Stability Issues?

[Sarian121]

Recently I've been having a lot of stability issues. The computer would restart for no reason and have lots random crashes for no reason. I thought that this was due to my poor power supply (Allied 400w) and replaced it with a Seasonic 380w and im still having issues with crashing and restarts. My temperatures seem to be fine... running at about 40C CPU and 27C System idle and around 52C CPU and 33C System on load. Can anyone help me out?

System:

AMD Athlon XP 2800+
Abit NF7 mobo
2x Coarsair XMS 512mb PC3200
WD 80gb hdd
Geforce FX5600

 

[Rike]

Random crashes are frequently a memory issue. You should start by pulling one stick at a time and see if you stabilize. Also, you should run Memtest86 and see if you start getting errors.

 

[Sarian121]

Hmmm ill try that.. Some of the errors I see include "Memory cannot be written at location..." which make it blatently obvious. I just dont want to have problems with my memory... i dont want to have to replace it ;(

 

[Rike]

If the memory does end up being bad, it will cost you time and hassle, but not money. I believe that Corsair has a lifetime warranty. Post back with your results.

 

[Sarian121]

Well, i took out my second stick of ram and everything worked great! So i figured it was the second stick of ram. Tonight i thought i would run memtest on it.. and boy was I in for a surprise. In just under 10 minutes of running it, I was well on my way to a million errors. Ranking about 650,000 errors in 9 minutes, i can clearly see there is a problem.. Time to contact Corsair!

Again, thanks for the help!

 

[Rike]

Glad to help. I hope the RMA goes well. I've never heard anyone bad-mouth Corsair's customer service, so you should be fine.

 

[Sarian121]

Well, I sent it in and got back a new stick. I tested it with memtest for a while and no errors! Then I started the computer back up and began doing my business. It wasnt even on for 5 minutes and I was getting random crashes. Restarted and it happened again.

I dont know what to do ... The only thing i can think of is that the motherboard is going bad.

Any suggestions?

EDIT: Just noticed that the chipset fan had stopped running... could this be the problem?

EDIT 2: I took the stick back out and went back to using the single 512mb stick...i started it up and got lots of errors and it crashed again. Lots of good stuff about corrupted files ><

 

[furballi]

Reset BIOS to default and run Memtest86+ for a day using both RAM modules.

 

[Rike]

Originally posted by: furballi
Reset BIOS to default and run Memtest86+ for a day using both RAM modules.

I'd give that a try just to double check, but I'd run Memtest with that RAM on another computer that doesn't have any issues just to be safe.

If you get no issues with the RAM, then it's something else. Could be mobo (overheated chip set might do it). Could be PSU (dirty power = all kinds of grief). Could be a bad mem controller on your A64 (I don't know much about this, but I recall that one batch of A64's had goofy mem controllers that gave some people trouble).

Sorry you've still got probelms. It's always a bummer when your rig wigs out on you.

 

[Sarian121]

Haha, yeah.. stuff happens. Anyway, I ran memtest last night with both sticks in running dual channel with my bios restored to its default settings. This morning, it was at 15hrs and had a total of 1 error. Im pretty sure 1 error isnt going to cause all these problems

I ordered a new chipset fan the other day, and it should be here tommorow. Im going to try putting that on, reformatting the computer (corrupted all the files on one of the crashes >< ) and see if that helps at all.

I was under the impression that the memcontroller was in the chipset? It just seems strange. The fan died.. then my second stick of ram started to go.. and now it only runs fine with a single stick in.Z

BTW, i dont have a A64... its an AMD Athlon 2800+ (yeah, its getting old)

Thanks for all the advice guys.. Its greatly appreciated.

 

[Rike]

Opps! My bad. You're right. For Athlons, the mem controller is part of the chip set; on A64's, it's in the CPU.

 

[furballi]

There should be NO error. Send both back for repair/replacement.

 

[n7]

Try seeing if it could be just be one of the RAM slots.

I had that happen with one of my mobos.

 

[Sarian121]

I tried sticking the RAM in the other slot, but since windows was so corrupted it wouldnt start. Ill have to try that later.

And I know RAM shouldn't have any errors, but I think one error isnt going to hurt much. I don't think its worth the trouble, the $10 shipping and the 2 week wait.