Second Life shuts my computer down - Help :(

[Aurelia Chauveau]

Hi Guys

I ran into this problem today. I'm in Second Life, next minute, my computer screen goes black, and my whole computer shuts down. This morning I was online there for about 3 or 4 hours, and then all of a sudden that happened. I just shrugged, turned my computer back on, and logged back in. About 3 mins later, the same thing happened. I've tried updating my firestorm viewer, doing a full clean re-install. I have tried downloading the latest SL viewer as well and the same thing happened.

I took a break for a few hours, then tried again and yeah it happened again.

I'm wondering if anyone else has come across this issue before? It was working fine, and now it isn't? Thanks for any ideas!

Aurelia :D

[Poenald Palen]

I am guessing your computer may be to hot. No, I don't want to ask it out on a date or see it in beach clothing on a hot day!

I think it may be the CPU overheating. SL client uses the CPU heavily. OVerheating is bad! It eventually can kill the chip by moving the particles to far apart and it never turns on again.

Maybe power supply as well, overheating or to much power. Did you upgrade your GPU card lately?

Maybe something overheats and disconects something inside, though this is maybe very rare.

More room around the PC or laptop and maybe point a fan at it to help it out.

Maybe turn down your screen resolution to like 1024X786 or whatever is close to that, sub 1000sX1000s basically. YOu can sort of run SL with 800X600 if you hit cntrl+p and find the slider that has UI size and slide it all the way to the left so it is like .75 or less. This is so you can see the buttons better after making the screen make less dots per inch. This may help but you may need fans changed or cleaned, maybe make sure everything is tightly in it's sockets. Some people even pull the heatsinks and apply new goowy cold goop stuff, thermal paste, to the CPU heatsink every so many years. Not sure if it helps, but you can kill components inside so learning some basic repair stuff (static electricity kills parts sometimes, chips more specifically) so...yeah, maybe learn that stuff or find a tech.

Hey, I think they have temprature utilities that work with some computers. You may also have an option to turn up fan speed at different tempratures in yoru system BIOS. Once again, might need to learn something about this. I am sure a tech may help check if it is overheating, he may even have a thermometer to help him find out if the motherboard inside has no temprature sensors. Who knows, and I don't know how much they charge these days but it used to be like 40$ or so for an hour or two of work.

[Sassy Romano]

I agree that it sounds like a heat thing.

Does the computer feel hot in any areas at all?  I can get one of my laptops such that the keyboard is at 70 degrees C and would be exceptionally uncomfortable were it on a lap.

If you have the latest Firestorm BUT NOT THE CURRENT BETA, then two easy things you can try.

Go into the Advanced menu, if you don't have this Ctrl Alt D will add that to the menu.

Go down to "Show Debug Settings" and in there find the following two settings.

MaxFPS.  Set this to something like 30 (or a bit less)

YieldTime.  Set this to something like 100.

You can play around with these settings but basically, if unthrottled, the viewer will use as much processor time as it can and particularly in simple areas, will drive the graphics card very hard.  The first setting will limit the graphics card to a set frame rate and the second will basically pause SL every now and then, if set to 100, every 100ms, to allow other things to happen.

Do understand that YieldTime will cause SL to potentially run slower but depending on choice of setting, you may not notice it.  Values between says 20 to 200 are ones to play with.

Just to give you some idea of the difference these settings make, if I use my desktop PC with a GTX 680 graphics card, when it "runs away" to treble digit frame rates, the fans spin up and it uses 56 Watts more power.  On the laptop which gets to 70 degress to touch, with YieldTime at 100, it runs a store model avatar all day long without the CPU fan screaming away and it's cool to touch.

Note:  DO NOT use the latest Firestorm beta as these values were omitted from the build of the currently available beta and thus have no effect.

[iCade]

Before you do any of the things the above two have stated, sometimes it already helps to simply unplug your computer, to open it and to clear the innards of it with a can of compressed air, a vacuum cleaner (very VERY carefully but that's what I have been doing for years) and a normal small painters brush.

I have three cats, so once every two month I open up my tower and clear out all the dust bunnies and cat hair. 

