Computer Freezing

[dc9mm3]

I have Win 7 64 bit PC getting kind of old. I built it a while ago then upgraded about 2 years ago. First gen quad core Q6600 8 gig ram. C drive is Intel SSD 160 gig plus I have another SSD 80 gig and 3 mechanical drives, 500 gig 640 gig and 2 terabyte drive. About 2 years ago I upgraded mother board to a Asus board to take advantage of the SSD drive.

Now I dont do much heavy use so I was hoping to wait until Intel had 8 core cpu's out at reasonable price. But Iam getting freeze ups and sometime Blue Screen of death with no real info. I looked at event monitor part of windows which only shows it had an improper shutdown which is what I have to do when it freezes up, i have to hold power button down till it shuts of and then reboot. It doesn't show anything else as why its freezing up. I tried unplugging all usb devices except keyboard and mouse. Still happens. Today it started giving me blue screens and when trying to reboot went right to blue screen. I though OH good now I can figure out whats causing it. I unplug all hard drives except C drive which is a SSD type. Boots right up. So I start with each drive and plug them in one at a time and reboot. Boots up fine with each drive. So now its back to normal.

So is there another program I could use to figure out whats causing the freeze ups or blue screen lock ups? I know its time for a complete rebuild but if I can just figure out whats causing this I will be able to wait until 8 core cpu's are out.

Oh other parts that are fairly new are the video card and the power supply a big 750 watt one. When I get home I could give out the exact model numbers like which Asus mother board and which Video card. But dont have that info with me now . Oh its in a big tower case heat is not an issue.

Oh one other quick question, if I do end up rebuilding entire system and use the video built into these new CPU's and use a motherboard which has both a DVI and VGA ports can I run dual monitors like iam doing now with a video card?

 

[Burpo]

Doubt you need to rebuild entire system.. What brand power supply?

 

[dc9mm3]

Its a 650 watt not 750 but its an OCZ power supply. Pretty sure its a very good one. The locks up are random with no particular program involved. Sometimes just net surfing like coming to this forum. It hasn't happened when using the full power of my cpu while editing video. I have my mechanical hard drives set to go to sleep after 10 minutes of no use and it has locked up after the mechanical drives went to sleep which means the system is using even less power. Plus my under standing is that when first booting it draws the most power. The only reason I replaced my old Power supply an Antec was it was only a 475 true watt one which when I added another hard drive back about a year ago I thought I would need more than the 475 watt could handle. I still have the old power supply. I could try putting that one back in if the power supply is a possible problem?

Iam hoping there is some program I can get or is already built into windows that could clue me into whats causing the lockups. I have all my usb devices unplugged for about a week now which didn't seem to make a difference. I was hoping one of those were the problem. I might try switching out my usb keyboard and mouse with other ones I have to see if that makes any difference. Maybe its just the motherboard. I hope not as its an old socket 775 doubt I could find one of those any more that's any good.

 

[C1]

Somewhere on these forums the name of a program capable of analyzing freezes is provided. Hopefully someone will recall the name & chime in to help. You also might try a search on key words. Also here are some possibilities:

http://www.resplendence.com/whocrashed

http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/blue_screen_view.html
http://www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-7-stop-errors-or-blue-screens-guide

Inspect the MB for leaking capacitors.

If that looks okay then Id use a test disk to run outside the OS to try to eliminate hardware (eg, run old DOS or a SeaTools from a start up disk or just let the BIOS screen run).

 

[ArisVer]

I think the program you are looking for is whocrashed (link below). Never used it myself. You could try your old power supply. OCZ does not have a good reputation on their SSDs, don't know about their PSUs.

http://www.resplendence.com/whocrashed

 

[Burpo]

From a post about OCZ 650 Watt
"and the error came back....so this problem can be reproduced....caused by 4 fans at high speed (excessive draw). So is this a bad power supply? An inadequate power supply? Or have I done something wrong?"

 

[dc9mm3]

I tried the program whocrashed. it seems to be saying a fatal hardware issue but no idea on what hardware from what I can tell.

On Thu 8/28/2014 3:59:32 PM GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\082814-10639-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: hal.dll (hal+0x12A3B)
Bugcheck code: 0x124 (0x0, 0xFFFFFA80073E1028, 0xB2000040, 0x800)
Error: WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR
file path: C:\Windows\system32\hal.dll
product: Microsoft® Windows® Operating System
company: Microsoft Corporation
description: Hardware Abstraction Layer DLL
Bug check description: This bug check indicates that a fatal hardware error has occurred. This bug check uses the error data that is provided by the Windows Hardware Error Architecture (WHEA).
This is likely to be caused by a hardware problem problem. This problem might be caused by a thermal issue.
The crash took place in a standard Microsoft module. Your system configuration may be incorrect. Possibly this problem is caused by another driver on your system that cannot be identified at this time.


