Question Why Does My PC Keep Rebooting During Games?

[CSaint1994]

My set up

CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-9700K CPU @ 3.60GHz
GPU: GeForce RTX 2080
32GB of RAM
PSU: RM 750x

I recently purchased Assassins Creed Odyssey, and I've gotten about 8 hours of playtime on it so far. Those 8 hours have been painful because my PC will randomly reboot while I'm playing. Now I'm at a cut scene and can't get passed it because my PC reboots every time this cut scene starts.

I've checked system temperatures and my CPU never gets over 40 Celsius. When I set the graphics for the game, it doesn't even come close to overbearing my GPU. Every bit of research I do says this could be do to not having a strong enough PSU, but when I look at the recommended PSU's for my graphics card no one says you eve have to go over 550.

For some references, my PC has ran Jedi: Fallen Order flawlessly when I played through that game.

I'm honestly confused, any help would be appreciated.

 

[Oussebon]

Is the CPU or GPU overclocked?

 

[OsaX Nymloth]

Did you try "fixing" the installation? Usually the launches for Steam/Origin/uPlay/etc have this option - could be some game files are corrupted. Or the drive they're at is corrupted, but chance for that is rather low if everything else runs fine.

 

[cruz666]

I am far from an expert but in my instance, I had attempted to change my screen refresh rate from 60hz to 75hz which was listed as an option. Didn't work out. Black screen with The Golf Club 2 which isn't that demanding on a GPU. Possibly re-seat your GPU and check connections ? Any recent changes or installs other than your game ?
I assume you checked your graphics settings ? Possibly turn them down a bit and try again.

 

[CSaint1994]

Is the CPU or GPU overclocked?

Neither are overclocked.

 

[CSaint1994]

I am far from an expert but in my instance, I had attempted to change my screen refresh rate from 60hz to 75hz which was listed as an option. Didn't work out. Black screen with The Golf Club 2 which isn't that demanding on a GPU. Possibly re-seat your GPU and check connections ? Any recent changes or installs other than your game ?
I assume you checked your graphics settings ? Possibly turn them down a bit and try again.

Yea, currently my refresh rate for AC Odyssey is at 60hz (default). I haven't installed anything on my PC other than games. For the graphics I have some settings set to High and some set to Medium/Low.

 

[zSCHIZOz]

Could be a RAM issue. Try reseating your RAM and if you still have problems take half of them out and run in Dual Channel. If its still happening repeat with the different two sticks and try again. If its still happening run MemTest86 with all RAM modules installed.

 

[Oussebon]

I'd try verifying the game files install as @OsaX Nymloth suggested next as it's quick and easy and as good an explanation as the next as to why you only seem to get issues in AC:OD.

Memtest is also a good call by @zSCHIZOz and can be left running overnight.

How old is the PC and where did you buy it from, or was it self-built?

 

[CSaint1994]

I'd try verifying the game files install as @OsaX Nymloth suggested next as it's quick and easy and as good an explanation as the next as to why you only seem to get issues in AC:OD.

Memtest is also a good call by @zSCHIZOz and can be left running overnight.

How old is the PC and where did you buy it from, or was it self-built?

PC is almost 1 years old. I built it.

 

[Baldyboy]

Windows or driver issues are usually the cause of reboots. Try turning off Game Bar to start.

 

[Inspireless Llama]

Do you get an error code when when it shuts down? Or does event viewer tell you anything? I agree that it's also very possible there's a driver issue somewhere.

I'd advice checking your event viewer to see if there are error codes (critical / error) arround the times it reboots. It may give some information about what's happening.

 

[Sarafan]

I've checked system temperatures and my CPU never gets over 40 Celsius. When I set the graphics for the game, it doesn't even come close to overbearing my GPU. Every bit of research I do says this could be do to not having a strong enough PSU, but when I look at the recommended PSU's for my graphics card no one says you eve have to go over 550.

