Help! Vista Freezing!

[Yaho]

Allright... I got my computer from a website called 4Launch Shop

for 40 euro's, they test the memory, CPU graphic cards with software to see if its ok. After that they just built the computer with what you choose.

So after that I got the computer... I installed vista and it worked fine. Decided to install the Nvidia driver, quickcam driver, Keyboard G15 driver etc. Didnt give me any problems for 3 weeks, but then I decided to overclock... The overclock did not give any problems for a week, but restarting computer did not work properlly.. "windows will shut down" then black screen forever... or before the round vista icon it would just be black screen. Only got this 4-5 times. So on one day I got A BSOD when vista was loading, and I turned off all overclocking. This did not solve the problem in any way. I do not ahve any problems with restarting or starting vista anymore, but now my whole vista freezes and the only thing I can do is restarting my computer.



As far as I know, listening to music gave me the most freezes. (Youtube, windows media player, winamp) Doing nothing gave me much freezes too, I turn on my monitor and see my monitor wont load anymore! (A freeze occured when I was asleep or at school) ... I even got a freeze when playing a game.

Well Fumz, I already reset my whole bios and I do not have problems yet since I did it, but if it happens in 24 hours, I will do your BIOS solution.

My drive does get detected, just after the BIOS icon screen thingy, you see everytime... harddrive not found. But everything works fine and it has always found the driver itself.

System Specs are in my first page?

Graphic card: 9800GTX+ (512MB)

CPU: 2.4ghz Quad Core (Q6600)

Ram: 4x2gb

 

[Fumz]

Just so I get this straight: you want help for a problem with your machine, but can't be bothered to enter in your full system specs into the forum's tool which helps us help you figure it out. Does that about sum it up?

My bios solution? I only asked that you load the optimized defaults to help diagnose the problem; it gives you a stable starting point to work with.

My drive does get detected, just after the BIOS icon screen thingy, you see everytime... harddrive not found. But everything works fine and it has always found the driver itself.

I don't understand what you're trying to say? A few posts ago you said hard drive detection was sometimes a problem, now you say it's always problem, except that it isn't...

Your overclock may have done more damage than you realize? What sort of heatsink and fan do you have, how far did you overclock and what voltage did you use?

These questions and the still unanswered questions from my last post are sort of essential, so I'll come back when you're ready to play along.

 

[NormCameron]

Hi Fumz, thanks for your help. In one of his earlier posts Yaho said-

"The only thing I did in the BIOS, was changing the FSB from the CPU. Doing this I had to put the AI thing on manual so I could've change the FSB ... first I tried 4.2ghz, it did not work. I got a BSOD when vista was loading. So I tried 3.2ghz or 3.6ghz, not sure. I used a program called coretemps to check the temperature. It was around 38 centigrade degress when idle and around 55 centigrade degrees when stressed.

After a week or so I recieved problems. Vista wouldnt restart properly anymore, after the "Vista is now closing" I just got a black screen. And before the round vista icon it froze at the black screen.

After some days I restarted my computer, and I got a BSOD. At that moment I decided to stop overclocking my computer and I turned the AI thing on auto. I saved my settings and it worked fine.

But after a day or 2, my whole system froze. Nothing would froze, it just locks up. The only thing that helps is pressing the reset button."

Thats what set alarm bells ringing for me. I am pretty sure he only changed FSB, but on the Asus board the RAM and PCI are linked and you have to manually unlink them by changing individual settings. He has Kingston 2x2GB DDR2 SDRAM PC5300 CL5.0.
I think he only has basic CPU and case cooling. Not only would he have run into heat problems with CPU and Northbridge, but he would have overclocked his RAM significantly if it was still linked. It was my thought that something got fried?

 

[Fumz]

Hi NormCameron,

I admit to not reading all of the first two pages, so I missed that quote; however, that would have set off the bells for me too. There's really nothing worse than the willy-nilly approach to overclocking... and this is a perfect example of what never to do: "first I tried 4.2ghz".

