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Freezing and blue-screening, but what's causing it?

FlayFlay Registered User regular
My computer has been having issues for a while, and several times after I thought I'd 'fixed' the issue, the crashes return only little while later. I've made a few threads about these issues in the past, but the problem persists. Time to knuckle down and find the root of this problem.

The problem: My computer is intermittedly freezing or getting the blue screen of death. These crashes have been getting progressively more frequent, to the point where it's difficult to get my computer to run at all.

What I've done about it: For a while I believed it was an overheating problem. Every time the crashes would get too frequent I would remove my heatsink, apply some new thermal compound and then reattach it. This would clear up the crashes for a short while, but they'd return a little while after. At this point I don't think that overheating is the issue (or at least, not the main one). I checked this morning in the brief window my computer was working, and at startup, the CPU was idling at 37 degrees.

The next thing I did was to run memtest86 to see whether or not faulty RAM might be causing the problem. The results were as follows:

SLOT 1: RAM 1 got 1 error in 1 test, RAM 2 got 0 errors in 1 test
SLOT 2: RAM 1 got 1 error in 1 test, RAM 2 got 0 errors in 1 test
SLOT 3: RAM 1 got 0 errors in 1 test, RAM 2 got 0 errors in 1 test
SLOT 4: RAM 1 got 1 error in 1 test, RAM 2 got 0 errors in 1 test

I then ran a test with RAM 1 in SLOT 3 and RAM 2 in SLOT 1, and got 4 errors across 2 tests. As a result, I removed RAM 1 from the computer hoping that would fix the problem. However, when I started my computer this morning, the crashes were as bad as ever.

I haven't been able to identify what model my power supply is. It's either a AeroCool E85-550, or an E85-700, but I can't tell which.

I don't think that the graphics card is the source of the problem. It's a MSI N560GTX-TI, which is quite new (as are the motherboard and the CPU, although those are a bit older than the GPU).

I'm not particularly experience with the inner workings of my computer, much of what I've said here has been discovered by following the advice of friends. Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated, so I can stop these crashes once and for all.

Flay on

Posts

  • urahonkyurahonky Registered User regular
    What version of Windows? It could be a driver issue. I sat here and thought of all the possible reasons to get a BSOD, and you've checked most of them. Have you tried JUST having RAM 2 in and running Memtest86?

  • FlayFlay Registered User regular
    edited August 2011
    I'm running Windows 7 64 bit, with all the drivers up-to-date. I've tried testing RAM 2 on its own, and it passed without any errors in all four slots.

    I'm beginning to suspect that the power supply seems a likely culprit. It's not so old that it should have degraded by now, BUT I think it might be being damaged by my monitor. My monitor is a piece of crap, and has a faulty power socket. Any power cable that's attached to it is extremely loose, causing the monitor to flicker between brightnesses often, and sometimes completely lose power. When it does lose power, you can often hear crackling electricity.

    It's a problem I've been meaning to fix, but haven't gotten around to. Up until now I've only considered it an inconvinience, but is it possible that it might be overloading the power supply?

    Flay on
  • FlayFlay Registered User regular
    edited August 2011
    I've just used the jumpers on the motherboard to reset the clock/CMOS. I won't know if that's fixed the problem for a while, however. The crashes only seem to occur with any frequency the first time I turn on the computer in the morning.

    By the way, here are my system specs, if that's any help:

    CPU – AMD Phenom II X4 965
    GPU – MSI N560GTX-Ti TwinFrozr
    Motherboard – ASUS M4A88TD-M
    RAM – 4GB Kingston DDR3 (well 2GB now that I've removed the potentially faulty stick)
    OS – Windows 7 64-bit

    EDIT: It looks like I'm not the only one having issues with this particular motherboard.

    EDITx2: I used a program called 'Blue Screen View' to recover some information about previous blue-screens. I can't tell which information is useful, so here's a screenshot.

    Flay on
  • urahonkyurahonky Registered User regular
    Well IRQL_NOT_LESS... blah blah... is a software/driver issue. Here are some links:

    http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc957609.aspx

    http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-system/irqlnotlessorequal-windows-7/e37150e0-1937-490a-be24-fa22c230b20a

    Try booting in Safe Mode and then seeing if you still get the blue screen?

  • FlayFlay Registered User regular
    edited August 2011
    Good news, resetting the CMOS seems to have cleared up the problem, mostly! I'm also going to try updating the BIOS, just to be sure.

    EDIT: Flashed the bios without destroying my motherboard, hopefully that'll fix things.

    Flay on
  • urahonkyurahonky Registered User regular
    Flay wrote:
    Good news, resetting the CMOS seems to have cleared up the problem, mostly! I'm also going to try updating the BIOS, just to be sure.

    EDIT: Flashed the bios without destroying my motherboard, hopefully that'll fix things.

    Wow, who'd have thought that would work! *makes a note for future things to check in regards to a BSOD.*

  • FlayFlay Registered User regular
    Ugh... I really thought it was fixed for a second there. Nope, it's as bad as ever.

  • FlayFlay Registered User regular
    I just installed my new motherboard, and what does my computer do first thing after booting up? It blue-screens again.

    At this point I am getting really pissed off. :evil:

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