Strange crashing...
 

I`m used to dealing with crashing, BSOD`s and the like but this is a new one on me. Recently my computer has sarted behaving very strangely- the monitor just goes into standby and all I get is a black screen. Everything becomes unresponsive. There is no real pattern to it all except that it sems to be becoming more frequent. Sometimes its after a hour of surfing net, other times from a few minutes gaming. BF2 nearly always fails to make it past loading screen, FEAR lasts a few minutes & then sound goes into a stuttering loop for short time. Sometimes it even does it straight after reboooting- only constant is that it is happening more & more and playing games has become near impossible. Tried latest drivers, windows update & running norton windoctor but no joy. Looked at all power options but all is well. Really not sure where to lay the blame- don`t want to go spending money where it isn`t needed. System is as follows:

3700+ AMD S739
KN8 Asus board
2GB Crucial RAM
256mb BFG 6800GS
500W PSU with good rails but not so good brand name
XP pro, SP2

Graphics card is only 4 months old, board about 8 (replacement for dodgy MSI Neo3) and PSU must be near 2 years old. It was replacement for PSU that failed. But symptons that time were that it froze up, rebooted or just plain failed to boot. Any ideas??

have you tried a fresh OS install with latest GFX/System drivers?

Fresh install would seem pretty drastic.... and from experience it seldom fixes these sorts of things.

it rules out any software mishaps, and if you got a spare partition/hdd doesn't ruin on current OS install.

I don`t have partition, so fresh install would be major undertaking- would take me days to get back on my feet again. Would only do it if there were good odds of solving my problem. I`m hoping that someone out there has encountered a similar problem before to hel pshed some light on the matter.

Only thing I can suggest is swapping out your graphics card with anything else ya might have, and seeing if that fixes it. Same with the PSU, as I'd first bet one of those is the problem.

good call. Have since removed graphics card & cleaned out inside my PC before reinserting. Seems to have done the trick- though will be keeping an eye on graphics card, its a BFG & have had to return it already so dont have alot of faith in it!!!