Possibly too small power supply?

WaveDemon

WaveDemon

Not Dead - Notable Member
Location
Hell, Florida
While I have a few weeks off from school I picked up Skyrim to play. After playing for a couple of weeks I upgraded my video card because my old one was lower than the lowest recommended card and didn't perform well. I bought and installed a 2gb EVGA GTX 550 TI . I installed the latest drivers for the card and latest patches for the game. With the new card I can play the game for 5-20 seconds and the computer turns off. No warning, no BSOD. I added up my power consumption and it's around 460 watts and my PSU is 500.

My guess is the power supply is not really 500w or doesn't carry the amperage the card needs. I'm planning on buying a new PSU but wanted to hear what you guys have to say.
 
MADMAT

MADMAT

Location
Ohio
That could be a DOA (not totally but DOA none the less) vid card for sure....maybe PS. Is it a OE or chitty PS? Try it in safe mode with crappy low res graphics.
 
Last edited:
L

LeftysRule22

Location
Austin, Tx
How old is the PSU and what brand? Before you replace anything, try a different power cord. Sounds weird i know, but Ive had that exact same thing happen.

What are the specs of your rig?
 
rasper99

rasper99

Freighter wake hunter
Location
Portland, OR
That sounds like an overloaded PS. After you play a few minutes the video card heats up, resistance increases and it draws a little more power. 460 out of 500 is pushing it. Sure you haven't missed adding up anything in your watt count? RAM draws a couple. If you have a voltmeter check the voltage at the wall outlet. If it's low you won't get all 500 watts. You could unplug the DVD drive to save a few watts as a test. If you have funky neon lights pull those too.
 
WaveDemon

WaveDemon

Not Dead - Notable Member
Location
Hell, Florida
LeftysRule22 said:
How old is the PSU and what brand? Before you replace anything, try a different power cord. Sounds weird i know, but Ive had that exact same thing happen.

What are the specs of your rig?
Click to expand...

AMD Phenom2 x6 1055t proccessor 2.8 ghz
gigabyte ga880gm-d2h mobo
4 gigs ram.
windows 7 home premium, 32 bit.
2gb EVGA GTX 550 TI video card.

The rest is pretty normal; hard drives, fans, dvd drive, etc.


The power supply is less than a year old and the brand is XON
 
WaveDemon

WaveDemon

Not Dead - Notable Member
Location
Hell, Florida
MADMAT said:
Hey Tim does it run fine otherwise? Stream vids? I say PS.
Click to expand...
everything works great otherwise. I'm using it now. I ran the system meters on another monitor to see what what is happening when it crashes. It may be where I saved my game at that causes it to crash so soon. I open a door and go into a huge decorative cave and I can see the CPU and ram starts getting hit pretty hard then everything turns off. The video card is surely working hard at that point too.
 
WaveDemon

WaveDemon

Not Dead - Notable Member
Location
Hell, Florida
rasper99 said:
That sounds like an overloaded PS. After you play a few minutes the video card heats up, resistance increases and it draws a little more power. 460 out of 500 is pushing it. Sure you haven't missed adding up anything in your watt count? RAM draws a couple. If you have a voltmeter check the voltage at the wall outlet. If it's low you won't get all 500 watts. You could unplug the DVD drive to save a few watts as a test. If you have funky neon lights pull those too.
Click to expand...

my count could be low too. I was using an online calculator and had to approximate a couple of things.
 
Matt_E

Matt_E

steals hub caps from cars
Site Supporter
Location
at peace
WaveDemon said:
A new PSU fixed the problem!!
Click to expand...

General FYI: Computer PSU advertised power ratings are extremely optimistic, to put it nicely. Unless it's expensive, that 500W psu might put out 400W for sustained periods of time - if you're lucky.
 
WaveDemon

WaveDemon

Not Dead - Notable Member
Location
Hell, Florida
Matt_E said:
General FYI: Computer PSU advertised power ratings are extremely optimistic, to put it nicely. Unless it's expensive, that 500W psu might put out 400W for sustained periods of time - if you're lucky.
Click to expand...
That what I was guessing, thanks for the confirmation.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom