PC keeps crashing

[neigau]

The last week we installed 9.1 sp2 on 6 seprate occasions the pc has shut down after 5-10 minutes of inactivity usually before I save .We have had 35-40 C degree days here lately .What I would like to know does mc9 have the ability to crash the pc through inactivity similar to windows desktop with the screensaver, or is this just overheating?

Quite frustrating to loose 3 hrs work all up.Saving more regularly now though.

Neil

[cadist]

Hi even I live in very hot country we have to keep the pc in air condition room and i have noticed that it crashes quite often in summer.

 

Best for you would be switch on autosave option from screen-configure command.

 

Best of luck

[Jack Mitchell]

Neil and Nadeem,

 

First off, Welcome to the forum.

 

35 or 40C is very warm but I question whether there was a problem before the Mastercam install.

 

I can see a problem when doing extensive surfacing and toolpathing at elevated temperatures but I really don’t envision a problem with the computer sitting idle, this might have something to do with a screen saver or perhaps something else.

 

Try a multiple session of Mastercam and run two of the surfacing sample files at the same time and see if you can force an overheat/shutdown to occur while attending the computer.

 

Good luck,

 

Regards, Jack

[Jimmy Wakeford from Barefoot CNC]

Are you guys using an apc? If you are getting power spikes or power "offs" it will drive you nuts.

 

The heat should not bother the pc unless as jack said you are really smokin the cpus.

 

And as always check video settings.

[Bullines]

Nowadays, most motherboards have on-board temperature sensors. Depending on your motherboard, you can see the CPU and ambient temperatures in either the CMOS setup and/or a Windows-based utility (PCProbe for Asus motherboards) to rule out over-heating. An ambient temperature of 70C or higher may be cause for concern.

[Fig sign]

Well ,A lot of things can cause a computer hang-on .

And it can be a lot of trivial things

Let you be more specific

Your computer spec(processor ,memmory ,video cars ,your OS , what are your memory allocations ,do you have autosave turned on ,what is a part ,if you have solids in it ,and so on ).

Also do you inside a LAN ,is it by chance Netware ,do you work from a network drive ,and so on .

Does it happ.!ens by chance with other programs too .

Have you checked your processor temp ,if your graphic card has a fan ,does it in working condition .

I know Mastercam issues but most of them are due to the bad graphic card or drivers .

I work with 9.1 sp2 from the first day as stable as ever

[Mike Mattera - TFM]

There was no mention of the OS. I've seen Win98SE fall asleep and never wake up again. Are you using a screen saver with a sleep mode? You might want to try turning that off also, just to see if it makes a difference.

 

Iskander is right, video is the source of most Mastercam problems. I'm a big fan of Nvidia chip sets. Some quiks of their own, but they rarely lock up. This doesn't really sound like a video problem. But!!! When your running Windows anything can happen.

 

Mike Mattera

[Fig sign]

quote:

---

usually before I save

---

That`s what cautioned me .

Due to card/driver problem I`ve seen this a lot with File->save or file->get sorta OS windows API call for windows box can not be implemented .

And also on Autocad and Intellicad .

There can be ton of other possibilities :

Windows ME the damn PChealth feature.

Windows 98 and swapping file problem .

Norton antivirus corporate edition client problem on windows (any version ).

Novell Netware and win2000 and XP .

And so on .

And I don`t say it is not Mastercam !

I say I have a big doubt that it is Mastercam !

 

Iskander teh hack your own PC .

[P_Scott]

neigau,

 

Most "problems", like pc shutdown while applications are running, are due to hardware issues, not software issues. This is true of Mastercam. It is rare that the software is causing a shutdown unless there are memory allocation issues but mostly then the software is shutdown, not the whole pc. Iskander asked for more details on the computer system you're using. Please supply us with some basic system information like CPU type and speed, video card, amount of RAM and the O/S (Win 9X, 2K, XP or NT). It's likely that one of these pieces of information will spark a light bulb, or "red light" to go off with one of us here and we can help diagnose the situation better. HTH

[CAM Disciple]

Did you have a graphic power eating screen saver?

 

It sounds like a video card hardware problem. Change the screen saver to something simple such as the starfield simulation. Check to see whether you have the screen saver turn to standby mode.

I had seen Win2000 cannot wake up from standby mode even though they are supposed to wake up when you beat the hell out of the keyboard.

[Eazy]

I agree with CAM disciple. I would be checking the energy saving features. On my pc, I can set it to go into standby automatically, but if it is set to turn the power off to the hard drives (which are in a RAID setup) I cant 'wake up' the pc. Hard reset is the only solution.

 

[neigau]

The pc is 3years old P3 550MHZ Windows 98 and is stand alone and runs 1 mill and 1 lathe .The problem seems to happen on new files before the inital save.I spent 8hrs creating surfaces and toolpaths yesterday with no problems.The ambient temp dropped back to under 30 C as well.

NEIL

[Fig sign]

Neil !

 

I worked on PIII with Mastercam on windows 98

and I knew this OS rather good .

May be it is not related but anyway:

 

If you have Geforce card insall detonator driver

from NVIDIA site (for win98 ,naturally ) .

It may help ,may became worse ,but worth to try.

A known problem of win98 is swap file .

It must be 2*Ram size .

Defragment your disk ,if you have more then one disk ,put it on the different from system disk one ,better on second IDE controller master disk .

Make it of permanent size like 256 ram -> 570 MB min and 570 mb max (unselect let windows manage ....)

Also ensure that your system disk has enough free space for all the temp. crap that windows need to make and use .

Chek your allocations in screen->configure .

Use Autosave to different name .

Open your box and check that your graffic card fan is working .

 

Throw through a window your old PC and buy new.

 

Say this to your boss :

Every month you loose more then new computer costs !

 

Iskander teh

[gcode]

If you can't talk the boss into a new box,

at the very least, upgrade the OS to Win2K

[P_Scott]

Neil,

 

Thanks for the info. Mastercam V9's minimum requirements are found here Minimum req's . If you have more than 256Mb of RAM on the system, Win 98 won't recognize it. You'll never be able to utilize the full power of your pc with that O/S. Do as Iskander and Gcode suggest. Upgrade the pc and you'll be more than happy with the results. HTH