PC Shut Down...
By
Baby_Phoenix,
Posted on: 2009-04-13 16:57 in ALL ACCESS Gameplay Technical Issues Bugs
Your PC will *normally* only shut down due to temperature issues, rather than OS or power problems.
Other issues may cause a reboot, but not a shutdown.
I would guess that you are overheating bigtime, and the automatic temp-monitor is taking over to protect your investment. If your PC speaker ( not your desktop speakers ) is connected it should shout at you with warning beeps prior to doing this.
Trying turning down "maximum particle count" in the advanced graphics options, as fire uses a fair amount of these. If that cures it, there's your answer!
Fahie
Cool thanks Fahie will give that a go! 
Golden-Phoenix - Lvl 50 Fire/Fire Tank
Oodja Nikabolokov - Lvl 50 SS/WP Brute
Baby-Phoenix - Lvl 50 Peacebringer
How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could Chuck Norris?
Power issues can also be causing this, as the load on both the cpu & graphics card increase so does the power demand.
This also increases heat within the PSU which again lowers the ability to output the power load (both the levels of power and the stability of voltages/amps)
This can cause over current protection or voltage protection within the PSU to cut in and switch it self off.
To diagnose the exact cause we'd need to know a lot more about your pc
The only time I've had this happen was when the fan failed on my PSU - resulted in a lot of poor voltage regulation when under heavy load.
PC would boot and run normally for about 10-15 minutes then shut down automatically.
I could get things to work by directing another fan directly at the PSU until I could get a replacement.
So I'd agree with others that others that this is a definite area to check.
The PSU is designed with a maximum current loading overall and also for each output rail seperately - if any of these get heavily loaded such that they approach their design limits then voltage stability will suffer. If this causes the voltage to go outside its limits (either high or low) the PC will shut itself down.
Things to check
Have you multiple high load components running off the same rail. This may happen if you are using power splitters.
Is your PSU capable of running everything in your PC? Cheap PSUs often list their power rating as the sum of the ratings for each rail but it is very rare that the PSU is designed to operate with all rails simultaneously providing their full rating.
Either of these may be an issue if you have significantly upgraded components - especially things like adding a new high spec graphics card.
Mind of Gaia lvl 50 Defiant's first Mind/Storm 'troller.
Deadly Doc 50 Dark/Dark Corr
and lots more on Pinnacle,Union and Defiant
It gets much worse than that on real cheap PSUs, they often don't have any protection and will happly go over load becoming very unstable untill things die.
IF this problem is PSU related then automatically shutting down is a good sign, IF this is PSU related then it's not some el-cheapo PSU and by turning it's self off it's shouldn't damage other components.
But again, unless we have more info about the pc this speculation is just that.
It's a bit like trying to diganose a medical condition from the statement "I feel a bit ill"
Thanks guys - happily after replacing my 'borderline sufficient' PSU with one considerably larger the issue has disappeared
Sadly my CMOS battery now needs replacing lol
Golden-Phoenix - Lvl 50 Fire/Fire Tank
Oodja Nikabolokov - Lvl 50 SS/WP Brute
Baby-Phoenix - Lvl 50 Peacebringer
How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could Chuck Norris?
I have an issue at present with my PC. It shuts down when playing CoH - i mean turns off fully - but it only does it when playing my Fire Tank. I know my powr supply is borderline for providing sufficient power so this could be why - therefore would the gfx involved in all my shields cause the GFX card to require more power thus cause the PC to shut down?
Or am I completely way off the mark here
Thx
Golden-Phoenix - Lvl 50 Fire/Fire Tank
Oodja Nikabolokov - Lvl 50 SS/WP Brute
Baby-Phoenix - Lvl 50 Peacebringer
How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could Chuck Norris?