So I'm playing through Far Cry again, this time with all the eye candy turned way up. This is all thanks to the wonder that is the GeForce 6800 GT. It's absolutely fan-freaking-tastic. But I digress...

I had just arrived at Rebellion, quite possibly the biggest map in the game. After clearing the first area of the map, I begin the long journey to the other side. As I round a bend in the road, the screen goes corrupt (in an incredibly wicked way) and my system hangs. Performing the three finger salute did absolutely nothing, so I was forced to perform a hard reset. So now I'm booting up my machine, everything is fine, and BAM - as soon as I reach the Windows desktop, I have the same problem. Complete and utter destruction of my screen. Again, keyboard control is highly unresponsive.

At this point I power down the machine and open up the case. Could the graphics card be getting too hot? I am pushing it rather hard. After waiting a few seconds, I power up again and all is well. I didn't try loading up Far Cry again, but I plan to give it another go tonight. Has anyone ever seen this issue? I updated my chipset drivers last night (after the crash), and I also patched Far Cry (I was running 1.3, and am now at 1.33), thinking that might help in some way. Hopefully this problem isn't an ominous omen of some sort. I certainly don't want to replace this awesome piece of hardware.