BSOD and faulty videocard or pcie slots

oekoeloe

Member
Hello

A couple months ago I was playing Skyrim at recommended quality settings.
Suddenly the game got stuck and I had to restart using the power button.
But it wouldn't start up again. It tried to boot but it suddenly stops and automatically retries. And the monitor stayed on standby the whole time.
No POST screen and stuff.
So I placed the videocard in another slot from pci-e 16x to pci-e 8x.
Then it worked fine again for some time.
This time I was playing Minecraft, also at recommended quality settings.
And it got stuck again, so I had to restart with the power button and it's the same story again.
But I got no pci-e slots left. And no on board videocard to try out if it's the videocard or the pci-e slots.
I always try to keep my computer dust-free.
Software up-to-date and no viruses/malware.

Windows XP
Intel Core 2 Duo, E8400, Socket 775
Arctic Freezer 7 pro
Kingston KVR667D2N5K2/4G, 4096 MB, DDR2, PC5300, 667 MHz, 2x
Cooler Master Real PowerPro Modular, 520Watt
GigaByte GA-EP45-DS3
Club3D GeForce 8800GTS, 512MB, GDDR3, PCI Express x16
 
I removed the thermal paste (which was hardened out) and now I'm running it without any paste and it went on.
Checking out a while how it runs.
 
The thermal paste on the CPU or GPU? Either way, not a good idea. At all.

Sounds like a driver error. Are the drivers up to date and did you remove the previous drivers correctly?
 
Last edited:
Paste from the cpu.
I got all drivers up-to-date.
I don't know what else it could be because right before I removed the paste it didn't work.
And after I removed it, it did work. And I only removed the paste in between.
 
Ok, on top of your original issue with the GPU, you are going to have issues with your CPU now.

Turn it off and do not restart until you put TIM back between the cooler and the CPU. Running the CPU without TIM, even with a cooler, is like setting a burger right down on the stove eye. Sure it will work, but it will make a bloody mess of everything in the process. Add the skillet back in the picture (skillet being thermal interface material a.k.a. "paste").
 
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