That's revealing. The "first attempt" was 4.2GHz using a cpu that normally runs in the 3.4-3.6GHz range, probably done with the stock cooler. Yikes... someone call the hardware police! :eek:

He might very well have fried something; however, I don't think we're going to find out by asking simple questions. "So I tried 3.2ghz or 3.6ghz, not sure." Neither willy or nilly is good with questions.

As to what exactly he fried, I don't know. Since he might very well have also corrupted the OS with that first 4GHz attempt, we're sort of... well, he's sort of made matters more complicated. At this point, my suggestion would be to, again, load the optimized defaults, and start from there. If there are problems, then re-install the OS. He should also lock himself out of the bios until he learns how to overclock.

 

[Yaho]

Just so I get this straight: you want help for a problem with your machine, but can't be bothered to enter in your full system specs into the forum's tool which helps us help you figure it out. Does that about sum it up?

My bios solution? I only asked that you load the optimized defaults to help diagnose the problem; it gives you a stable starting point to work with.

My drive does get detected, just after the BIOS icon screen thingy, you see everytime... harddrive not found. But everything works fine and it has always found the driver itself.

I don't understand what you're trying to say? A few posts ago you said hard drive detection was sometimes a problem, now you say it's always problem, except that it isn't...

Your overclock may have done more damage than you realize? What sort of heatsink and fan do you have, how far did you overclock and what voltage did you use?

These questions and the still unanswered questions from my last post are sort of essential, so I'll come back when you're ready to play along.

Please check the first post of the topic, all the specs are in there. :D If you need more, just post what you need exactly.

About the harddrive not found, I am not sure if I said Sometimes, but I will explain what I mean.

After you start your computer, you will see the icon of your motherboard where you can enter the BIOS... after that it will turn into a black screen and in grey letters you will see Harddisk not found! and then it dissapeares. I've had this all since I had the computer and I do not think there is a problem with it.

I do not think the overclock did any damage at all.

*Good news* It has been almost 72 hours since my last freeze.... If I do not freeze before tuesday I think one of the memory holder thingies (those white things to keep the stick on the place) was loose. And the Sata cable was maybe not good in it. Or the bios was simply not correct.





I will optimize the BIOS if I recieve a freeze, as I think the problem is fixed, but time will tell. (I will wait till tuesday)

Hi NormCameron,

I admit to not reading all of the first two pages, so I missed that quote; however, that would have set off the bells for me too. There's really nothing worse than the willy-nilly approach to overclocking... and this is a perfect example of what never to do: "first I tried 4.2ghz".

That's revealing. The "first attempt" was 4.2GHz using a cpu that normally runs in the 3.4-3.6GHz range, probably done with the stock cooler. Yikes... someone call the hardware police! :eek:

He might very well have fried something; however, I don't think we're going to find out by asking simple questions. "So I tried 3.2ghz or 3.6ghz, not sure." Neither willy or nilly is good with questions.

As to what exactly he fried, I don't know. Since he might very well have also corrupted the OS with that first 4GHz attempt, we're sort of... well, he's sort of made matters more complicated. At this point, my suggestion would be to, again, load the optimized defaults, and start from there. If there are problems, then re-install the OS. He should also lock himself out of the bios until he learns how to overclock.

I was told that 4.2 is a normal overclock with Q6600 on another forum, but after starting vista started loading, I got a BSOD, so I changed it into 3.6 (I remember saying +1.2ghz) So it was in 4.2 ghz less than 5minutes?

If you have read my first post, it says another cooler is built in.

About the OS, I already reinstalled it.

Again I will say I will try your solution if I get a freeze before tuesday, as I think the problem is solved.

I will post here on tuesday or earlier when I get a freeze! I appreciate your help, please do not think I do not, because I do appreciate it.

 

[Fumz]

Just so I get this straight: you want help for a problem with your machine, but can't be bothered to enter in your full system specs into the forum's tool which helps us help you figure it out. Does that about sum it up?

Please check the first post of the topic, all the specs are in there. :D If you need more, just post what you need exactly.

Thanks for clearing that up. I told you what I needed; you refused this simple task. If you won't lift a finger, don't expect me to either. I'm not scrolling back to page 1 every time I need to find out information about your hardware; to expect people to do that is... well... I won't say, but I'm sure you can figure it out?

