About 5 minutes into the game (sometimes more, sometimes less) my pc shuts off completely. It has happened in both the first mission and the training. There are no errors before shutdown, or after booting back up.

I have 5 fans inside my computer, and temperature sensors on my GPU and CPU, so I don't think temperature is an issue. GRAW1 worked great, and so does Oblivion and RS-Vegas.

Specs:
OS: Windows XP Pro - SP2
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4600+ (2.4GHz)
Memory: 2GB
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce 8500 GT (512mb)

Everything checks out when it detects my hardware configuration, and it even sets most of my graphics to high. I have tried setting everything to low, but it still crashes.

My GPU driver is NVIDIA ForceWare 169.21

If someone can help me troubleshoot, that'd be great. I consider myself to have considerable technical knowledge.

Just patched to v1.05 and it didn't help.

what power suppy do you use???? this sounds like too much power wanted/overheating, but I recon to much power wanted

There's almost no way it's overheating. I keep a close eye on the temp, and it never gets above average (60c) before shutting off.

MSI Turbostream 500W - link

I guess low power might be possible, although I would think that I would have had problems with other games by now.

What item do you think isn't getting enough power?

Also, what would you recommend I step up to? I did do some research before buying the PSU, but if I need to upgrade, what kind of specs should I be looking for? The cheaper the better, but I understand that the PSU isn't something you want to skimp on.

humm 500 watts should do afaik?
there are sites where you can calculate your power needs, can't rememberw here at the mo, but google is your friend.
I have a core2 duo 6300 geforce 8800 GTS, x-fi music, and stuff running without trouble on an antec 450 watt power....
I would take the system to a local pc(repair) shop and have them take a look....
have you ever cleaned the inside of your PC, reconnected all cables and memory?
what happens in the memory/cpu usage when gaming (monitor that for a while?)

I tried using one of those wattage calculators online, and although I don't know the specific power needs of every fan and component, I got the idea that the PSU was more than sufficient.

It's a new (<6months) computer, and I built it myself, so I doubt it's dirty. I might take a look inside though, just in case.

I will try running the game and monitoring my cpu and memory. That's the only other thing I can think of. I will try and take another shot at calculating my power needs as well.

Thing that gets me, is this is the only game that does this to me. What kind of power would this game need that other games like COD4 not need?

Cod4 is a lot lighter on your system as it doesn't use the processor and graphics up to the max. in COD4 you'll see that the objects are way less dynamical than in graw, when you shoot a wall you see flat bullet marks appear that aren't 3d polylines, so way less graphic needs.
The engine used for GRAW isn't one of the main stream ones, its an engine developed by GRIN itself, and though it gives alot of eye candy it is using too much PC power to do so.
In GRAW I get 45 frames per second in COD4 100, more than double....
In COD4 joining an online game takes me less than 20 seconds in GRAW it takes up to 5 minutes.....

I didn't actually know that. I've realized that my computer can run COD4 pretty smoothly, and although it looks awesome, GRAW2 isn't nearly as smooth, even with graphics turned down.

I recently tried playing again, while monitoring temperature, and the CPU temperature got really close to 60 cels.

Although it never reached that, the game also didn't shut off. My BIOS isn't set up to shutdown at any temp, but I wonder if it shuts down at or above 60. I will have to try again soon and see if I can get it to heat shut down again.

quote:

Originally posted by BlueFalcon01:
I didn't actually know that. I've realized that my computer can run COD4 pretty smoothly, and although it looks awesome, GRAW2 isn't nearly as smooth, even with graphics turned down.

I recently tried playing again, while monitoring temperature, and the CPU temperature got really close to 60 cels.

Although it never reached that, the game also didn't shut off. My BIOS isn't set up to shutdown at any temp, but I wonder if it shuts down at or above 60. I will have to try again soon and see if I can get it to heat shut down again.

60 degrees is nothing to worry about, I'd worry if it gets above 85 (afaik that is the bottom line for safe temps, but look at nvidia site to be sure, so there has to be something else....)

Did you ever figure out your issue as I'm having EXACTLY the same thing happen, but my CPU temps are much lower. This leads me to suspect that it's a driver issue but WHAT? I'm running it on my own built gaming rig with a AMD Athlon 64X2 (Dual Core)3.0GHz, Radeon HD3870 Card and 2GB of RAM, plenty of power (650Watt PS...)Ubisoft gave me the old "check your drivers" routine and as far as I know, they are the latest.

I've got a custom built system as well. 500Watt PS, AMD Athlon 64 X2 4600 (2.4GHz), GeForce 8500GT (256mb), 2GB RAM. I've checked my drivers, and they're up to date, of course.

If it's any help, my mobo is a "Socket AM2 / nVidia nForce 570 SLI MCP55P Chipset".

Hopefully some other people experiencing this problem can help shine light on a solution.

I should add that the last couple of times I have played the game, I didn't experience the shut down. I first tried while being careful and monitoring my temperature, and then tried again the other day without monitoring, attempting to get things to heat up more (lowered the fan speed, raised the graphics). I will certainly post back if the game crashes again.

Absolutely the only thing I could think of is the 8500 it is a graphic card that is budget..... so don't expect too much from it, though it might give better 3ds marks compared to my old 7600GT there might be less vertex pixel shaders or something else giving trouble in GRAW. You could always try different drivers, some new graphic divers might be worse than older ones
I always keep the last before the newest as backup.