my pc. somethings faulty. :531 intel p4 3ghz 2 gig 2x1 kingston value ddr2667
asrock conroe945g-dvi turtle beach catalina x1950pro 256mb sapphire pcie generic 500w 18a +12v psu.
history of computer. once i had moved, and had a bad heatsink. it didnt fit the motherboard good. i moved, and knocked it loose. my motherboard shut down the processor when it got to 80 or 85 C. i thought the place didnt have the power to push my computer. one night i moved it and heard a bang. anyway, i had tried to turn on my computer a few times, and it had overheated and shut off. i thought the place couldnt keep my pc running, the wiring was weird. ok the banging i realized something was loose and fixed it. it was the heatsink. later, i was getting bsod. it kept saying video error. i put new video drivers in. maybe a history of my computer will help figure out what is wrong now. after new video drivers, this was same processor, different everything else. new drivers, and problems went away, for about 4 to 7 days. something like that. no bsod u know. well the problem sort of hid itself anyway for 4-7 days. then my computer started restarting in games. games such as call of duty 2 and stuff. and oblivion. figured it was a heat problem bought compressed air. blew out the dusty stuff no problems. before i blew the dust out, prime95 would give me errors in 10 minutes. dust out computer no problems. computer was fine. well, recently, i built new computer, old processor thou. at first i didnt have the heatsink on right. and the motherboard shut down the processor before it got too hot. i watched it in bios going up a degree at a time. i knew i had enough time to mess around with bios settings. anyway reatach heatsink, and computers fine. my computer usually runs 48c to 67 i have seen it run. on hot days. it would be fine when i first got it. even with the new computer, it was fine, and probably got that hot.
now for some reason it locks up when i play 2 games. battlefield 2 and call of duty 2. it started with cod2, after maybe 2 hours, my computer sounds like a skipping cd, and doesnt respond, i have to hard shutdown. got to point of every 30 minutes. got tired, and played bf2. fine, play for hours, all night no problems. played till sick, back to cod2. 10 minutes ingame, computers locks up, or skips. go back to bf2. 40 minutes in game, computer skips. sometimes, its 30, 20, 40, or 80 minutes, or close to two hours. the other night, i got my room freezing cold. played cod2 on less strenous server, with a 10 second respawn so not all 50-60 players on screen at same time, u know all the time. played two or three hours, fine. went to bf2. played for three or four hours. fine. later, i dont want to freeze out my room. bf2, maybe fifty minutes ingame skip. so i watch tv for like four hours. .. boring. go back to pc, i want to play some bf2. freeze my room. cold i cant hardly stand it. been cold for quit a while i load up bf2. my whole room is very cold. forty to maybe an hour and twenty minutes later, computer skips. (after my computer skips, you could hear the fan on the hs going fast, it had revved up. but when it skipped this, time, the fan sounded normal rpms.) i dont know what is wrong with my pc. i was thinking of buying a better hsf. but after having my room freezing. i dont think its heat. ive took off the heatsink, applied new thermal grease, cleaned dust off the heatsink, lower temperatures, but computer skips. i ran memtest, when i first got my computer, back in july. ran test in aug. everything fine, full test. i nkow the x1950 uses 18a itself, and everything else can use 8a. i had a psu problem before. kept getting worse, until i couldnt hardly turn on my computer, psu kept dying. HAH. its about rated 200w now it was 350w. i have tried to duplicate this error with everything else i can find. ill not freeze out my room. and i will run prime 95 the heat test, and any other test. once with everest running at the same time. to heat my processor as much as i could. then after maybe twenty or thirty minutes, well i ran everest itself for about twenty, then both for another twenty. trying to find errors, and a reason it skips. then i realized, maybe the power supply wasnt giving the processor what it needed, and it was dying, and only using power from processor, alone, wasnt enough. so i ran prime95 and ati tool together for around 20 to 30 minutes. nothing, no errors. ran prime 95 tonight two hours, no problems. that way im asking the psu for as much power as possible, and heating up the video card, and processor at the same time. i was doing the heat test. and the power consumption test. nothing, no errors. everything ran fine. i can play oblivion all day, no problems. swat 4 tss no problems. source games no problems. fear combat three hours the other night, i gave me problems before when i had psu problems... it was a game that would make my computer reboot. and got worse. i reinstalled bf2 today, deleted all the folders after uninstallation. to make sure no bad ini left behind. reinstalled. forty minutes later, skip. one time i booted my computer, and my video card runs 48-53c used too with a colder room, 47-52c idle. it was normal, cool temp in my room. i seen 53 thought well getting hot again, before i used airconditioning. sat played cell phone games, they locked up. i run ati tool. looked up, 83C. no time to think if its error. i shut down computer. i think maybe the fan stopped running. maybe too much dust. i take it out its hot as a firecracker. i set it in front of aircondioner and cool it off. i clean off dust. put back in seeing if fan will spin its fine. i figured fan stopped and it started running hot. it will run 68C at load. atitool load. no problems out of it now. i know sapphire x1950 have hot vrms, but mine has ceramic heatsinks, a later version. and some people say they don't have vrm cooling issues. but with atitool, i cant replicate the computer skipping error. so nothing i do can i replicate the error. anyone know whats going on. or something i could do and maybe be able to troubleshoot with? thanks.

lol ok first of all, i will try my best to help you. But I'm going to summarize this and tell me what I'm missing if I am;

When you play COD2 and BF2 your computer skips or freezes an it causes you to do a hard shutdown. Now, when you play moe graphically advanced games such as F.E.A.R. and Oblivion, it doesnt do anything. You've repeatedly tested the temperature issue as well as the cleaning but to no avail.

I'm going to take a shot in the dark, but maybe your ram is going faulty. This is just a guess, don't take it to heart or anything like that. Maybe it is really you fan and heatsink. Do you happen to have a PCIEXPRESS slot? If you do, you can purchase a fan card that has two fans built into the card which helps keep your computer cool. Also, make sure your pcu connection isn't faulty as well. Also, are you playing BF2 and COD2 online? And my final suggestion is, are you sure yor CD's aren't scratched.

please post any corrections are things you have tried out and whether or not they have helped or worked.

ok yea let me recheck my post to make sure. ok i sort of got an idea whats going on with my computer, and ill reply. yes cod2 and bf2 my computer skips. i made a video with my phone, so you can see my computer skipping and know what im talking about. http://youtube.com/watch?v=Xv_t3m7fJJw
thats whats happenning. and yes, fear,(which gave me major problems when it was heat once), and oblivion, no problems. i checked the ram when i got it. with memtest86 that was back in june tested yesterday a full run, no errors. yes i have a pci-e slot, it is in use by myvideo card. i have took a room fan for cooling and cooled down my room, with side of my pc case open. still same problem. my pcu connection is faulty? my pc? it has worked for a long time with the same powersupply. i have recently bought a psu. antec trio 650w trying to fix this but it still does it. my vc connector? i think its fine. the fan turns, and nothing else is giving me problems. video card seems fine and i have 2 pci-e plugins. really i don't know. back to computer problem. call of duty 2 doesn't require cd in for multiplayer, yes, i play these games multiplayer. when the comuter skips. cntrl-alt-del. shift-cntrl-esc. does nothing. the computers locked up. it doesn't respond. this video cards brand new june and the motherboard and ram and the psu is new. i have tried to duplicate this error with 3dmark06 in repeat mode for 40 minutes, with my video card running at 67C. and i ran prime95 for 3:30 hours with no errors.