New Comp Problem

[Vinceisg0d]

Hiya. I've been having some problems with my new setup. It isn't eaxctly new, about 6 months. Regardless, here's whats happening.

-It boots up slowly sometimes.
-Computer will crash awhile alt tabbing in/out of games
-Computer will seize and stop responding
-Computer will not start up until you give it some time. It sometimes says 'Your chip did not load fast enough or something'
-Visual will go scrambled, something like the old NES used to do when you started it up and it glitched (I could tell you what it looked like if anyone had SS's to compare to
-When this is happening, after I try to reboot, loud noises come from it
-It will happen 100% of the time if I move the computer from one place to another. Happened 5 times so far. Struggles to start up for an hour, then once it's up and stable it's fine again.

Here are the specs:

amd 4200+ 64bit
2gb ram
radeon x1900xtx
500W OCZ PSU

Any ideas?

 

[StarLancer]

Sounds like an Overheating issue with your video card.
What are you temps?
Is the fan working properly?

 

[Vinceisg0d]

fan seems to be working properly, let me get the temps..got a program I can use offhand?

 

[StarLancer]

Rivatuner or ATI Tool should work.

 

[Vinceisg0d]

Downloaded ATITool

Default (648/774)

50*c voltage regulator
8.2A GPU current draw
27% Fan speed
55*c GPU Temp
45*c temp . chip

GPU temp now up to 66, seems rather high...fan speed also seems rather low.

 

[Job]

When the computer crashes, does it just restart straight away or does it freeze? Eg, if you're playing a game or video etc, does the comp stutter continuously b4 restarting?

 

[Vinceisg0d]

Thats one of the reasons i wasnt sure if it was cooling problem. It doesnt reboot. If it does something, it either:

A) freezes up doesnt reboot, picutre frozen on screen

B) Shuts down. Doesnt reboot, just shuts off.

 

[Job]

IF you're playing sound at the same time, does it stutter?

 

[Vinceisg0d]

Um.. off the top of my head, no. I don't think so. I'm always playing MP3s while playing, so i doubt id forget if it stuttered.

 

[Job]

Ok go through all the hardware you've got setup
1) CPU overclocked?
2) RAM - wot type? Overclocked? Using Dividers?
3) Wot Mobo?
4) CPU temps? (66 for a GPU isnt that high)

 

[Vinceisg0d]

Nothing is OC'd. I'm using I think..

asus A8N-E or something, off the top of my head

28*c on CPU the ram is ocz dual plat or something

 

[Job]

hmm well the freezing and crashing whilst tabbing usually suggests a ram problem and the sudden switch offs could be either CPU overheats or lack of enough power from your PSU - the Abit alarms usually go off due to overheating....but your temps seem to be fine.

If your hardware is ok (and if you're not fiddling around with the BIOS and overclocking, then it should be) you need to trim some of your software. First, I would suggest running a prog called prime95, which submits your CPU and RAM to prolonged stress tests. First run a CPU intensive cycle, then a RAM intensive cycle (min 4 hours each) just to make sure theres nothing wrong.

Then run all the progs you would normally have running and go through the processes list on task manager - make a list of all the progs that are using too much ram or CPU

Set a system restore point

Uninstall all the dead weight

Type "msconfig" (without the quotes) into start\run and deselect all the progs you dont want to load as soon as you boot in to windows

Resart

Go into bois and reset to "optimum defaults" or something similar - usually F8

Get back into Windows and do full virus scans, etc

If this doesn't work it might just be easiest to reinstall windows. Your hardware doesnt appear to be the problem

 

[Vinceisg0d]

thanks for the advice, i will try all of the above and get back to you in a couple of days or hwenever i'm done!

 

[Vinceisg0d]

So, I downloaded prime95, I couldnt find any specific CPU stress tests, but I ran the one under torture test, labeled 'blend' which tests some of everything, and lots of RAM tested.
Here's the results.

Torture Test ran 6 hours, 53 minutes, - 0 errors, 0 warnings...

Where do I find the CPU tesT?

 

[Job]

Use the small FFT test - it will stress your FPU (floating point unit - on the CPU itself) - if there's a problem with your CPU it will likely find it; whether its a fault or a heat issue. Before you run this test, I think it would be a good idea to reset your BIOS settings, just to make sure there's not any screwy settings in there. Have a read of this: http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...&STARTPAGE=1&FTVAR_FORUMVIEWTMP=Linear ....it seems some ppl are having similar problems with restarts etc