Please help Mijj fix pc for raids!

Hi
I have an issue where in 3 different spots in GSB my pc switches itslef off. (No blue screen, no warning, just switches off).
The 3 places are:
1. Right as we kill Duke Laterius at the point where it teleports you
2. During the Hylas fight at the exact point we get turned into bunnies (I see myself as a bunny and do the port but then it does it)
3. At the part in Greenscale where you have to run under the bubble, however the wierd thing is it lets me do the first bubble and then dcs me for the second time we do that part of the fight.

I have checked video drivers, and the critical error that occurs which just says kernel shutdown. Pnub has been through everything we can think of on my pc, have redone all the graphics settings.

I have the following pc:
i7, 2 x nvidea GTX 295 cards, 6g ram
So I think I have an ok system to run rift on. I play with my settings on max and get 50fps usually during heavy aoe in other fights and run Gilded prophecy and the raid rifts etc no issues. My pc performed fine in aion for example where we were doing forts with 300 ppl and although the framerate slowed down a little it never switched off like this.

There are posts on Rift forums about the game randomly making ppl's pc's switch off but for mine it is only ever in those 3 places, and it is consistently the same thing every time.

Before I start worrying about my hardware which from the things I have checked seems fine, does anyone know if this is some type of Rift error as opposed to Mij pc error!

Thanks
M

» Edited on: 2011-06-16 16:34:09

this may be a stupid question, but did you run the repair utility?

This kind of behavior is typically caused by one of two things: 1. Overheating or 2. Video driver issues. It seems intermittent enough that I would be inclined to rule out #1, since it doesn't happen at any other time. However, have you measured your CPU and GPU temps at all? I would say overheating seems unlikely but I wouldn't rule it out completely until I check the temps. As for #2, maybe you should try rolling back your video driver to a slightly older version? In addition, you could also reseat your video card. And while it's out make sure there's no dust etc in there. Before you reseat the card, make sure the video card fan is working. The more I think about it, the more I think it is video card related. The first two places where you disconnect are big graphical swaps. I started having really bad issues when my video card RAM started blowing chunks. Any way you can swap a different video card in for testing? And yeah, run the repair. If you had the bandwitdh you could re-download a new copy of Rift and try that.

I have not had Rift shut my pc down however, I have had it close and take me directly to my desktop OR minimize itself without warning. No idea why it did this and it has not happened for several weeks. From your description it sounds like a cooling/heating issue but having it occur at the same locations all the time is a bit unusual. Do you have any other graphic intense games you still play that cause similar behavior? As Charlatan suggests, try capturing your cpu and gpu temps and then go try and crash your computer. (To see if your temps are anywhere near redline) One other possibility may be your PSU. Is it fully rated to handle 2 video cards and whatever accessories in your machine?

» Edited on: 2011-06-16 19:44:30

This game runs on the same engine as warhammer, right? I had the exact same problem and it was solved with a combination of a clean install of all video drivers, plus an in-depth cleaning of all cooling ribs on CPU and video card. Then i installed two 120 mm fans that sucked hot air out from the top of the computer. Hope it helps.

I would recommend driver sweeper by phyxion.net You can download it from 3Dguru.com Just follow the instructions on the website (you may need to write them down as you will be restarting in safemode). what driver sweeper does is cleans up any left over files from the video drivers after you uninstall, allowing you to install a clean version of the new driver. This is assuming that video drivers are the problem. My PC recently had a problem where it would go into a restart loop which surprisingly enough was linked to a monitor of all things. Seems the built in webcam was the culprit in my case.

You also might consider making sure your power supply is up to scratch.

I have 1 suggestion that worked for me on my frequent and randomly crashing issues over the past 2 months. The memory sticks and their pairings. I had 4x2GB and 2x4GB for 16 in my system. I also had 2 CPU Xeon Setup. I removed the 2x4gb and just left the original 8GB setup and now I have not crashed in a week. So having 6GB ram you must have 3x2GB setup. Trying just leaving them in Pair 2x2GB and test it out. Also you can use MemTest x86+ tool do search and you can make usb drive boot or use the windows 7 Mem Diag tool on next boot. Hope that helps you out. If you need more assistance grab me on Vent sometime.

Thanks for the suggestions. I have so far done a Memtest - it says everything is ok. Have repaired Rift, which dl'd 819mb so hopefully that works. Have checked temp at the time and it was 31 degrees on average accross the different sensors and the fan speed was normal on all of them too which doesn't suggest overheating. Unfortunately, I can't take anything apart as it is under warranty, but they only fix hardware issues and I cannot yet prove it is a hardware isssue, If I do then they will replace the parts for free. Im going to do a reinstall of video drivers and then look at power, I don't think it is memory but you never know. As for other games - Aion forts is probably the most challenging I have played on this pc and they ran really well, with no shutdowns. Wow raiding was fine but then that isn't really that hard. Hopefully what I have done so far fixes it!

That sort of behavior might also happen if a chunk of video RAM was bad - as soon as it hit the bad chunk of memory it might throw a fault that would cause your PC to BSOD or shut itself down. I'm not aware of any memtest-like utility for video cards myself - can anybody else suggest one?

Have you tried with 1 video card at a time? Remove/disable them one at a time, see if it crashes. If it only crashes with 1 of the cards you just found your hardware issue. http://mikelab.kiev.ua/index_en.php?page=PROGRAMS/vmt_en is a video memory tester. Not the clearest tool, as the author is Ukrainian and does not have perfect English, but works pretty well.