Asus Power-Surge Protection Problems

[Cryptid]

Hi! I'm fairly new to pc gaming and about last summer I had bought my first gaming PC and was really excited about playing a load of games on Steam. The problem is that sometimes when I'm playing a game my computer would kind of restart itself and I am told that Asus Power-Surge Protection had done this to protect my pc.

Now this seems to happen a lot when I'm playing Skyrim with mods and without mods but I don't think it's a matter of me pushing my computer too hard because I can play other games with higher specs without this happening and the surge-protection even happens when I play older games that don't require high specs.

My PC uses an Asus H81M-Plus motherboard as I assume this is what controls the surge protection as this is the only Asus-brand part in it. I am hoping if anyone who has had any experience with this problem or with Asus products could help me?

p.s. If anyone can help me with this please go easy on any PC jargon as I'm new to pc gaming.

Thanks

[rotNdude]

I would disable that in the BIOS.

[Azza ☠]

It's there for added protection to avoid damage...

However, it could be you are running a graphic intensive game that is stressing the PSU? The PSU voltage is dropping but then recovering back up again. That would cause the ASUS anti-surge to kick off a false positive of trying to protect it's components from over voltage damage (as the voltage is actually return back up to normal levels, but it just see the increase).

Do you know what your PSU (Power Supply Unit) is? If it's a real cheap and/or low (shared) wattage, consider getting a Tier 1 or Tier 2 PSU to replace it, those will be much more stable voltage.

PSU Tiers list (2015): http://i.imgur.com/tgrbCnr.jpg
(Note: There's probably a 2016 list updated now, if you care to Google)

Make sure your PSU isn't classed as a Tier 4 (bad) or 5 (worst).

And what is your Graphics Card (as that's probably the highest voltage drainer)?

If your house power supply is dirty or overloaded, I strongly recommend considering a Power Conditioner and/or separate/isolate the power to different plugs. Avoid stacking too many high drain devices on the same plug.

Just consider what is the cause, before opting to disable the feature completely. If you do disable under the BIOS, then have a surge protector on the plug instead, etc.

[rotNdude]

Originally posted by Gazmoz96:

I have considered doing that but I'm not sure about doing that just yet in case it does more bad than good. Thanks for the suggestion though.

That feature has proven to be nothing but a marketing ploy and is not generating anything but a headache for users. The on-board sensors and the voltage thresholds just don't cut it. Disable it and don't worry about it.

[Cryptid]

Originally posted by Azza ☠:

It's there for added protection to avoid damage...

However, it could be you are running a graphic intensive game that is stressing the PSU? The PSU voltage is dropping but then recovering back up again. That would cause the ASUS anti-surge to kick off a false positive of trying to protect it's components from over voltage damage (as the voltage is actually return back up to normal levels, but it just see the increase).

Do you know what your PSU (Power Supply Unit) is? If it's a real cheap and/or low (shared) wattage, consider getting a Tier 1 or Tier 2 PSU to replace it, those will be much more stable voltage.

PSU Tiers list (2015): http://i.imgur.com/tgrbCnr.jpg
(Note: There's probably a 2016 list updated now, if you care to Google)

Make sure your PSU isn't classed as a Tier 4 (bad) or 5 (worst).

And what is your Graphics Card (as that's probably the highest voltage drainer)?

If your house power supply is dirty or overloaded, I strongly recommend considering a Power Conditioner and/or separate/isolate the power to different plugs. Avoid stacking too many high drain devices on the same plug.

Just consider what is the cause, before opting to disable the feature completely. If you do disable under the BIOS, then have a surge protector on the plug instead, etc.

My pc is using currently using an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 graphics card (Graphics card power of 170W and a minimum recommended system power of 500W, sorry if this info is irrelevant) and I am guilty of daisy chaining power leads that ends with surge protector then my pc. I've considered that the daisy chaining may be the cause of the problem but it's not exactly convenient for me to move furniture and my pc around right now.

If anyone can confirm that the daisy chaining is the problem I'll try to fix it ASAP

[Azza ☠]

If it's a single graphics card and you have daisy chained it's power lead, then just avoid overclocking it. The 2nd PCI-e slot will not use much, unless overclocking, in which case it drains more voltage to do so then.

ps: As mentioned before, it might be the cause of a slight drain, then return to normal voltage, however the surge protector confuses that as a voltage spike, causing your issue. If that's the case, you can safely disable the "Asus Power-Surge Protection" as that slight drop in voltage doesn't actually hurt your system. The daisy chain PCI-e cable is fine in most cases, under standard graphic card settings. Ideally it's best if separate cables, but not required.