Hi

Please forgive my limited IT knowledge and skills.

2 days ago, my computer crashes when load/play an online game (I have played this online game for 4 years on this very machine). It first seems to jam up, followed by pixels smearing on screen and few seconds later my screen goes black and to an off position although I can still here my hard drive and fan ticking.

I dont think the issue is with my screen, i think its either a Motherboard or Graphics Card overload or burn out.

I have tried loads of things so far i.e. re-update drivers, run virus checkers but nothing helps, so i am sure its a hardware issue.

Here is my spec

Operating System
MS Windows XP Home 32-bit SP3

CPU
Intel Pentium 4 630
Cores 1
Threads 2
Name Intel Pentium 4 630
Code Name Prescott
Package Socket 775 LGA
Technology 90nm
Specification Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.00GHz
Family F
Extended Family F
Model 4
Extended Model 4
Stepping 3
Revision N0
Instructions MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, EM64
Bus Speed 199.5 MHz
Rated Bus Speed 798.0 MHz
Stock Core Speed 3000 MHz
Stock Bus Speed 200 MHz

Caches
L1 Data Cache Size 16 KBytes
L1 trace cache 12 Kuops
L2 Unified Cache Size 2048 KBytes
Core 0
Core Speed 2793.1 MHz
Multiplier x 14.0
Bus Speed 199.5 MHz
Rated Bus Speed 798.0 MHz
Thread 1
APIC ID 0
Thread 2
APIC ID 1

RAM
2.0GB Dual-Channel DDR2 @ 266MHz (4-4-4-12)

Motherboard
Dell Inc. 0YC523 (Microprocessor)
Manufacturer Dell Inc.
Model 0YC523
Chipset Vendor Intel
Chipset Model i945P
Chipset Revision 00
Southbridge Vendor Intel
Southbridge Model 82801GB (ICH7/R)
Southbridge Revision A1
BIOS Brand Dell Inc.

Graphics
Monitor
Name SyncMaster on NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX
Current Resolution 1280x1024 pixels
Work Resolution 1280x994 pixels
State enabled, primary, output devices support
Monitor Width 1280
Monitor Height 1024
Monitor BPP 32 bits per pixel
Monitor Frequency 60 Hz
Device \\.\DISPLAY1\Monitor0

GeForce 7800 GTX
GPU G70
Device ID 10DE-0091
Revision A2
Subvendor nVidia (10DE)
Technology 110 nm
Die Size 334 nmІ
Transistors 302 M
Release Date 2005
DirectX Support 9.0c
DirectX Shader Model 3.0
OpenGL Support 2.0
Bus Interface PCI Express x16
Temperature 54 °C (running at present)
SLI Disabled
GPU Clock 430 MHz
Memory Clock 1200 MHz
Driver nv4_disp.dll (6.14.11.6371)
ForceWare version 163.71
BIOS Version 5.70.02.11.15
ROPs 16
Shaders Vertex 24/Pixel 24
Memory Type GDDR3
Memory 256 MB
Bus Width 256 Bit
Pixel Fillrate 6.9 GPixels/s
Texture Fillrate 6.9 GTexels/s
Bandwidth 76.8 GB/s

Hard Drives
244GB Maxtor Maxtor 7L250S0 (IDE) 42 °C

Optical Drives
HL-DT-ST DVD+-RW GWA4164B
SONY CD-RW CRX320EE
Audio
SigmaTel High Definition Audio CODEC

I cut and pasted this info from my Piriform Specci program.


Any advice would be greatfully recieved, but please put in the most simplest of ways if you want me to perform tasks on my computer

Thanks in advance for your help

Hi again

I have done a few more things since last night

Here are my Speedfan test results:

GPU 54c (little fire logo)
HD0 41c (little green tick logo)
Core 54c (little fire logo)
Ambient 0c (little blue arrow, pointing down logo)
CPU 46c (little green tick logo)
Local 46c (little green tick logo)
Remote2 -64c (little blue arrow, pointing down logo)


I downloaded a graphics card stress tester (from FurMark) and here are the results:

FPS: min=11 - max= 1053 - avg=90 (and dropping) - Cur = 12
Stability Test - Frames=20,000+ - Time+5 mins+
Cloaks Core 430MHz - Memory 1200Mhz - Temp=min-60c max 80c

After 5 mins graphics smear followed by freeze, then black screen (machine still ticking, but monitor switched off/stand by (same issue).

After i run the program to crash, I dusted inside unit and took graphics card out and cleaned also. My standing graphics Card temperture is low 50's now i have cleaned unit and card.

Run the graphics program again on full, lasted maybe 5 seconds b4 again, graphics smear, system lock and followed by shut off.

Did manage to bring up a blue screen message with the following:

The problem seems to be caused by the following file: nv4_disp. I have found that nv4_disp.dll is my latest driver on my graphics card (dunno if this help to give resolution) .

One little thing i have noticed is that my Word.doc (micrsoft setting) all changed when i open. The little graphic in corner not coloured and all fixed colours and fonts changed (not my settings, the Microsoft templates).

Any advice or help will be greatfully recieved.

Thanks