suggest making a partition for your os, and a seperate one for games and other apps.

 

[devlish96]

I have a separate partition for my games, i never really noticed any performance setbacks. What happens when you uninstall and reinstall your games? Have you tried that already?

At least try everything before purchasing a new video card,...and when u've your new card,...provide extra cooling...slot coolers, blower, etc.

 

[Keider]

BSOD

Ok it just did a BSOD on me when i was playing on Day of Defeat.
It read:

DRIVER_IRQL_LESS_OR_EQUAL

And then a ***STOP*** message.

Does anybody know what this is. Im guessing its driver issue but which driver? And this must be what is causing my games to crash to desktop because it did exactly the same thing half an hour of play and then BAM!

Kei