Update - what could be crashing my PC?

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Posted: Tue May 27, 2008 3:36 pm

As some of you know, Ive had PC nightmares recently. First my router lost its mind, then it took me forever to get a MAC code from my now sacked ISP (after they were no help at all, at great expense), then forever for BT to send me a wireless router.

Well, it finally came, when I plugged it in, my motherboard, which had been whining for days about 'DRAM timing ' being 'too tight', passed away. Just to put the icing on the cake, I pulled the P4 out and mullahed a few of the pins putting it back.

Anyway, I'm back up on a new motherboard, and an Intel dual Core processor. It doesnt run 2 core because of my poxy 256Mb SIMM, I've ordered 2 512Mb ones so it will run better.

My issue is that 3 times now, while using Mozilla Firefox, the PC has suddenly reset itself, as if the plug was pulled for a second? Files have been corrupted, Checkdisk takes forever. Sad

Suggestions as to what to check or how to find a log file would be handy.

In case Firefox is the problem, I'm currently using IE, but I'd rather not.

Posted: Tue May 27, 2008 3:42 pm

Maybe your ram is not good isn't qualified for the board? Or could you be overheating? Try running a program called Everest Home Edition, it can give you a lot of information about your system. Curious, but what motherboard & CPU did you get?

Posted: Tue May 27, 2008 3:49 pm

The RAM is rather old, I'm replacing it with DDR400 chips, which I know from the manual are compatible (as well as cheap). Not sure what the old memory is, the guy at arai reckoned it'd be OK, do you think an obsolete SIMM could crash the system?

Board is a Gigabyte GA-81865GME-775-RH, processor is an Intel Pentium Dual Core. Don't tell me its no good, Ive bought and installed it now.

So far, it hasn't crashed while using I.E. eachtime it has been usning graphics & multiple tabs with Firefox, though that may be down to memory - I tried re-installing Firefox, but it has crashed twice since.

*** BANNED *** Joined: 10 Jan 2004 Posts: 3779

Download a version of memtest as an iso image, burn it to a CD, boot from there and let it check your RAM. Takes some time but big errors are usually found rather quickly. Bad chips can cause some really strange effects and I'm speaking from my own experience here.

http://www.memtest86.com/
http://www.memtest.org/

Posted: Tue May 27, 2008 10:41 pm

With a new mobo and cpu, you may wish to check the power supply..

Trophy Videos · Posted: Tue May 27, 2008 11:13 pm

It's definitely hardware issue. No crash of software causes power reset or reboot problems. Check above componets mentioned, and also, is there thermal grease between the cpu chip and the heatsink? there should be, or the cpu will overheat, and shutdown, or burn up.

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 12:03 am

Roy, you can also try this to see what is causing the reboots.

Quote:

1.Right-click My Computer, and then click Properties.

2.Click the Advanced tab.

3.Under Startup and Recovery, click Settings to open the Startup and Recovery dialog box.

4.Clear the Automatically restart check box, and click OK the necessary number of times.

5.Restart your computer for the settings to take effect.

Now when you go to shut down and a fatal error occurs, you'll at least see it and it won't cause an automatic reboot. You still have to sort out what's causing the problem, but that gets us to the next section quite nicely.

Found it at the MS site here

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 1:35 am

^^^ Good advice OD.

@Roycropper When you blue-scream let us know what the errors are.

Also if you have just Frankenstein'd your kit you might need to run the windows repair option off an XP disk. If you do this let me know as there are some DLL's that you will need to re-register in order to do updates. The process is very simple and I wrote a batch file called MsSucks.bat that runs the process automatically.

I'd recommend;

http://www.sisoftware.net/ Sisoft Sandra

http://www.yamicsoft.com/ for the winxp configure tool.

In general you might want to uninstall and then reinstall FF and other programs that are causing problems too.

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 9:21 am

Ooh, lots to go at there, cheers lads. Thumbs up

The article from the MS site looks promising.

Thermal grease, eh? The Pentium installation leaflet suggested it, but they don't give you any these days. I just bought a tube on eBay for 99p, so I will use it when it arrives, along with the memory. Last Pentium I got they gave you some free, but I dunno what happened to the leftovers. having ballsed up one processor removing and replacing it, I'll have to be careful taking the fan off again.

I did reinstall Firefox, but it's gone tits up since. When I' finished with work today I may try and break it by downloading large files, that's what I've been doing each time it's reset, which made me suspect the memory.

I'll try tweaking it so it doesn't reset when it kerplunks.

Can't get on with Internet explorer, apart from the security issues, clicking on a link just gives me a blank window. Rolling Eyes

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 9:53 am

^^ You never want to run a modern CPU w/o some sort of thermal paste/grease/pad. I've always used a brand called Arctic Silver 5. It's a bit pricier than generic stuff that comes with a CPU but I've found it works well for lowering your temps.

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 11:09 am

Grease is on its way, the Pentium has a fan that snapped into the board. having buggered on CPU I'll have to be very carefull taking the fan off again. I'd rather not, but I dont want to fry the CPU, do I?

That article Oxygen Depraved (don't blame me, it was my Firefox spell checker Smile

)found had this telling part...

Quote:

In the case of automatic reboots, even when you've selected a shutdown, a search of the Microsoft Knowledge Base turns up Windows XP Restarts When You Try to Shut Down Your Computer, which points to a known problem with Roxio's Easy CD Creator 5.0 and Windows XP

Shoot, I'm running an updated version of that, updated from win95 or so. I have some archive files that need it to open, but it loads on every bootup, and I don't know how to stop it. sod it, I'll uninstall, and worry about the archive files when I need them.

