To expand a little on what mph said, if you did not use the CD that came with the MOBO, then you need to as, like you found out when you went to the device manager, you have no drivers installed, thus the reason your onboard audio chipset didn't work among other things. coastie65

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eMachines T5212.... Intel Pentium D 945 3.4Ghz..... evga 8600 GT 256 Mb PCI-E video card..... Realtec HD audio......2 Gb 533 Mhz DDR2 memory..... Lite on CD RW; DVD +R / RW DL optical drive...... Windows XP MCE 2005....... Antec Basiq 500w PSU......200 Gb PATA HDD

You referenced that this issue occurs mostly when you use a keyboard. Just to cover all bases, do you have access to another keyboard? On a side note, I would strongly advise you to go to the website of the motherboard manufacturer and download the latest CDs for your computer. All of those devices showing the drivers were not installed can ultimately cripple your computer.

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This is my personal Dream PC: http://forums.pcworld.com/blogs/mphenterprises/2007/12/21/my-gift-to-myself

Hey smax, That should help as I think he is missing a bunch of critical MOBO drivers. coastie

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eMachines T5212.... Intel Pentium D 945 3.4Ghz..... evga 8600 GT 256 Mb PCI-E video card..... Realtec HD audio......2 Gb 533 Mhz DDR2 memory..... Lite on CD RW; DVD +R / RW DL optical drive...... Windows XP MCE 2005....... Antec Basiq 500w PSU......200 Gb PATA HDD

Hey, You need to make sure you have an up to date BioS for the board. Also all your drivers need to be downloaded and installed if what you said you found in device manager is any indication. I don't think there any MOBO drivers installed whatsoever. As mph said, it is imperative that these get installed. You'll see that little icon thing sorta on the upper left and something that will tell you to click that to get to the drivers. As for the list on that page, All I saw was Norton and McAfee apps that I don't recommend. Adobe was there and that would be your choice for PDF files. coastie

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eMachines T5212.... Intel Pentium D 945 3.4Ghz..... evga 8600 GT 256 Mb PCI-E video card..... Realtec HD audio......2 Gb 533 Mhz DDR2 memory..... Lite on CD RW; DVD +R / RW DL optical drive...... Windows XP MCE 2005....... Antec Basiq 500w PSU......200 Gb PATA HDD

Hey smax, In the final paragraph of his original post, he mentioned going to the device manager and there was a gang of stuff missing. I followed the link to the first page to see what was there ( Not a whole lot ), but didn't really go beyond that, although I did see a mention of drivers if you followed a certain link. I am assuming you did follow it up. I'm pretty sure there are some controllers missing or at least not installed. coastie

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eMachines T5212.... Intel Pentium D 945 3.4Ghz..... evga 8600 GT 256 Mb PCI-E video card..... Realtec HD audio......2 Gb 533 Mhz DDR2 memory..... Lite on CD RW; DVD +R / RW DL optical drive...... Windows XP MCE 2005....... Antec Basiq 500w PSU......200 Gb PATA HDD

As Coastie, SMax, and I stated, you need to download and install any driver that matches the devices that are not in compliance on the Device Manager section. I am surprised that you are able to really do anything at all based on this current configuration. Once you download the latest drivers, restart your computer (which you may have to do several times based on the installation process of each driver) and check the Device Manager again to confirm if anything else is missing.

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This is my personal Dream PC: http://forums.pcworld.com/blogs/mphenterprises/2007/12/21/my-gift-to-myself

Sounds like a BIOS error call-out to me.

Yeah, installing the motherboard drivers would be a good start, but I'll just chuck in a few other things to muddy the waters....

Another little problem we're getting into as the weather warms up again is overheating. A busy computer running an emulator is going to get a lot warmer inside than an idle one waiting for keypresses in your web browser. As solid state electronics get older, they get ever more sensitive to heat, especially if they've ever overheated before. This is called 'thermal runaway'.

Make sure the heat sinks are clean, all the fans spin, none of the vents are obstructed in any way, your computer has a supply of fresh air and that your new sound card isn't snuggled right up against the video card blocking air circulation.

Another easy test is open the thing up and point a strong fan right into it. If it runs longer or stops failing, you need to look at better cooling.

Another problem with adding hardware is sometimes the PCI slot you stick it in causes conflicts with other devices. Under low load, the conflict rarely comes up, but under high load it happens predictably.