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[gamewizardinnc]

 Okay, so I recently built two computers, one for me and one for my brother. They are identical in everything except for the case. Mine runs everything just fine. However, games on my brother's computer randomly crash to desktop inexplicably, and by games I mean everything it tries to run. The crash usually happens around an hour of playtime, for something like TF2, to 5 minutes, for Next Car Game. Sometimes they have an error message, but most of the time they don't. I have updated and reinstalled all the drivers on it, and have had a professional look at the hardware. He said the hardware checks out. I am at my wit's end here.

I will post the exact specs in one week, as I do not have access to his computer right now, but can you guys please spitball any ideas until I scrounge them up?

[crazysheep]

They are identical in everything except for the case.

Maybe the case is the problem.. overheating components, perhaps?

[Blargityblarg]

Also make sure every component, cable, etc. is securely seated in its port/housing, just in case.

[Steeled]

Have you checked to see if your computer is plugged in? Have you wiggled all the dongles?

[Jelle]

Only after an hour of an intensive application? Sounds like an overheating problem to me. Maybe it's the case? Or it could be a poorly/wrongly connected power cable?

[gamewizardinnc]

I'm thinking it may be the psu, the wires are a little short.

[Bouchart]

Will the computer crash if you just turn it on and just leave it at the desktop without any games or major programs running?  That might also indicate overheating.

Also, have you run a virus scan lately?  It could be a software issue.  Though the parts are the same, chances are you and your brother browse different websites and download different things.

[BoboJack]

Maybe your RAM is broken? You can just download some software to test that.

[David Holmes]

If they really are identical, you can also try swapping parts from your computer into his.  Run both systems with video cards swapped, then with RAM swapped, then with power supplies swapped, etc.

Run Memtest86+ (all tests) to check the memory and memory access.  It may turn up problems with the memory, or with the memory-related components on the motherboard.  I once had a motherboard where a particular DIMM slot caused corruptions, no matter what RAM was in it.

Check windows system event logs (run "Event Viewer") at the time of the crashes.

[miauw62]

Doesn't sound like overheating, overheating generally just causes your computer to shut down instantly to prevent damage, not kill processes.