then
On Thu 8/28/2014 3:54:30 PM GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\082814-12542-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: hal.dll (hal+0x12A3B)
Bugcheck code: 0x124 (0x0, 0xFFFFFA80073B9028, 0xB2000040, 0x800)
Error: WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR
file path: C:\Windows\system32\hal.dll
product: Microsoft® Windows® Operating System
company: Microsoft Corporation
description: Hardware Abstraction Layer DLL
Bug check description: This bug check indicates that a fatal hardware error has occurred. This bug check uses the error data that is provided by the Windows Hardware Error Architecture (WHEA).
This is likely to be caused by a hardware problem problem. This problem might be caused by a thermal issue.
The crash took place in a standard Microsoft module. Your system configuration may be incorrect. Possibly this problem is caused by another driver on your system that cannot be identified at this time.

and then this


On Thu 8/28/2014 3:50:01 PM GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\082814-14554-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: hal.dll (hal+0x12A3B)
Bugcheck code: 0x124 (0x0, 0xFFFFFA80073C7028, 0xB2000040, 0x800)
Error: WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR
file path: C:\Windows\system32\hal.dll
product: Microsoft® Windows® Operating System
company: Microsoft Corporation
description: Hardware Abstraction Layer DLL
Bug check description: This bug check indicates that a fatal hardware error has occurred. This bug check uses the error data that is provided by the Windows Hardware Error Architecture (WHEA).
This is likely to be caused by a hardware problem problem. This problem might be caused by a thermal issue.
The crash took place in a standard Microsoft module. Your system configuration may be incorrect. Possibly this problem is caused by another driver on your system that cannot be identified at this time.

 

[Burpo]

Most likely the system disc (hard drive with Windows) is failing, or at the very least has corrupt files..

 

[dc9mm3]

Most likely the system disc (hard drive with Windows) is failing, or at the very least has corrupt files..

The C drive is the newest SSD Intel drive but I will run Intel SSD toolbox and see if it sees anything wrong with the C drive which is were windows is on.

I did install speedfan and the temps seem ok except the video card a ATI radeon HD not sure which model # is at 78C but I looked up online and temps for Radeon cards seem to run in that range up too the 90C range. I ran HD video to watch temp never got much higher than 78C. I have the case open now and the video card doesn't seem too hot. I might try putting old video card back in an older Geforce card that I had. I upgraded that card to the current radeon card for smoother play of a Radio Controlled Flight Sim called Real Flight for traning to fly Radio controlled plane/helos.

 

[groovieknave]

blue screens and lockups are almost always memory or hard drive... if it isn't that then it's corrupt software, or it's conflicts with something connected to your computer. It's usually quite simple and it will be the hdd or memory. There's a million programs to test memory and hard drives, just google it.

 

[denis280]

this point to hardware problem.could be hdd or psu. Make sure your CPU is running at Stock speed and check your RAM Timings and Volts etc. While your in there check your temps!!

Another thing you could do is download Speccy and have a look at your temps etc while your in windows.

 

[dc9mm3]

this point to hardware problem.could be hdd or psu. Make sure your CPU is running at Stock speed and check your RAM Timings and Volts etc. While your in there check your temps!!

Another thing you could do is download Speccy and have a look at your temps etc while your in windows.

Well I ran the western Digital Data lifeguard program it it says all mechanical drives seem to be fine. I also ran the Intel SSD toolbox full test on the 2 SSD drives both show good.

I have speedfan now installed all temps look good except the video Card a Radeon at 79C but what I found out about the Vid card as anything up to 90C is ok.

All voltages and clock speeds are at normal settings, I don't overclock at all. I used to do that with my old PC's when I was a gamer but not for quite a while now. Never on this PC.

Its possible its a hard drive failing. I might just have to wait till it fails completely to figure out which one. I might just get two new 2 terabytes drives and replace the older drives the 500 and 640 gig ones. My luck it would be my current 2 terabyte mechanical drive.

Iam still leaning toward the motherboard which if its the case then I will just redo the entire system, not worth trying to find a decent socket 775 motherboard.

Of course since I stared this thread the PC has been running fine.

 

[C1]

Of course since I stared this thread the PC has been running fine.

That's actually possible. Particularly with aging equipment, simply re-seating components solves a problem by curing an intermittent arising from contact oxidation.

This actually just happened to me the other day. Had a devil of a time getting an old IDE HDD that I use for back up to work. It kept clicking, suggestive that the drive went bad.

Sprayed the connectors out with DEOXIT and plugged things back in place (cocking the IDE HDD connector slightly) and that did the trick ! Was able to complete the back up operation and verify that the resulting image was without error.

 

[dc9mm3]

I did unplug all the mechanical drives and also removed the video card to look it over. So maybe that had an effect. If I keeps working ok I will just leave it. Like I said I would really rather wait until sometime in 2015 when hopefully 8 core Intel cpu's are out before any major rebuild.

 

[Burpo]

8 cores are out..
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-19117404-L02A

 

[dc9mm3]

8 cores are out..
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-19117404-L02A

Oh I didn't realize. Now I just have to wait until there reasonably priced. 1 grand is crazy but its always like that for the latest greatest. Hopefully around Feb or March 2015 I can get one in the 300 to 400 hundred range.