Urgent help needed (PC problems)

Surf Solar

Surf Solar

So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Hey guys, I hope you can help me out, because I'm in a rush (sorta).

The last few days I spent the whole time composing music tracks and making soundeffects for two seperate games. I'm nearly finished, but yesterday I encountered a problem.

Everytime I have a few special programs open, my pc turns off all of a sudden for no apparent reason. Not only that all unsaved files are gone after such a shutdown, the PC doesn't even react when I push the "power" button to turn it on again. I have to unplug the electricityjack and plug it in again to be able to turn the PC on again.

And this happens just with two programs. Cubase (the audio editing and mixing suite) and guitar rig (sort of "virtual instrument"). Unfortunately those two programs I use the most, especially Cubase. I already scanned the whole PC for virusses, but there are none. I have absolutely no idea what this could be and for the one game I have a deadline till next week thursday, so I'm a bit in a rush as I said. The other one is not so badly needed, it's actually just a few soundeffects for FOnline. But it would be neat if could keep on working on them, not fearing all data will be lost regardless what I do.

So, any ideas what this could be?

:|
 
Its a long shot, but whats the ventilation like on that case? It sounds to me like its overheating. Also, is there any funny smells or noises that are out of the norm?
 
Hm, it was very hot the last days, (I'm living in a flat beyond the roof), maybe thats the issue...
I'll try to clean it from dust and put the PC a bit nearer to the window.. Maybe this will help.

The PC (and ventilator itself) isn't old, I actually bought it just a few months ago and had no problems with it till yesterday.


EDIT: Cleaned everything (there wasn't that much dust on the ventilator), installed a program to watch the heat in the PC (the temperatures are ok) - but kazzang! - when using said programs - computer shuts down. :(
 
It sounds like the PSU gets overstrained or something. Do you have any troubles while for instance playing games?

If you have to unplug the powercable it should'nt be the RAM-sticks, but you could try removing one if you have pairs of them.
 
No, everything else runs fine, games on high settings, multiple instances of programs etc.
It's just those two programs. :(
 
Hmm... did you possibly update the programs or something, so that they developed some kind of memoryleaks?

I've never heard of anything like this. :s
 
Mettle said:
Hmm... did you possibly update the programs or something, so that they developed some kind of memoryleaks?

I've never heard of anything like this. :s
Click to expand...

Memory leaks wouldn't stop a reboot and they're usually noticeable before the system crashes. Plus, i don't think they turn it off do they, usually BSOD or reboot.

On the note of the power supply, that's a possibility. Surf, do you know how to get into the BIOs? Press delete while the PC is booting and look for a section called "PC health" or something along those lines. Look for 3 entrys saying 1.2v, 3.3v and 12v. There should be a number similar to them, ie 1.18v, 3.32v and 12.3v. Write them down and post them here.

I had a similar issue a year ago where a PSU failed to deliver enough power on the 12v rail.
 
Cubase is very CPU-intensive, no? If anything's overheating, it's probably the CPU. Get RealTemp and have it run in the background and log CPU temperature, then check the log after the crash.

However, if I'm reading right, you can't even power on the system immediately after the crash. That's very suspicious and indicates PSU or motherboard issues. Give your computer a thorough cleaning and try to eliminate the possibility that system components might be overheating (by using RealTemp). Can you borrow a better PSU from a friend and try it with your system? If that doesn't fix the problem, something is almost certainly wrong with your motherboard. Tough break.
 
Sigh. All I want to do is work. :/

Cubase is very CPU-intensive, no?
Click to expand...

Depends, the RAM is more important when it comes to handle few virtual instruments. But yep, a good CPU is also important (that was actually the reason I've bought the new desktop)

This sounds like a serious problem, so I have to transport all those data on another computer (my laptop), install all those programs AGAIN to work further, jesus... I'll open my desktop and clean everything as you said ratty and'll check the Temp with the program you've mentionend.
I'll also check out the numbers in the BIOS, Aphyosis.

Anyway, thank you guys. :wink:
 
Just my two cents, but I'd also go for the PSU. Had a similar problem a few years ago (yet not with two specific programs) and changing the PSU fixed it.
 
I had/have some problems with my old computers GPU, usually would result in a total lockup of the computer, but extremely rarely/never in games.

Sorry for running away, but I had to install my new DVD.
 
smells like a PSU failure to me.

get a friend's PSU and rig it up without taking the old one out. try to make it crash like before. if it goes down, it's not the PSU.

if it acts fine, get the old PSU out, friend's PSU in, close that case and try to crash it again.

if it crashes with it, it's probably overheating (since it didn't crash with the case open due to the external PSU).

you could try leaving your case open before doing all this first, however, if it's a dying PSU, it might burn some of your stuff in the meantime. cd/dvd drives will likely be the first thing to die since they're most fragile when it comes to power surges.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top