Good luck with your rig.

 

[Yaho]

Just so I get this straight: you want help for a problem with your machine, but can't be bothered to enter in your full system specs into the forum's tool which helps us help you figure it out. Does that about sum it up?

Please check the first post of the topic, all the specs are in there. :D If you need more, just post what you need exactly.

Thanks for clearing that up. I told you what I needed; you refused this simple task. If you won't lift a finger, don't expect me to either. I'm not scrolling back to page 1 every time I need to find out information about your hardware; to expect people to do that is... well... I won't say, but I'm sure you can figure it out?

Good luck with your rig.

Hold ctrl, press page 1 button... Tadaa another page.

But just for you:

Stuff in my computer:

OS: Vista 64bit

Motherboard: Asus P5n-T Deluxe 780i

Graphic card: Asus Nvidia 9800gtx+ (Currently running under GTX driver, cant seem to download the newest GTX+ drivers on the asus site! Freezing occured before updating driver!)

Edit: Already downloaded the latest driver from the nvidia site!

Cooler Processor: Cooler Master Processor cooler RR-CCH-L9U1-GP Hyper TX2 AMD & Intel

Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.40GHz FSB1066

RAM: Kingston 2x2GB DDR2 SDRAM PC5300 CL5.0

Edit: its actually 4x2GB ram, forgot to add that.

The Power thing: (PSU?) OCZ Powersupply GameXStream 850W

Hard drive: Seagate 500GB SATA300 32MB, ST3500320NS

Tower: Thermaltake Big Tower Shark VA7000BWA ATX No PSU

Happy?



Wait... After reading your quote for the 3rd time I noticed you want it in my profile. Sorry I did not read that... will update after I finished watching movie which is in 10 minutes.

Finished updating.

Please know I will have to test my computer first if the fix I tried last is working. If not then I will try your solution.

Hey Fumz, if you are still reading this, please know I did not see you wanted it in my profile... I somehow read over it, so I pretty much said to look at page 1. I'm sorry for that.

 

[Fumz]

Wait... After reading your quote for the 3rd time I noticed you want it in my profile. Sorry I did not read that... will update after I finished watching movie which is in 10 minutes.

Hey Fumz, if you are still reading this, please know I did not see you wanted it in my profile... I somehow read over it, so I pretty much said to look at page 1. I'm sorry for that.

Because that's not the only overlooked statement in this thread I was ready to just give up on this. I'd like to help, but I'll be honest, I get frustrated when guys don't pay attention; patience is not one of my virtues. Perhaps, for both our peace of minds, you could re-read what I've already written... just so we're both on the same page... because I think the other thing you're not getting is what I said about the bios?

Loading the optimized defaults is how your computer should run. The fail safe defaults are slow and not where you want to be. It means nothing to run for a few days with the fail safe defaults... because for the most part, they're fail safe. If there's a problem we need to know about, we're less likely to find it using the fail safe defaults.

 

[Yaho]

I might´ve found the problem... MSN!

Windows Live Messenger to be exact. Havent used it since my last freeze, and everytime I used msn and closed it, it would freeze after 12 hours or more-less.

To make sure its not MSN, I will turn it on now and wait till 8PM my time, which is in 19 hours from now in my time. If nothing will happen, I will use optimized BIOS settings and try if there is still any problems with it.

I must make sure its not msn first, ok?



Why I think its msn:

After I closed MSN, I noticed its still in the task manager "msnmsnr.exe"32", which cannot be good. This might be the error of the freezing.


Unless you are sure it has nothing to do with MSN or that it will not freeze within the fail safe settings, I will change it now.

So... should I test it first or change it now?



Just saw a topic with the same problem:

http://www.vistax64.com/vista-performance-maintenance/153442-vista-freezing.html

 

[NormCameron]

To set default settings on an ASUS P5 mobo go into the BIOS and press F5.

 

[Yaho]

Ok I did that... I couldnt find any button for optimized settings so I used F5.

I guess thats the optimized settings?

I think my monitor got a little darker... not sure though.

 

[Fumz]

Ok I did that... I couldnt find any button for optimized settings so I used F5.

I guess thats the optimized settings?

