PC freezes under load

[Ven]

Now before i begin my post in earnest, i need to give some context for the problem that i am having.

 

back in 2012 i built a gaming PC but stopped using it only a year later due to it being broken. broken how you ask? well first it started out freezing on high damand games at the time like BF3, but eventually it got so bad that it started freezing on youtube videos, i consulted forums and technitians and they had no idea what was wrong as there was nothing wrong my my hardware according to various tests, so i went back to being a console peasant until late 2013 when i decided i would sell my functional PC parts.

it was at this point when i lifted the CPU cooler off of my AMD FX 4150(?) did i realise that the thermal paste had been burnt through, so i reaplied it, turned it on and voila! my freezing problem was gone!

 

now in fabuary this year i upgraded my PC, i upgraded pretty much everything but my old 1TB HDD, motherboard and PSU. (my full system specs at the end of the post) everything was awesome with my new system until.... it started freezing again, but only under load or when doing multiple things. so i reapplied my thermal paste, and it kept happening. i ran FurMarks built in "CPU Burner" utility, and me having a stock air cooler, the CPU eventually reached 86C and turned off, but it didn't freeze like i was expecting it to, it turned off.

 

so temperature is out of the question, so i asked some friends and they seem to think its either a faulty motherboard, or a faulty HDD as those are the components i didn't replace and i am having a similar issue to what i used to have.

 

some examples of when these freezes occured:

 

• Playing Final Fantasy 14 + watching 1080p video + downloading games on origin
• Applications that really pushed my PC, such as "Sleeping Dogs: Definitive edition"
• It also crashed once while running Heaven Benchmark 4.0, that one benchmarking software linus has in some of his videos.

i mean i can run some things fine, Titanfall at 60fps max settings @ 1080p, no issues at all. my graphics card also never goes above 70C unless im playing Sleeping dogs or FurMark in which case it goes to 85C, as its supposed to with my GPU.

 

now i want to know your opinion on what exactly the problem might be while i try reformatting my C drive and putting windows on a crappy £10 HDD to see if it was my old HDD that was the problem.

 

before i upgraded my old PC i never pushed my PC this hard before, mostly because i didn't have 2 screens or because i realised i didnt have the hardware to play these high tier games.

 

My System Specs:

 

Motherboard: GIGABYTE 990FXA-UD3 Rev 1.2

CPU: AMD FX-8350 4.0ghz w/ stock cooler

RAM: Corsair CMY8GX3M2A1866C9B Vengeance Pro Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1866Mhz CL9

GPU: AMD R9 290, its a non-reference Asus DirectCU II OC to be exact.

PSU: ModXStream-Pro Powersupply 700W (is that even the model name? meh, i can take a pic of the box if you want. but i doubt my problem is a PSU issue)

HDD i use for games: WD 2TB Black

HDD i use for OS/other software: 1TB... dont know the brand or even the RPM. it came with a computer i bought in 2011 which i used parts from to build my 2012 machine and after contacting the seller they dont even know what bran it is as they used multiple ones in the pre-built computers, one of which i bought. infact i think thats the only part i did use.

 

[Lotus]

Sounds like a bad OC to me. Have you messed around with anything in bios? Also, 86°C is dangerous for the FX CPUs. Anything above 60 is considered bad, with 65 being the hard and fast never exceed point.

[Tedster]

Sounds like a bad OC to me. Have you messed around with anything in bios? Also, 86°C is dangerous for the FX CPUs. Anything above 60 is considered bad, with 65 being the hard and fast never exceed point.

I accidentally turned off Cool 'N' quiet for my FX-6100 and it seemed to throttle at 83°C. But yeah, it's not ideal.

The processor looks fine and seems to still work fine.

[Ven]

Sounds like a bad OC to me. Have you messed around with anything in bios? Also, 86°C is dangerous for the FX CPUs. Anything above 60 is considered bad, with 65 being the hard and fast never exceed point.

 

nope i have not overclocked anything, other than setting my RAM to its correct speed which i got help with on this forum the other day, but i had this problem before doing so i dunno why im even mentioning this.

 

when i run a game, usually my CPU sits around 70C~

my example of 86C was me running CPU burner, which as you can tell from the name is designed to run all cores at 100% and get the CPU as hot as it can go, which it did.

 

thing is that CPU burner took my CPU to 86C and then the computer TURNED OFF, not freeze. this is why i have dismissed it as a temperature thing, especially as i have reapplied the thermal paste on this CPU since building the system 1~ month ago.

[Tedster]

nope i have not overclocked anything, other than setting my RAM to its correct speed which i got help with on this forum the other day, but i had this problem before doing so i dunno why im even mentioning this.

 

when i run a game, usually my CPU sits around 70C~

Oh. You're using the stock cooler, which really hasn't ever been good enough.

 

Could you get a better heatsink (even like a Hyper 212 Evo?) That would make a massive improvement.

[Ven]

Oh. You're using the stock cooler, which really hasn't ever been good enough.

 

Could you get a better heatsink (even like a Hyper 212 Evo?) That would make a massive improvement.

 thing is that im unemployed and a little short on money, so i want to be sure that if i buy something it will be the solution im looking for.

i dont want to buy a £60 cooler only to find out that the problem wasn't solved, leaving me with no cash to buy what might actually solve the problem. also there is the problem of me having a mid tower case so i dont know what coolers would fit in a mid tower case, especially ones that push air to the top, or back, as i have no sidepannel fans

[Tedster]

 thing is that im unemployed and a little short on money, so i want to be sure that if i buy something it will be the solution im looking for.

i dont want to buy a £60 cooler only to find out that the problem wasn't solved, leaving me with no cash to buy what might actually solve the problem. also there is the problem of me having a mid tower case so i dont know what coolers would fit in a mid tower case, especially ones that push air to the top, or back, as i have no sidepannel fans

The 212 Evo is only like £25.50 on Amazon right now, so less than £60.

I'm sorry to hear you're unemployed. Job centres and all?

 

Do you know what case you're using?

[Ven]

The 212 Evo is only like £25.50 on Amazon right now.

Do you know what case you're using?

my case is a Corsair Carbide Series SPEC-01 Mid tower Case.

 

and yea, currently looking for a job.

[Tedster]

my case is a Corsair Carbide Series SPEC-01 Mid tower Case.

 

and yea, currently looking for a job.

Okay, the 212 Evo wouldn't fit.

 

I'm not really sure what to recommend if you can't use the 212 Evo. There are other good coolers for a similar price, but this is just the one that the entire world uses.

[Ven]

Okay, the 212 Evo wouldn't fit.

 

I'm not really sure what to recommend if you can't use the 212 Evo. There are other good coolers for a similar price, but this is just the one that the entire world uses.

 

im not entirely sure i need a new cooler though as im using it as stock speeds and my CPU idles anywhere between 25C and 35C and like i said the temps haven't really gone over 70C~ in actual use, that and i've had this issue in the past with my old CPU, which also used a stock cooler. reapplying the thermal paste fixed it and until now i thought it used to be a temperature issue. now im not so sure as its happening with acceptable temperatures on a completely different CPU.

 

 

also what about this CPU cooler? it will fit in to my case from the looks of it.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cooler-Master-Hyper-Patent-Technology/dp/B00D4EEEFQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1426202537&sr=1-1&keywords=hyper+103