My first suspicion when it comes to sudden computer reboots is a faulty PSU. I've experienced similar issues in the past and it was its fault. If you have a chance you should swap your PSU with another one and check whether the issue still persists. This could be also a memory problem as pointed above, but first of all I'd check the PSU. You should have enough power, but maybe the PSU is broken in some way.

 

[cruz666]

My first suspicion when it comes to sudden computer reboots is a faulty PSU. I've experienced similar issues in the past and it was its fault. If you have a chance you should swap your PSU with another one and check whether the issue still persists. This could be also a memory problem as pointed above, but first of all I'd check the PSU. You should have enough power, but maybe the PSU is broken in some way.

In both instances, PSU or RAM, wouldn't you think it should be a problem everywhere? Not just on 1 particular game.
Definitely odd.

 

[OsaX Nymloth]

Hm... I remember one game that had issue like this, that I couldn't figure out for the life of me.
It was Cryostasis and with the PhysX turnen on there was a late game sequence with a LOT of water. And that was crashing my PC no matter what. Had to turn PhysX off for that one sequence, pass it and then I could enable it again. I am still not sure if there was something wrong with the scene itself or the amount of physics calculations with water was so enormous the game/pc couldn't handle it.

Not sure if this applies here, but you can try disabling most advanced options and lowering graphic settings and see if you can pass this one particular scene - if you haven't already.

As for PSU proposition, as I mentioned with RAM before - it's odd it'd only happen in ONE game. If issues were in other games etc. then yeah, sure. Unless Assassin's Creed is literally the most power hungry game OP plays, then maybe there's a slight chance for PSU being the issue.

 

[Oussebon]

In both instances, PSU or RAM, wouldn't you think it should be a problem everywhere? Not just on 1 particular game.
Definitely odd.

This is a good point, and you'd definitely think so.

That said, Assassin's Creed Odyssey is absolutely brutal (as is Origins). My CPU's overclock was stable at 4.6GHz for everything - every other game, prime95 as long as you like, any torture test I could find to throw at it. All fine. Except AC:O, where I had to either up the voltage or drop the frequency to avoid crashes.

So it wouldn't entirely surprise me if there actually was a hardware issue that only AC:OD exposed.

But you make a very good point.

Before looking at the PSU (PSU always gets the blame first on the interwebz) I'd usually suggest it's better to rule out software issues. If validating the game files didn't help, a clean Install of Windows would be my next step:

How to Perform a Clean Install of Windows 10

A while ago we showed you how to get a Windows 10 ISO for a clean install. Today we'll show how to clean install Windows 10 from beginning to end.

www.groovypost.com

As well as any free hardware troubleshooting/diagnostics like Memtest.

 

[Sarafan]

In both instances, PSU or RAM, wouldn't you think it should be a problem everywhere? Not just on 1 particular game.
Definitely odd.

This may be just the beginning of problems with PSU. In my case I had reboots only in some games that stress GPU heavily. In some other (which also stressed GPU!) there was no problem. It may become more frequent in time. That said, it's not certain that this is the problem. I'm only saying there's a possibility of PSU malfunction. The only way to exclude it is to switch to a different one.

 

[Oussebon]

If the OP doesn't have another PSU to hand, then they should not go and buy one at this stage. Not until ruling out everything else.

 

[lamboto]

For the longest time, my PC would shut down randomly. Whenever I booted up AC Odyssey with a Vega 64, my whole system would freeze and reboot. I swapped out every single component, reinstalled the OS, except for the PSU (You can see where this is going). Turns out my PSU was configured in single-rail mode when I should've had it in multi-rail mode. I have a Corsair PSU so I used Corsair Link to change the settings.

 

[Sarafan]

If the OP doesn't have another PSU to hand, then they should not go and buy one at this stage. Not until ruling out everything else.

I was thinking about borrowing another PSU from someone rather than buying a new one, but you're right of course.