BIG Problems, please help!

[BIGJ]

Hey guys, so the system in my sig is giving me some problems, and I have no idea whats going on. I will describe the problems as best I can!

First off a little about my system. I am currently running at 3.4GHz and just did a prime test all night last night to see if it just wasnt stable, or if it was over heating. Test ran for 10 hours without a problem. Heat avrg was about 40c...on a q6600 that souldnt be an issue. I have not OC'd the GPU past the factory, and have already turned the fan on at a constant 100% to keep things cool. Here are the issues

(all while playing DOW II...a game which this same PC used to play for 5 or 6 hours a day every day)

1) In the middle of a match, after playing about three matches, it just restarts, almost like the power went off for just a split second, and it turns itself right back on (although this did happen earlier today after two matches)

2) Blue screen, saying something about drivers?? I turned the PC back on and WIndows (vista) told me that it had solved the problem...I was missing drivers for a printer I had recently plugged in...BLUE SCREEN FROM MISSING DRIVERS???? For a devise I wasnt even using???

3) Last match, in the middle of the match, almost as if it was going to crash, everything started to lag, and then it froze for a split second, and when it came to (a second later) no sound, NOTHING (although the game kept running), and so I thought it may have been the game, so I closed it and checked the sound through the mobo...NOTHING, not even outputting sound.

I am so puzzled and angry right now, I would love any sort of help,

Thanks,
Josh

***the card has given me problems in the past, if it sounds like a GPU issue to you, what do you suggest as an upgrade for an 8800GTX something in the $200 range and preferably something BestBuy has in stock as I work for them part time to get the disscount! I can get a 4890 for around $170 through them..is that the best way to go, I have always been an nvidia person...

 

[Dual]

Could be that your system memory is going bad. Bad memory problems can often look like driver issues. I take it you have 2x2GB memory. If so you could take out 1 stick
at first. And then after a while swap out with the other stick. I would try this even if memory testing programs passed.

I would be more likely to suspect the GPU if you had artifacting before the crash. It could still be the GPU. Is there any chance that someone you know has an extra GPU that you could borrow for a few days?

Power supply came to mind as well but usually a bad power supply will cause the system to shut down instead of rebooting.

 

[BIGJ]

Could be that your system memory is going bad. Bad memory problems can often look like driver issues. I take it you have 2x2GB memory. If so you could take out 1 stick
at first. And then after a while swap out with the other stick. I would try this even if memory testing programs passed.

I would be more likely to suspect the GPU if you had artifacting before the crash. It could still be the GPU. Is there any chance that someone you know has an extra GPU that you could borrow for a few days?

Power supply came to mind as well but usually a bad power supply will cause the system to shut down instead of rebooting.

Thanks so much for the quick repsonse. all of those things came to mind except the RAM, and I have had trouble with it (aka not recognizing it the right way) since I bought them.

Unfortuantly I do not have an extra GPU, to test, but I will def let you know how the ram goes, thanks again!