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Old July 6th 03, 07:30 AM
grendel
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Default Advice on lockup problem

I've had a lockup problem for awhile that is heat related. I am guessing
that my video card has a heat failure based on the fact that for some period
of time it ran without a working fan. PLus I need a better card anyway.
However my heat related problem (definitely heat related since a fan aimed
at the open case cures the lockups every 15 or so minutes in games like
GTA3) could be a bad solder anywhere in my system or a failing component. My
Athlon 800 never gets above 55C in even hot weather and my mobo is never
above 35 C at the max. This is well within the specs. Anyway other than
methodically switching out components with others that are somewhat
equivalent I have given up hope of ever curing this problem unless it is the
video card. Therefore I'm wondering is it a good time to switch to newer
hardware. Here's what I got now.



Asus A7V with 800 MHZ Athlon
256 Crucial SDRAM PC133
Geforce 2 GTS with 64 meg (being replaced with ATI Radeon 9700 non pro)
All the latest Nvidia and 4 in 1 drivers and BIOS
Antec 300 W PS


I only play Half-Life based games plus GTA3. I never buy new games until
they are low priced. Basically a year or 2 after they come out. Therefore I
don't see a real need to upgrade because of performance. I think the ATI
9700 will cure all of my jerky video in GTA3 but this may be a CPU intensive
game. If this is the case I can upgrade to a Athlon 1400 at max. However if
I am gonna upgrade the whole thing I will upgrade to:

Genuine Intel 865 PERL board
512 M DDR 400
2.4 Pentium 4 with 800 FSB


I never overclock and I don't a real need for it. I want stability. I hear
and I expect Intel to have the best chipsets and mobos stability wise.
Companies like Asus make these great mobos that are "great" because they are
pushing things too much.

Opinions?