Why does my PC keep crashing during games?

I could really use some help here... my computer keeps crashing out of the only games I actually play. It happens about 30 seconds in, every single time. I'm just running the original StarCraft and Football Manager... any idea why this is happening? Thanks...

Look, you clearly didn't bother reading the rules, which is why you're hitting us with all-caps titles. That's a no-go here. On top of that, you might have a corrupted install, some DirectX issue, a busted driver, or just something else acting up...

It’s also possible that a specific component—like your GPU, CPU, or even the power supply—is overheating.
First, get a clear picture of your actual hardware specs using a tool like Speccy. Once you have that, start monitoring your CPU and GPU temperatures using software such as MSI Afterburner or PlayStation 3.

Thanks for the help, everyone... turns out the issue was my graphics card. A buddy of mine just handed me an Nvidia GeForce 7300 GT the other day, and I realized I just needed to get the drivers installed. But I'm hitting a wall... it keeps throwing an error saying my computer isn't compatible for PC game optimization...

Did you wipe the old drivers first?

And did you install the correct ones afterward? Check right here — select GeForce, then the 7 series (not the 700 series), and make sure to pick your specific OS

I actually headed over there, but I went for the 700 series instead...

I have no idea why this isn't working... I might have gone a bit overboard by wiping out all the old drivers during the cleanup... man...

Maybe try running Driver Sweeper? It's pretty great for wiping out any leftover junk from those old graphics drivers...

Nothing seems to be working... I've tried running DDU to wipe out all my Nvidia drivers and then doing a clean reinstall, which went fine, but the games are still crashing on me... It’s honestly exhausting...

Did you happen to wipe the old drivers first (if there were any installed previously)?
And did you actually check those temperatures like I suggested?

I think I managed to grab the drivers through Sweeper... I just can't seem to find them anywhere else... Temperatures look okay, though... so I doubt that's actually the issue...

I mean, why is it such a hassle to just write down what your computer's temperatures and other component stats are looking like? 🙂

I mean, honestly, I’m struggling here because where am I even supposed to look for that?

Well, you might as well just say that... Grab Core Temp and use it to check out those temperatures.

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

urbantiger53 said:I'd say the temperatures look fine... I don't think that would be the issue here.

It’s pretty obvious—your system is crashing because of overheating. You're much less likely to see those kinds of crashes while idling since the GPU isn't being pushed at all, unlike when you're actually running games.

urbantiger53 said:Honestly, I’m struggling here—where am I even supposed to look for this?

I already gave you a list of three programs to use in my previous post.

So, for a few days now, I’ve been getting this little pop-up on my computer asking me to upgrade my AVG—which I just kept clicking away from—but then last night, things started getting... well, a bit crazy, I guess. My computer just started acting totally haywire. Every few seconds, this warning would pop up saying AVG had detected some threats, and when I finally decided to actually run it, it showed it found what looked like Windows 32-bit issues—no less than 140 of them! Some were fixed, but others weren't, maybe? And now, I’m getting this "send error" window popping up literally every single minute. I tried to just uninstall AVG entirely, but I can't even get the "Add or Remove Programs" menu to open. I’m honestly at a bit of a loss here because I have no idea what happened to it. If anyone has any advice, I’d really appreciate it

Maybe you could try using Revo Uninstaller to wipe out that junk while you're in Safe Mode... once that's done, just run through some scans with Norton, HitmanPro, AdwCleaner, and the rest of them.