I've had the same problem as you two years ago and tried a lot of things, including going into the BIOS, and then a friend of mine pointed out to just open the comp and check how dirty it's innards are. Boy was that a sight

Just saying, sometimes the easiest solutions help, but only sometimes, in case this doesn't help you go for the suggestions above, they're very good.

[Thinkerer Melville]

That sounds like a problem of overheating -- here is an article on hot to test for overheating and what you can do about it:

• System slows or stops when running graphics? Check for GPU overheating

TKR

[Aurelia Chauveau]

Thanks guys for all the helpful replies!!

 

Looks like it was an over-heating problem, because today, after my computer has been off for a while, things are running fine again. Strange because literally just had a new fan installed in the computer so that overheating didn't even cross my mind. However, I do live in the tropics, and its the middle of summer, and it was the middle of the day and I didn't have air-con on... so I really should know better! If I keep having the problem though, I will try those other suggestions. Thanks again!

 

Aurelia

[Poenald Palen]

---

iCade wrote:

Before you do any of the things the above two have stated, sometimes it already helps to simply unplug your computer, to open it and to clear the innards of it with a can of compressed air, a vacuum cleaner (very VERY carefully but that's what I have been doing for years) and a normal small painters brush.

I have three cats, so once every two month I open up my tower and clear out all the dust bunnies and cat hair. 

I've had the same problem as you two years ago and tried a lot of things, including going into the BIOS, and then a friend of mine pointed out to just open the comp and check how dirty it's innards are. Boy was that a sight

Just saying, sometimes the easiest solutions help, but only sometimes, in case this doesn't help you go for the suggestions above, they're very good.

---

I would NOT recommed a painters brush because of static threat to chips, compressed air is good though. IF you do wish to poke around in a PC wear cotten, not staic producinig stuff. Static, even though you do NOT feel it is present and can kill electronics with far far less than you may think.

Having said that, I myself don't go crazy about this and have pulled parts and built PC's without a electrostatic mat or wrist band thingy.

I also have shocked myself workiing on amps, solder stuff and have ruined electronic boards. Hi, I am the crazy guy with a stack of broken parts and "dead" things and spends my worthless hours getting cut up and injured, falling over, hunched over 20 year old engines and even safety goggles can't stop bits of flying junk flying at my flesh and eyes!

So, while I think and sometimes say "Just pull the side of it, it'll run cooler" I forget to mention that you may also be at risk of electromagnetic radiation, because the FCC only tests medical effects of PC's in thier cases. You may have fun with soldering irons, but wear goggles or eye protection because I have a guy working on stuff get it explode (tiny explosion) and go in his eye. It doesn't just happen to some people, it seems to happen to me and people I have been around lol. So, have fun tearing into stuff because one day it may be your last day that you hand works because you are NOT lucky and have your fingers pull away from the transformer like they did when I was just a crazy lad with a screwdriver and no worries. You may even reach with another hand and then it stops your heart!

So, even though this is a "necro" thread, I will post this so you do not end up with necro tissue, necro chips or necro hope for fixing things. I did get PC's working, kept engines started and done work with them dozens of time. The guy didn't go lind or even need medical attention, though small damages may manifest themselves later (I think risk of detached retna for the blow to the eye...can't remember but maybe also cataracts...sad stuff for when I am older ) so...yes, no, maybe and you are risking yourself.

And, yeah...for the most part you will not break stuff but may break stuff. And chips that are broken sometimes go dead totally, but sometimes intermittantly or have a glitch. I have seen this in a GPU I overheated, it worked sometimes and then not and then never and one works for like 5 seconds and then the screen goes crazy messy.

[Kwakkelde Kwak]

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Poenald Palen wrote:

So, while I think and sometimes say "Just pull the side of it, it'll run cooler"

---

Better watch your temperatures when you do that. My previous computer ran 10 degrees cooler with the side off, but this was while it was standing under my desk with little room for exiting air. It has more room now and I added a front case fan. Like my current computer, it now runs warmer if I take the side of.

[Sassy Romano]

Not uncommon.  Leaving the side of the case off changes the way that air is drawn (or not) through the case.