SOLVED: Problems playing these games with Unreal-Engine

[JoeSlow]

It's a pity! I love playing this game.

But with games using Unreal-Engine I have trouble.

All of the sudden my computer gets a black screen and reboots.
This may happen at any time and without an obvious reason.
It may be when I start my computer start one of these games and after a minute it may crash.
It may be with excat the same game that I can play several hours without any problem.
It may happen only once a month or three times a day, you'll never know.
It may happen when I'm standing in the game doing nothing but thinking (like today in Level 10).

I have no such problems in a game with another engine.
It happened lately in ReThink, Aporia: Beyond the Valley and in Subnautica.

In Windows event monitor I see, the first time it happened was in July last year. The return code was 41 or 45, Windows wasn't able to record the reason of the crash.

Anyone's a simillar problem?
My computer isn't that old (about 4 years old) and normally is capable to run most of the games:

INTEL Core i7 4790 4x 3.60 GHz 8MB
GIGABYTE GA-Z87X-UD3H Z87 LGA1150
16 GB RAM (2 x 8GB DDR3-1600 Kingston (1x8GB))
3072MB Gainward GTX 780 Phantom (Direct-X 11)
Nvidia driver 390.77
SB Creative Recon3D PCI-e
be quiet! Dark Power Pro 850W

Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit SP1

[Sidian]

Sounds like your PC is overheating. A sudden reboot is often done to protect the hardware from taking damage by the heat. That is of course intended and not a crash, that's why it's not listed as a crash in the event monitor.

Try to remove the dust from all fans and see if that helps.

You may also check the temperature of your CPU and GPU first with programs like HWMonitor - the temperature should never exceed 90°C (or 194° F) - that is already close at the limit. A normal temperature is about 30° C (86° F) when idle and 60° C (140° F) when playing games.

[JoeSlow]

Indeed last week I've cleaned my computer from all the dust it collected over the years. But that didn't change a thing.
And overheating isn't very likely as the rebooting may also happen when the system just started, direct from the cold.
There is absolutly no pattern which could help me locating the problem.

[Sidian]

Still, you should check your GPU's and CPU's temperature. Maybe a fan is damaged and not able to cool the hardware enough.

ReThink uses the Unreal Engine, but Aporia: Beyond the Valley uses the CryEngine and Subnautica was made with Unity, therefore it's not an issue with a specific engine.

[¥aeko]

Dear JoeSlow,

i am sorry to hear that you have these problems with the game.

I did some quick research regarding the other games that you listed, and came to the conclusion that your problems are not caused by UE4 or any of the two ReThink games.

Explanation:
Aporia: Beyond the Valley <- made witch "CryEngine"
Subnautica <- made with "Unity"
ReThink(s) <- made with "Unreal Engine 4"

Therefore it cant be an issue with UE4 or the game itself.

Since you say that dust is not the issue, which i totally believe since an overheating CPU/GPU would only throttle, not shut down the whole pc immediately. (you would notice severe drops in Framerate) <- this does not mean that overheating is impossible, but I would expect different behavior from that. (but you could still post your temperatures here, after playing for a while, just in case.)

It *should* not be a Software-issue either, since that would give you a Bluescreen and a aproper Error report in Windows.

This is why (i personally) expect that some part of your computer nears its "End of Life", but i abviously can not diagnose what is going on through Steams forums.

I am sorry that i only can give you this unsatisfying answer.

Thank you.

[JoeSlow]

OK, thank you all.
So I made the wrong research for the engines used in the games mentioned above.
I googled "subnautica unreal engine" got a result and thought it would be UR4 engine, but now I see you're right. All these games run on different engines.

Yeah, that's for certain not what I wanted to hear and yes, my computer seems to cause these problems.

[Nite69]

Unexpected Reboot means its a faulty or weak power supply, I noticed you have a "be quiet" which doesn't sound like a top quality brand

[JoeSlow]

Yes, the power supply unit may cause these problems.
The brand 'be quiet!' isn't low quality. I had serveral computers equipped with a PSU from 'be quiet'.
I don't know what I should do now. At the moment I can live with these crashes, but I have to be prepared that it will come worse.

Spending 150 Euro for a new PSU and maybe the problem persists?
Then buying a new motherboard? It could be a faulty solder point ...

That could result in burning money without solving the problem

[Nite69]

I have a suggestion I just thought of, is the be quiet multi rail or single rail on the +12 volt? it might be drawing too much load off one of the 12v rails, so try different 6 pin connectors on the GTX 780 and see what that does

I buy single +12 rail PSU's just to avoid that problem

[JoeSlow]

That sounds good.
The GTX 780 has two power connectors and the PSU has unused connectors too. So I can try switching the ports

[JoeSlow]

So now I have splitted up the power supply of the GTX.
I plugged in another power cable to the second port of the PSU , so that the GTX receives power from two different connectors of the PSU.
Now I have to wait until I see if that helped solving the problem

[JoeSlow]

Hmmm, nice try ...
The problem persists. At least I have a situation where I can force the crash:
Level 10 in the very beginning:
At the left is a closed cyan barrier and at the right a pink barrier.
When I run directly after beginning against the closed cyan barrier, everythings alright, no error.
Then ich go downstairs and open the pink barrier solve the puzzle take the device and go directly to the closed cyan barrier, as so as I run against the barrier: black screen and reboot ...

[Nite69]

well I can tell ya this its definately not the game, I am currently to level 27

[JoeSlow]

Yes I'm sure it's my computer and as I said other games crash too ...
I have to make a decision:

• if I try to make a repair
  
• if I wait until my compter crashes completely
  
• if I going to buy a new computer

None of these possibilities makes me happy

[Nite69]

ok I must have got a cursed from this thread, I just now had a black screen crash myself for the first time on this game, didn't reboot my system it only reset the video driver (GTX 1070)

[JoeSlow]

Outch, I'm sorry for my bad vibrations ...
... but if this happens only once, it's OK I guess