Hi, I been having crashing problems for ages. I mostly keep crashing in games, but sometimes during burning and other heavy tasks as well. I'm pretty sure it isn't my software because i reformat and ghosted my computer many times over. When i crash, i either have a black screen, frozed screen, or a blue screen. Everytime when i reboot my computer, a windows message pops up giving me an error log to send to microsoft. I always select cancel though. Right now i'm trying to deduce which hardware is causing the problem. First component i thought that was causing the crashes was my GPU, 4870HD. But then i'm having 2nd thoughts and maybe it's the RAM or CPU. But here's the real question i want to ask you guys. Does GPU being faulty or overheating cause crashes during burning or other heavy tasks? Cause my GPU idle tempurature is 68 degrees, so i figured it could be my GPU, but not so sure after it keep crashing during burning and video converting. *see here also - http://forums.afterdawn.com/t.cfm/f-216/sudden_crashings-829106/ *
"Does GPU being faulty or overheating cause crashes during burning or other heavy tasks?" An over heating GPU can cause crashing at any random time. You problem sounds like bad RAM but 68 degrees C is awful hot for any electronic equipment.
Crashing at any random time? That explains alot, thanx man... As for my RAM...how do I actually test to know it's bad RAM? Personally I think it is my GPU, but it's best to get rid of any other possibilities it might be other parts before replacing it.
Your graphics card is not overheating, you can ignore that. The HD4800 series cards deliberately set the fan speed as low as possible so they run quietly at idle. 68C idle is quite cool really, typical idle temperatures can be as high as 83-85C, and be perfectly safe. The "emergency" point at which a graphics card is likely to cause problems is typically around 115 Celsius. Your crashes are the cause of something else. If the system simply freezes and you can't move the mouse cursor, it's typically overclock or motherboard related. If you get a crash but can still move the cursor, just not click on anything, it could be a driver fault, or the CPU, if you have overclocked.
I see... Judging by the information you gave me, knowing i don't overclock, it's probably the RAM, or at worst, could be a motherboard fault. I'm pretty sure it isn't a driver fault, since I keep formating and installed different driver versions from the drivers included in disks. Also, i used memtest86 to test my ram... Not sure if that program is reliable..but it showed around 4000 errors when i got back after a 2 hour nap. Is that for real? Can i really trust that it says "4000" errors?
Memtest is a very reliable program. Memory errors mean memory errors. Try replacing your RAM first, as that's easy to swap out and retest.