Video Card is Freezing Computer

[orbitgum]

I bought this desktop in Dec 2011. Within the first week, it started having problems whenever I played graphics-heavy games. The computer would freeze and these colored lines would appear on the screen. It's accompanied by a loud buzzing sound. Nothing wakes the computer up (esc, alt+tab, ctrl+alt+del); only manual shut down via power button.

So, I worked this out with HP support back in Jan 2012. Their final solution was to replace the video card (I did some driver updating and re-installing, along with some diagnostic tests, to no avail, before that). So HP replaced the graphics card, and it worked great for two years. Now, the same problem started again this week. I can't play a game for longer than four minutes; even watching a movie for over an hour caused it. I'm beyond warranty now.

So my request is this: could someone look at my specs and tell me if there's a problem in my setup? I planned on just getting a new and improved graphics card, but if someone can spot a weak link in my setup, that would be much appreciated. I'd hate to spend a ton of money on one deluxe component only to find out that the rest of my system is junk or subpar. Also, I don't want to go nuts on a video card upgrade. If you have any recommendations for a high quality video card, but still inexpensive and not overkill, I'll take them. I'm a beginner, if you couldn't already tell.

Specs:
HP Pavilion HPE h8t
Model #: h8-1110t
OS: Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium [64- bit]
CPU: Intel(R) Core( TM) i5-2320 quad- core processor [3.0GHz, 6MB Shared Cache]
Memory: 8GB DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM [4 DIMMs]
Video Card: 1GB DDR3 Radeon HD 6670 [DVI, HDMI, DP, VGA]
Hard Drive: 1TB 7200 rpm SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
Power supply: 460W

The games' websites and canyourunit.com both say that my machine exceeds the recommended hardware.

I thought it may be overheating, so I vacuumed out the dust this week. Still the same problem.

Previous troubleshooting from 2011:
(None of these have helped noticeably):
Windows update
HP update
Updated Drivers
Uninstalled/re-installed video card drivers
Ran both games on "low quality" (StarCraft II and Arkham games) meaning low detail and/or low resolution
Gave the computer a 16-hour break while shut down
Increased Virtual Memory (paging file size) to 90 000 MB initial and 200 000 MB maximum--that seemed to help, but not solve the issue
Checked for viruses
The computer's fans are not blocked and the machine is always cool to the touch.
Tried to "window" the games instead of using fullscreen--same problem still happened.

The games it freezes on:
Starcraft II
Arkham series (Batman)
Star Wars: The Old Republic
Team Fortress II (this game actually is what precipitated the problem the second time around)
some movies

UPDATE: I ran Speccy, My graphics temp was 46 deg Celsius without doing much. I turned on my game, and it climbed to 103 deg Celsius. I'm assuming that's a big part of the problem, I guess?

 

[techgeek]

Well the last thing you mentioned is probably part of the problem. How clean is the heatsink on your graphics card? Also you should look at the airflow in your case. How many case fans do you have? And where are they located? Do your intake fan(s) have filters? If so have you cleaned them?

Beyond that if you intend to upgrade your graphics card, you might as well count on upgrading the power supply. In my opinion that power supply is border line for the system you have and it's now three years old. As power supplies age, they become weaker. This is mainly due to the aging of the electrolytic capacitors.

I am sure that you can make your computer more stable if you address your heat issues first. Since you are new to all this, if you use compressed air to clean heatsinks, be sure not to let the air spin the fans. Hold the fan blades so they don't turn. If you let the fan spin, the fan can spin so fast that it wrecks the bearings in the fan and it won't spin as fast or at all afterwards.

You need to give us a budget on how much your willing to spend. This will give us some idea about how much you can spend on a video card and we can determine from there how much PSU power capacity you'll need to safely run your system.

EDIT: I re-read your post again and see that you said that you vacuumed out your system. While this is good enough to remove the loose dust and cruft from your system, you need a more vigorous method to remove dust from your heatsinks. Again like I mentioned above, use canned air. You can find it pretty much anywhere. I get mine at Costco. It's sold under many brand names. When your blasting your heatsinks with compressed air don't be cheap, do a thorough job. As long as you see dust coming out, keep blasting. Hit if from multiple angles and directions.

 

[techgeek]

Just did a quick calculation at eXtreme Power Supply Calculator of your system at present. I had to take a few guesses about fans, but the important stuff was what you stated above. It recommended a minimum of 390W for your system as it is right now. You have a three year old 460W supply. That's only 18% overprovisioning. Not a lot of room. Not only do PSU's become weaker as they age, but as they warm up, that can deliver less power than they are rated for. That's the dirty little "no so" secret of the PSU industry. There is no standard temperature used to rate the power delivery at. So a disreputable manufacturer may use some unrealistic temperature say 30C or lower to rate their supplies when in fact the operating temperature is much higher (say 50-60C). So the rated power may be much less than what is specified. OEM's are famous for using low quality cheap PSU's and only giving just enough power to supply the system as sold.

So this is one item you should count on upgrading if you upgrade your graphics card. That is unless you go with a low power option like a 750 GTX. Even then I would still consider it.

 

[orbitgum]

It's fixed now. Cleaning it out did it. But I actually had to remove the video card and clean it out with that pressurized air can. There was a ton of dust clumped up in the fan, and I couldn't get to it until I physically pulled out the card and got the right angle on it. The resting temperature before was 46 deg C at rest, and 103 deg C at high use. Now it's 30 deg C at rest and peaked at 60 deg C during high use. Thanks for the suggestions, everyone!

 

[techgeek]

Good deal, glad I could help.

Yeah I've had big gobs of dust come out when cleaning my graphics card before. It looked like a big batten of dry lint, came out in one big piece. It doesn't take much once it starts to pile up.