PC shuts down randomly when playing games

[antony209494]

Since I am very stable at my problem evaluations, I am putting the blame back to cpu overheating. I put back the 6970 and it shutdown again with it. I downloaded Hot CPU tester and before the first test got to 50 % it shutdown again just like in-game and when I booted in seconds after the cpu temp was at 65 (I am guessing it must have hit more than 90 during the test).

Also run windows memory diagnostics test with no problem there.

I have this CPU for like 6 months and it started the shutdowns in the last three and mostly the last 2 months. I guess getting an aftermarket cooler is the only option now. I knew the stock cooler sucked but I thought it would last longer considering I never overclocked the cpu.

 

[Aquinus]

Since I am very stable at my problem evaluations, I am putting the blame back to cpu overheating. I put back the 6970 and it shutdown again with it. I downloaded Hot CPU tester and before the first test got to 50 % it shutdown again just like in-game and when I booted in seconds after the cpu temp was at 65 (I am guessing it must have hit more than 90 during the test).

Also run windows memory diagnostics test with no problem there.

I have this CPU for like 6 months and it started the shutdowns in the last three and mostly the last 2 months. I guess getting an aftermarket cooler is the only option now. I knew the stock cooler sucked but I thought it would last longer considering I never overclocked the cpu.

Not even the stock cooler should run that toasty. How much TIM did you use when you mounted the cooler or did you use what AMD puts on the HSF out of the box?

 

[antony209494]

Not even the stock cooler should run that toasty. How much TIM did you use when you mounted the cooler or did you use what AMD puts on the HSF out of the box?

Just what AMD had put out of the box. I already ordered a water cooler

 

[Norton]

Quick note- check clearance of the cpu cooler in the cooler bracket. Gigabyte usually uses an AM3 bracket rather than the AM3+ two piece bracket... the thing that can happen is that the corners of the AM3 bracket sometimes interfere with the stock AM3+ heatpipe cooler- I have had this issue on a few of my builds

TL;DR

Check to make sure the cooler seats firmly onto the chip and doesn't hang on the cooler bracket

 

[mastrdrver]

I just bought this for 125 dollars. It's new and I can't afford a better one. Why do you insist it's the PSU? It is powerful enough for the system. What I understand is that the cards have the problem. When the 6950 is involved the shutdowns occur whether it's crossfire or single. The 6970 doesn't shutdown the pc but causes overheats to the cpu when in games.

Turn that 6950 back in to a 6950.

If the problems go away with crossfire disabled (assuming it is not the top card) or with the 6950 out of the system, then that is the problem.

 

[Flow]

Antony, just for reference my experiences with an unlocked 6950 I added to our amd system. While this is an older one, with the phenom 945 cpu, it runs fine, and we had the 4890 fitted.
I put the sapphire 6950 toxic in and immidiately got problems. After 2 or 3 minutes gaming in tombraider or other intense games the pc did a reboot.
Ran prime95 and checked cpu temps, which were too high indeed. So fitted the cooler from our phenom 965BE which was still lying around, and saw tems drop big time.
But still the reboots. So next in line was the psu, bought a new one, still the same reboots.
Eventually the conclusion became that the 6950 wasn't very compatible with this amd system.

So I did a bios update since we never did this on that board. It fixed the reboots. All is stable, games run fine now even maxed out with poor fps. No more rebooting.

Now I don't say this would be your problem also, and maybe you already are upto date with your bios. Further more I might add that I bricked a motherboard last week by flashing the bios, an intel board.
But maybe it could solve your problems.

And get a better cooling device on your cpu. You don't want it to overheat.

 

[OneMoar]

power and or temps seem at fault here sounds like the cooler is incorrectly mounted
also gpu unlocking is hit and miss it could unlock and still be unstable ...

 

[mastrdrver]

power and or temps seem at fault here sounds like the cooler is incorrectly mounted
also gpu unlocking is hit and miss it could unlock and still be unstable ...

You apparently did not read the part where he said that with the 6950 in the system by itself, the computer reboots. With it out, the problem goes away.

CPU temps are very high, but not the problem here, nor is the PSU.

 

[buildzoid]

Try switching the 6950 to a locked bios as it could be that the unlocked stream processors aren't stable