Help troubleshooting - freezes while booting

[fx_rage]

I need help! I was sitting in front of my computer today and it randomly rebooted. I let it reboot and as it tried to post, all I saw was a black screen. I waited it out but I had to turn it off and try again. This stayed this way until I cleared the CMOS. This allowed me to boot into Windows and everything seemed fine. I checked temps, which were still fine, and tried playing MW3. After about 15 minutes of gameplay, my computer locked up. I was monitoring temps and nothing was about 40 C. I was able to reboot it fine, I reset the 4.4 Ghz OC and ran Intelburn with no issues, I thought I was fine at this point.

I tried using it again this evening and it randomly rebooted again. This time clearing the CMOS did not let me get into windows. I was able to get into the bios and tweak settings, but when it tries to boot into windows, it hangs at the starting windows screen. I tried booting into my other internal hard drive and it still hangs at that point. I tried booting at stock and am still having no luck.

Thoughts? Bad PSU? Bad graphics card? I appreciate any and all help!

 

[sm625]

I tried booting into my other internal hard drive and it still hangs at that point. I tried booting at stock and am still having no luck.

That's some good troubleshooting there. If two completely independent hard drives both get stuck at the same point in the boot process, that tells you a lot. (This is when I start ranting about how windows doesnt give you jack for troubleshooting bootup.) Have you tried booting to safe mode so that it will at least give you a list of drivers it is trying to load? Or maybe it will actually boot into safe mode...

Anyway I would reseat the ram first. 2nd I would remove all ram but one stick. 3rdly I would try a different psu. 4th: a different gpu. (swap 3 and 4 if one is more convenient for you than the other.) 5th: open all ram timings.

Remove any usb, lan, audio, or sata cables (except for your boot device, kb, and mouse)

If none of that works, then you pull the motherboard and try booting with it out in the open. Apply pressure on each of the big chips, starting with the southbridge. Just hold the pressure somewhat constant throughout the boot process. Use one hand on each side of the mobo, unless you can use your thumb on the front and index finger on the back. Do not use any other object than your finger to apply the pressure on the front and the back of the board.

 

[fx_rage]

I tried booting into safe mode with networking and it loaded all the drivers and then got stuck again, same as before. This is really confusing me.

I also removed all the peripherals to no avail.

I'll try the RAM, etc. I'm just really limited right now as my build is extremely tight, two 120 rads in a V351 so I'm not a huge fan of touching things. I'm also in finals which is giving me no time to work on it.

I just have not had any experience with this issue and have no idea what it could be. Just out of curiosity, what am I looking for on the southbridge, and why?