re: pc shutting off during games

Even if it isn't the psu, you need to get a decent one

I'm the same but this is a need in my opinion.

What brand would you replace it with?

one of the ones mentioned on this board I guess. corsair seasonic etc.

are coolermaster ones any good?

quote:

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The side of the supply has 12v1 and 12v2... both for 22 amps

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SG_Geaux speaks the truth, and him mentioning the amperage requirement + me finally getting some coffee made me realize what's probably happening.

Your power supply has two 12v rails (i.e. a multi-rail PSU). PSUs usually have something called over-current protection. In theory, it's designed to shut off power to your PSU at a certain amperage limit. So a single rail PSU, where there's, say 40amps, over current protection has one rail to monitor and will simply shut off your PSU if the draw exceeds that amperage.

On a multi-rail PSU (yours), the draw on each 12v rail is monitored separately. If one of them goes over the rated amperage (22a in your case), the PSU will shut down.

In shitty multi-rail PSUs(and PSUs made as recently as mid-late 2000s, like 2007 or so), the over-current protection feature was flawed (either through poor specifications or an engineering error, or poor QC standards, I don't remember). In these PSUs, instead of being able to put your GPU on both rails, only one rail is devoted to the power-hungry components and the other rail devoted to HDDs, fans, etc. In other words, your motherboard, CPU, and GPU are all competing for 22 amps, and the other rail is barely pulling 3 amps, and the leftovers cant be shared with the other rail. So once you reach that 22amps, over current protection turns your shite off.

In your case, the extra bit of GPU power required to show you pretty colors on that second monitor was the tipping point. I am confident that even without that second monitor, your PSU would shut off if your GPU was under a true full load -- Furmark, for instance, or even a graphic intense game that puts your GPU usage in the 99% range. I'm not recommending you run furmark. Over current protection in a cheap PSU doesn't necessarily mean it will shut off before burning your card. Better to be cautious.

So that's that. Replace your PSU.

Drinking coffee this late?

One of these days I need to get around to that game, I've got it sitting in my steam library.