if the whole PC didn’t crash but you had to minimize it’s most likely a GPU crash
yeah i know what your saying, but its proberly best if we rule everything else out before going and saying
“oh shit bro, replace your video card and itll be sweet”
the only other thing related to video card that hasnt been stated yet is this.
Try the normal nvidia drivers. (or the branded ones)
If that doesnt work, once again the temp’s would be nice. And while your at it, give us your voltages for good measure 
I also have a 9600 gt, it was idling at around 68-72C, so I opened up the GPU, replaced the thermal paste, cleaned out the fan, and I also have my pc case open with a small fan aimed directly at the GPU, never goes over 54C.
I think it’s safe to say that this is no heat issue of any kind. I have opened up the case. Set fan speed to 100. This did not work. So I got a small household fan, and put it infront of the open case, and turned it on full speed. My computer is COLD! Only way it could get any colder is if I put it in the fucking fridge! THIS DID NOT WORK. My video card was idling at 38-40 degrees and in-game only reached up to 60. I don’t know what to do. I’ve installed and uninstalled all sorts of drivers. Nothing works.
Also, this power supply is new. I got it just for the new card.
It may very well just be a faulty card. That’d be my first guess if it’s a new card and you’re only getting up to 75 degrees.
get your hands on a copy of everest (i dont care how u get it) and post the lowest and highest temp of atleast your cpu and chipset. perhaps even your voltages. Other then that, i spose you could try running the game as admin + maybe even run in xp mode. Also check if your drivers are actually even installed (i know my mates 250gts kept having default drivers installed).
it’s not a heating issue. If it was the computer would just shut itself down. Nothing is overheating. The computer doesn’t freeze. The games do, and I can minimize out of them and get back in. XP mode? My OS is Windows Vista 64-bit.
Yes, i’ve installed and uninstalled so many different drivers. Nothing works.
Even used Driver Sweeper
By XP Mode he means the compatibility mode. Right click the program .exe and click properties, go to the compatibility tab, and there’s the “Run in” or something like that box and you can choose what OS compatibility to run the program in.
i put a can of compressed air to the thing and dusted and cleaned most of my computer, now it’s idling at a toasty 58 degrees celsius. i don’t think that was the problem
is the heat noticeable by touch?
I could probably burn myself on the outside of my PSU air outlet… Is this healthy?
If your PSU fan(s) are spinning and the voltages are more or less where they should be you’re fine.
Anyway, it doesn’t have to be a heat issue but it’s still probably a GPU failure.
My GPU hits 80 when playing TF2… Would that explain why it runs so damn badly on min even though the recommended settings are fairly high? O_o
EDIT:
Just getting some more data…
GPU (TF2) max: 78
GPU Idle: ~67
CPU Max: 73
CPU Idle: ~55
Also recently developed a problem where the computer will freeze completely, (though it could be the video output freezing, no way I know to tell the difference), and requires a cold boot…
Booting now takes 8 minutes to get past the initial boot screen, (thus arriving at the Windows XP [loading bar] screen) for a total boot time of 10 minutes :fffuuu:
Still waiting for it to restart to tell you the specs and other useful info… (accidentally kicked it, which causes it to restart due to power failure… I think the power button wiring has come loose somewhere)
Moar Edit:
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce 7300 SE/7200 GS, 512MB
CPU: Intel Pentium 4, 3.40GHz, (2CPUs) ~Hyperthreaded?
1024MB RAM
Anything else needed, I am happy to provide, just let me use my computer again :’(
ouch those specs will only get you so far…
I think you’re getting normal performance in TF2 but your GPU temp could be lower, you should really consider a GPU upgrade.
Thing is, I’ve only just had it replaced after… get this… the CPU, GPU and PSU were written off because they were fried. Used to hit 100, 110… Now tell ya what, even I know that ain’t healthy.
However, TF2 used to be playable on this machine. As was HL2 and other source games; and that was with decent settings. Right now I can’t even play it on minimum because of the performance. If there’s a command to show the fps in TF2 without having to run another program to get an overlay to do it, let me know so that I can tell you just how bad it is. It’s certainly below 30 on minimum. Best guess, below 10; maybe around 6.
Type “cl_showfps 2” in the console, and you get a color-coded fps counter in the top right corner
Right, thanks for that. Went ingame, and found I get during average gameplay 4 frames per second. If I’m lucky, 5.
I don’t believe my graphics card is that bad…
Pardon me, I can be a noob at times but why is this?