I think my monitor got a little darker... not sure though.

To set default settings on an ASUS P5 mobo go into the BIOS and press F5.

F5 are the default settings. On the main bios page there 'should' be, either above or below, "load fail safe defaults" a "load optimized defaults" heading.

 

[Yaho]

My computer just froze. I will check out the BIOS right now to see it.

By the way... my monitor seems lighter again...

 

[Fumz]

The thread is long and I've lost my way. Tell me, do you know if you have the nvidia SATA drivers installed? If not, then perhaps it's time you started looking at your hardware, from the bottom up.

Dl this, make a bootable floppy, usb or cd and run it: Memtest86.com - Memory Diagnostic
One pass isn't going to cut it, so plan to do something today while this runs. Ideally, you'd like to pass 8 hours with zero errors. If you're able to do that, then we'll move on... if you can't, you've got a RAM problem... either one or both sticks are bad or your timings and/or voltages are off.

 

[Yaho]

I do not know if any nvidia SATA drivers are installed, I think not.

right click on C:, properties, hardware, properties, driver program (?) .. there it says microsoft, not nvidia.

After checking the BIOS, I could not find the fail safe or optimized settings.

This is the only option I have found:

Load default settings



I will run the memory test when I am going to sleep. (which is in 3 hours) Do you know any program that is easy to install to make a bootable CD?





*** NEVERMIND ABOUT THIS ***

EDIT: I will use nero ISOburn I mean

EDIT2: I selected the .iso with ISOburn and made a CD. I restarted my computer and it did not load from the CD. I guess it cannot make a bootable CD or am I doing something wrong?

Will try out magicISO!


*** NEVERMIND ABOUT THIS ***



Any program you recommend for making a bootable CD and will Sony CD-R 700mb work? And please tell me how as I seem to destroy all my CDs... sigh,.

 

[Fumz]

Is your hard drive an SATA drive or IDE? It's most likely an SATA drive. The reason I'm asking about all this is because there's a known issue with the nVidia SATA driver and it can cause all kinds of havoc on a machine. If you used the CD that came with the motherboard to install your chipset drivers, most likely you've installed a bad driver.

For nVidia chipsets, it's best to not install the nVidia SATA driver and instead use the default Microsoft driver. You can find out what driver you have in your device manager, listed in IDE ATA/ATAPI.

I'm not sure why you can't find the optimized defaults, perhaps someone with your board can come and let us know where ASUS is hiding this option, but every modern high performance board has the ability to load optimized defaults.

For burning software, use ImgBurn: The Official ImgBurn Website

You're probably making coasters because you're not using a burning program that's Vista compatible. Use ImgBurn and you'll be fine. It comes recommended by these forums.

You don't need to use a 700MB cd; memtest will fit on a floppy. If you have a floppy drive you can dl the executable which will create a bootable floppy for you. You can also make a flash drive bootable, but I'm reluctant to go that route because of our bios navigation problems... so, to make a bootable CD, using ImgBurn, read this: Bart's way to create bootable CD-Roms (for Windows/Dos)

 

[Yaho]

Not sure what for drive it is



Checking in device manager, this is what I found:

ATA channel 0
ATA channel 0
ATA channel 1
ATA channel 1
NVIDIA nforce serial ATA controller
NVIDIA nforce serial ATA controller
NVIDIA nforce serial ATA controller
Standaard (In english, standard) Dual Channel PCI IDE controller
Standaard (In english, standard) Dual Channel PCI IDE controller

So I think it has been installed. There is a network nvidia driver too.

ImgBurn, I will try that, thanks.

Do not have a floppy drive, so I have to use a CD.
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[kcm4321]

Recovery Partition

how do i create a recovery partition in windows vista x64 so i dont have to insert the recovery disk to boot into if vista crashes?

 

[Yaho]

Sorry kcm4321, I do not know.

To Fumz, I was looking on the site on how to make a CD bootable, but which one do I need to pick?

"Single boot image (diskemu)" ?

 

[NormCameron]

Hi Fumz, re: Asus "Optimized Defaults", I don't believe there is one on the P5 series boards. Asus claim to provide an "optimized" board.