Diagnose a hardware issue

Cruzz563

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I built a new PC, and something's gone wrong. So it boots, runs windows, etc., but it'll randomly freeze and I have to hold the power button down to the shut it down, it becomes completely non responsive. Hoping someone knows any good diagnostic program I might be able to use, I plan on running memtest86 tonight or tomorrow, other than that I dunno what I can use. If it passes the memtest then I'm back to not knowing what it could be, the only other part it could be would be the motherboard I suppose. Any help is appreciated :)
 
Chances are its the RAM, I use this as it has lots of mem test apps on it. Sometimes just a driver update can fix whatever is wrong with it. Make sure to grab the latest Intel Chipset drivers for your board from Intel.com as well.
 
Have you checked the temperatures?
 
I had something similar, it turned out to be either a board or a CPU issue. Everything else checked out fine.
 
Well I ran memtest86+ for 12 hours, no errors. Guess it isn't the RAM. Z that's what I downloaded last night, :) way ahead of you :D

I guess I'll test the CPU next...there's no way to test the motherboard on here that I can see. Temperatures seems fine Interceptor, board is at 31C, CPU is at 35C at idle, and 63C at load. It's an i7 860 with an aftermarket cooler.
 
Chances are its the RAM, I use this as it has lots of mem test apps on it. Sometimes just a driver update can fix whatever is wrong with it. Make sure to grab the latest Intel Chipset drivers for your board from Intel.com as well.

Do I need to download the Intel drivers if it's an ASUS board? o_O

EDIT: Nvm, found some stuff one ASUS' site...I can't remember if I downloaded these already...gonna do it anyway.

EDIT 2: Yeah I already had the latest ones from ASUS, so yeah...I think I'm just gonna have to buy another mobo <_<
 
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A complete freeze of the PC can be generated by the graphics card, too. There is software to read its temperatures, maybe even the standard driver of the GPU provides that. Check that as well before you go and buy new stuff.
 
Will do, thanks for the tip :)
 
Quick question about the graphics card, it's an XFX 4770, should I download the latest drivers from ATI or XFX? Does it matter?

Nvm, both files are the same D:
 
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Right so the 4770's temp is 46C with 'No Activity'
Seems ok. The card, not the computer as a whole :p
 
Yeah, 46 ?C is fine. Maybe it really is the mainboard. Is there any special action you can take which will trigger the freeze, or is it always random? Is there a period of time after which it happens?
 
I think it's random, because before I thought it would only happen when I would say extract a DVD ISO to the same HDD it was on. But yesterday it happened when I was reading game reviews.
 
Check the condensers (that's what they are called right? the drum looking things) on the board, see if any are blown. Also try UBCD, it has an assload of testing tools, might be able to find something for the board. See if Asus has some testing software, often manufacturers provide diagnostic soft for their stuff. Hmmm... what else? Oh check the ground, a friend of mine had a similar issue and it turned out that his PC wasn't grounded somehow..... Also see if you can change RAM timings in BIOS, or if you have some fail safe settings, sometimes RAM just doesn't like the way it's set up. See if you can test with some other RAM chips, there are strange gremlins sometimes where certain makes just don't like to work together (fuck knows why). Another thing, and this is random and non obvious, check your keyboard and mouse and see if you can use different ones. We had a strange problem with some servers at work where they would just refuse to boot with a certain keyboard. It wasn't an obvious issue like USB vs PS2 or IBM vs Dell, it would just not work with one keyboard but plug an exact same different one and they would work just fine. That's all I can think off at the moment :)
 
Thanks for the suggestions prizrak, will check ASUS' site again see what utilities they have.
 
Check the condensers (that's what they are called right? the drum looking things) on the board, see if any are blown. Also try UBCD, it has an assload of testing tools, might be able to find something for the board. See if Asus has some testing software, often manufacturers provide diagnostic soft for their stuff. Hmmm... what else? Oh check the ground, a friend of mine had a similar issue and it turned out that his PC wasn't grounded somehow..... Also see if you can change RAM timings in BIOS, or if you have some fail safe settings, sometimes RAM just doesn't like the way it's set up. See if you can test with some other RAM chips, there are strange gremlins sometimes where certain makes just don't like to work together (fuck knows why). Another thing, and this is random and non obvious, check your keyboard and mouse and see if you can use different ones. We had a strange problem with some servers at work where they would just refuse to boot with a certain keyboard. It wasn't an obvious issue like USB vs PS2 or IBM vs Dell, it would just not work with one keyboard but plug an exact same different one and they would work just fine. That's all I can think off at the moment :)

Capacitors.... but I can attest to a blown capacitor causing weird intermittent issues.
 
Yeah, you shouldn't rule out the RAM because Memtest doesn't run into an error. I can do the same thing with my laptop, which simply refuses to run with two 1G RAMs I bought. Memtest runs fine with them for eternity, but as soon as I boot into Windows, the computer freezes.

Try running your PC with one piece of RAM only for testing purposes.
 
What hard drive(s) do you have?

I just built an all new computer in January and i have been struggling with the exact same problem. At first I thought it was the ram because it was pretty much guaranteed to freeze immediately upon windows log in unless I had only one stick in (but still froze very often). Memtest was clean, but OCZ had me send in the ram anyway. After the new ram was in it ran much better - I could have both sticks in and it froze much less - but it was still freezing. After many other attempts at fixing it (BIOS flash, reinstalling Windows, etc.) I bought a new mobo, which also improved the stability, but it still freezes. So I can assume I probably had more than one thing causing the instability.

Recently I discovered that the problem is very likely my hard drive, which is a model that has a super high failure rate. There is a firmware fix for this issue but mine does not have that version and therefore I don't need to update it. Regardless, it has started clicking, as well as buzzing when the computer freezes. Whether or not this is causing the stability issues is unknown but I'll find out Thursday when I get my new hdd's I ordered.

So perhaps if you have the same thing I do I might have narrowed it down for you, and a new hdd could be a fix.
 
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I have two WD in the case atm, the C:\ is a 640GB Caviar Black and the other is a 1TB GreenPower drive.

An update tho, I've been using the PC for a few hours today. No freeze. Yesterday, because it was suggested that I check the graphics card temp, I updated the drivers from the ones they released in February. Wondering if it was as simple as that. Here's hoping. Will keep you guys updated. I'll post back here tomorrow if there's no freeze, I'm not shutting it down (if) until then! :)
 
Oh well, it crashed again last night, 'least this time I got BSOD D:
Usually I have to hold the power button down...back to the drawing board.
 
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