Update:
I removed Roxio, rebooted, and went back to the site that I was on for 3 of the resets. No problem for a while, then blackness. XP doesnt get a chance, its like the plug was pulled. I'll avoid that site like the plague till I get the SIMMS and grease, then we'll see what hapens.

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 1:00 pm

If you don't want a program to run at startup, go to
START -> RUN -> then type MSCONFIG
Go to the startup tab (last one) and uncheck the box of any program that you do not want to run at startup. You'd be surprised how many programs want to start on boot. Shocked

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 6:25 pm

AFAIK, socket 775 motherboards use DDR-II, not DDR.
And is phisically impossible to insert a DDR module in a DDR-II slot, unless...
Laughing

u are very strong or using a large hammer.

:edit: Confused

oops, sorry, hadn't realized your motherboard uses DDR DIMMS
Probably your tiny memory size might be the culprit.

Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 7:02 pm

^^ I thought the same thing until I researched the board. I have a socket 775 too and as a recent Intel convert didn't realize some still use DDR ram. I don't think the size of his ram matters, or it would just be slow and start using the page file.

Sadly, just because ram is pc3200 doesn't always mean it will work on all motherboards. For some reason not all seem to be made to the JADEC spec for ram I guess. The Gigabyte site lists his motherboard here and the compatible memory here . Is your ram on the list Roy?

Posted: Thu May 29, 2008 9:59 am

My memory is generic Aria stuff, 2 offLINK

DDR400 so it should be OK.

Thanks for the link to my board's page, I bookmarked it for future reference. I doubt very much my tiny dinosaur RAM is meant to be there at all. The main reason I chose it was because it had the IDE sockets, as my old hard drive was essential.

No more rests to date, I am avoiding using Firefox with memory hungry graphics and multiple tabs until this is resolved.

EDIT: The postie turned up with my heatsink grease and the chips, which are Rendition DDR PC3200 ones. PUt the chips in, on POST it said it is now running in dual channel mode. OK, I'm off to try and crash it again. The grease will have to wait till I have time to take the board out, to release the CPU fan.

UPDATE: Much faster, I can still crash it though with multiple Firefox windows. I thknk there is a beta version of FF3.0, maybe I should give that a go.

Posted: Fri May 30, 2008 5:44 pm

well, Ive tried evrything else and it still crashes without warning. Always while running Firefox, though I am still unsure it is the culprit. Today it was on crash.net, hardly a demanding site for it to run.

I fished out the mummy board, took the fan off and applied the grease which came in a tiny syringe, ala My Little Junkie.

Is there a program which will let me monitor the cpu temperature? Anyway it must be running cooler, we'll see what happens.

Trophy Videos · Posted: Fri May 30, 2008 6:21 pm

http://www.passmark.com/products/temperature.htm

Here's a few to check out. Maybe one is compatible with your motherboard.

Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 2:41 pm

Grolloc and Guggery - 'Mr Wembley, it happened again'

This time using IE, so its not Firefox, new SIMMs so its not the memory, paste and fan in place so its not the temperature.

WTF? starting to wonder about the power supply, never was a problem before, maybe there are greater demands on it, or its just old. Bit odd that it was OK until I changed everything though.

Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 5:02 pm

To monitor temps, I use Everest Home Edition and/or Core Temp.

About the power supply, are you putting more stress on it with the new components? What are it's specs (brand, total wattage, rail specs, ...)?

Also, try running a linux live cd (like Ubuntu) and try using Firefox and see if it still does it.

Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 9:44 pm

Roycropper wrote:

paste and fan in place so its not the temperature.

WTF?

What if a person were to run their car with no coolant. Every time they take it on the highway the engine seizes. They continue. The postman comes with some coolant, they put it in and the engine still craps out but the person figures it was not a coolant problem. Your may or may not have dodged a bullet there Roycropper.
If the dV/dt is too low or for some hardware issue suffering in the PS, one of the messages would be excessively tight timing. The beauty of the sick PS in your case is that the total power that has to be dissipated in the form of heat is reduced as its basically the area under the voltage waveform. When the voltage takes too long to rise, the power is reduced. With insufficient headroom, any additional power demand will trigger a reboot.

Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 11:43 pm

I'd check the power supply.. Rolling Eyes

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

Here is another tool for you to help diagnose the problem. Speedfan has been around for several years and is clean of any nasty stuff. It will monitor temperatures as well as voltages on your motherboard. The price (free) is also right. The readings are "real time" so you can watch the voltages as you add load to your computer so you see if the power supply is keeping up with system load.

http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 11:06 am

Thanks for that PF, I have it running though I don't know what is good or bad yet. Core(s) and Hd running at around 37 degs.

Not sure what I can check with the PSU, voltage must be OK or it wouldn't run, maybe it shuts down when pushed too far, I don't know. Another thing to replace & see if it makes a difference.

Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 2:47 pm

37°C is a nice temp, no problems with that.

The Everest Home Edition I talked about will list the voltages on it for your power supply. You can see how close they are to what they are supposed to be (12v, 5v, ...).

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

Here is what my (I hope to think) well adjusted system is running. It may not be apples to apples, but hopefully it can provide a baseline for your diagnostics.

Edit: At no load.

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