Diagnosing a crash/halt in XP

Mugenmidget

I need some help troubleshooting a problem that I'm having a hard time isolating. Hopefully you can bare with me, as I'm not the best with these kinds of things and the following is pretty vague. Basically, here's the "symptom" as best as I can describe it:

-If Windows XP is booted, operation may proceed normally for a few seconds (if even that) before slowly coming to a halt, freezing up, then shutting itself off completely.
-I have two installs of XP, and this same problem happens on both.
-There is no BSOD, and the option to automatically reboot upon critical error is disabled.

Right now I have UBCD booted on the PC and I'm running diagnostics. I did a single pass of Memtest that did not run into any errors with my two sticks of RAM, I plan on running multiple passes later if I can't find problems elsewhere.

Looking inside the PC itself for hardware problems, I can't seem to eyeball anything that looks damaged (but of course that's no indicator). After Check Disk finishes I'm going to remove components one by one and see if I can get the problem to stop.

Here's the general setup of the PC if it helps:

-An ECS motherboard, possibly the K7VTA3 (I can't locate the manual right now and I haven't had a chance to get a good look at the board itself). The motherboard ID from my memory contains a string similar to "FRYSRELEASE" and it was purchased from Fry's Electronics.
-1.6 Duron GHZ processor.
-XP shows 640 MB of RAM, not sure of the actual configuration, the memory bus is DDR SDRAM.
-2 IDE hard drives, 200 GB and 500 GB. Both XP installs are on the 200 GB hard drive.
-The video card is an older nVidia GeForce, I think some variant of 6200.
-There is an SB Live sound card, CT4780.
-Hauppauge PVR-150.
-SAMSUNG DVD-ROM.

That's all I can remember without looking closer. I'll be able to provide more information if you request it and clarify on anything, I'm just currently writing this while it's in the middle of Check Disk so I can't do much to it/with it.

Here's everything I've attempted so far to try to fix it/diagnose the problem:

-Ran the alternate install of XP to ensure it wasn't a software issue.
-Tried Safe Mode on an XP install, seemed to be okay. I'll try spending more time in there later if need be.
-Used Memtest for a single pass, did not find any issues. Probably need to let it run a few more.
-In the process of using Check Disk.

Here's a two things I'm thinking to try:

-Messing with the hardware configuration, probably starting with the RAM sticks then moving on to all other peripherals.
-Reinstalling XP, even though I haven't been given much reason to believe that it's a bad install.

As you can see, I can definitely use some suggestions on where to go from here. Any general diagnostics practices that you think I need to run through would be helpful, as well as any personal insight you may have gleaned about my problem.

Thank you for any and all help!

exoplasm

Oh god I used to use that same motherboard and CPU for years. I was so god damned happy when I got a Core 2 Duo system. Still, that old beater served me well.

If Windows XP is booted, operation may proceed normally for a few seconds (if even that) before slowly coming to a halt, freezing up, then shutting itself off completely.

This sounds very strange. When it shuts off, do you mean the power shuts off? As in you have to press the power button to boot up again.

This could be overheating CPU, overheating power supply, or just plain bad power supply (it can happen over time). If you can, try another power supply and see if that helps. Also check the CPU temp with speedfan while in Windows.

Mugenmidget

Haha, yeah it's a very old setup but I'd love to bleed it to death some more. It'll be a shame if it ends up being an overheating CPU or something else I can't easily replace.

I can't remember if it reboots or not, I'm pretty sure it just dies and then I have to press the power button again. I might not be remembering that 100% correctly and I'll replicate it later for some solid confirmation.

About the power supply: would it be able to operate in "lighter" operation like UBCD and Safe Mode? I just wonder because these diagnostics have consumed a lot of time and the PC hasn't acted up during any of it. And checking out the CPU temperature sounds like a good idea, thank you for that.

exoplasm

Well the fact that it does the same thing in 2 different XP installs says hardware to me, but if it doesn't do it during intense testing from UBCD/Linux then it's either a specific piece of hardware that the live CDs aren't using much, or both Windows installs are bad. Weird. Could be a dying hard drive at this point.

Mugenmidget

UBCD had something for "hard drive health" and a quick scan for bad sectors that I did before the deep Check Disk going on now. If there was a problem with the HD is there a good chance it would have shown up through that? It's called HD Tune:

http://www.hdtune.com/

I admittedly didn't know exactly what I was looking for but there were explicit "OK" statistics and nothing that caused alarm.

I haven't been given any reason to suspect hard drive failure otherwise (even though it's mostly wishful thinking), but I only know to listen for "clicks" and "screeches" so I'm not sure it's something I'd be able to observe very well.

exoplasm

So how long are you able to use Windows before it shuts off? After booting up and logging in. Any particular applications running when it happens?

Mugenmidget

The time was variable and almost erratic (as in nothing in particular seemed to trigger it), but it appeared to shorten with each time I'd use XP (which sounds like it could be heating related since I was doing it in quick succession).

It has come to a point where nothing needs to start up before it's freezing, it'll hang on something like the Start Menu and then become entirely unresponsive. The only start-up application I can think of would be the kX drivers mixer.

The alternate install of XP seemed to not freeze as fast, but once I had enough things open (maybe showing some indication that it's memory related) it finally went ahead and crashed. I admittedly did not try using with the alternate install after the original one started to shut down almost instantly after start up. I'll need to mess with that some more once the Check Disk is finished so I can give you some better answers.

Barrakketh

Mugenmidget wrote: »

The time was variable and almost erratic (as in nothing in particular seemed to trigger it), but it appeared to shorten with each time I'd use XP (which sounds like it could be heating related since I was doing it in quick succession).

[...]

The alternate install of XP seemed to not freeze as fast, but once I had enough things open (maybe showing some indication that it's memory related) it finally went ahead and crashed.

A faulty power supply can cause problems that look like bad memory or an overheated processor. I'd remove the fan from the heatsink and see if there is any dust caked up in the heatsink or fan that is impeding airflow, check your PSU fan(s) to ensure that they are still working, and if you feel comfortable with it remove your PSU from the case and open it. Take a look at the capacitors and see if it looks like any of them are leaking what appears to be a dark viscous ooze. Take a look at the caps on the motherboard to see if any of those are leaking, too.

Mugenmidget

Hm, I'm still wary but I think the problem may have been resolved.

I removed my GeForce 6200 after I woke up because the screen devolved into a horrible black and white mess overnight. The machine wouldn't boot with it in there so I finally took it out. And lo and behold, it looks like at least 5 capacitors are blown on the board.

I don't know why it would have caused crashes/halts in the way it did, but this seems very much like it was the problem. I'll keep using the PC and see what happens. Thanks for everyone's help so far!