[Technique101]

Okay, let me get straight to the point. I recently noticed that my computer tends to shutdown after 25-40min of playing a game. This was never the problem about 5 months and the games that i play are still the same (Guild Wars, Prince of Persia 2, NHL 06). Now in a little more detail, When for example i would load up Guild Wars, 40 or so minutes into playing it my computer just turns off. I can usually just click the power button to turn it on, but sometimes i'm forced to turn the swtich at the back of my case on and then turn it back on after a minute or so to get my computer back on and running.

My specs are as follows:
Mobo: Asrock K7S41GX
CPU: AMD Sempron 2600+ 1.82ghz
Memory: 512mb RAM
Video: ATI Radeon Sapphire 9200SE 128mb
*my case is constantly open and my computer is in my basement, if it makes a difference.

Like it said, it was working fine about 5 months ago and since it started happening, i've gone through about 3-4 PSU's, all having the same result. Now i'm using a 500W PSU. I first thought that my CPU or computer is overheating. These are the results i got from SpeedFan (program that monitors temps) :
Temp01: 29C (below recommended)
Temp02: 42C (at recommended)
HD0: 29C (below recommended)

After seeing that my temperatures were relatively good, i paid a little more attention to when my computer turns off. I noticed that the longer i have my computer off prior to playing a game, the longer i can play the game without having the computer to turn off. Also, i noticed that the lower i set my graphic settings, the longer i can play with having the computer to turn off. I stress that i have had everything the same for more than a year now, and it was only about 5 months ago where the shutdowns started taking place. I've played Guild Wars and POP2 at med-high settings before with no problems. Any ideas? My mind is thinking that my video card is overheating or something, but it was working fine before...

Any ideas? All help is appriciated.

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My mind is thinking that my video card is overheating or something, but it was working fine before...

Yup. that's my thought! You might want to pull the vid card and clean it off with some compressed air. Also, sometimes the heatsink will pull away from the GPU... you might want to check that. If you're feeling brave, you might pull the heatsink off and apply some Arctic silver.

[makai]

My mind is thinking that my video card is overheating or something, but it was working fine before...

Yup. that's my thought! You might want to pull the vid card and clean it off with some compressed air. Also, sometimes the heatsink will pull away from the GPU... you might want to check that. If you're feeling brave, you might pull the heatsink off and apply some Arctic silver.

[Technique101]

I just had a talk with my dads friend who is a computer technician and he said that my mobo could be causing the problem? Any thoughts on that... BTW, thanks for help, i have pulled the video card out before cleaned the dust and put it back in before.. never pulled the heatsink off before tho.. i'll see what i can do...

[makai]

Well, it really could be anything, but it looks like it's just that the vid card is overheating. This is only happening when you play games right? No other problems running other apps? What you might do to aid something like this is to add a few more fans to your case. Of course, this wouldn't fix the "real" problem, but it might help.