Vista Home Premium x64 Freeze Problem

[Fatawan]

My new build is driving me crazy. Specs are down below. The problem is that the machine freezes randomly, anywhere from 10 minutes to hours after reboot. It just locks up, mouse won't move, task manager won't open, nothing. I have to reboot. There are no events in the event viewer that correspond to this freeze-up. Original build used all the drivers off the mobo disk, and 2 HD's in RAID1. I called MS support and the first man took over my machine and did all sorts of things to "improve performance"("Your PC will work PERFECTLY from now on!"). After that it would do nothing but BSOD, even while trying to get into safe mode. I reinstalled onto a single drive. I got every up to date driver I could, Nvidia graphics, Intel ICH10 chipset, JMicron controller, Realtek HD Audio, Realtek NIC, asus monitors. No difference. I pulled out the RAM and did it with 1 stick--no difference. I set the BIOS to 9-9-9-24 and 2T, 1.5V as spec'd. It passes memtest inifinitely. I tried MS Support a second time. He ran some DOS deal (scf? skf? scannow) which found nothing. The Vista Diagnostics supposedly found and fixed issues, but he did not share those issues with me. It froze 40 minutes later. They are calling back tomorrow to see if it worked. I will gladly take any and all suggestions at this point. I have no idea where to turn next!

Thanks

 

[lordbob75]

This seems to be a common problem with Vista. We are not sure of the cause, and everyone is a little different.

I myself had the same problem, and it just fixed itself on its own.

As for the problem, I cannot guess at it right now...

~Lordbob

 

[Fatawan]

This seems to be a common problem with Vista. We are not sure of the cause, and everyone is a little different.

I myself had the same problem, and it just fixed itself on its own.

As for the problem, I cannot guess at it right now...

~Lordbob

Well, I started just turning processes off in Task Manager. It still froze with Defender off. It has now been 4 hours without freezing after turning off HD Audio Control Panel and some Nvidia driver helper(???). I forgot to write the name down before turning it off. . We'll see how things are in the morning.

Editpened IE7 and left it at Google news and it froze within 15 minutes. Now I will try turning off Realtek only and no IE7.

 

[bruce2]

Hi Fatawon, I believe graphic driver 180.48 might have been more stable then the newer ones; try that. Replace the SATA cables with aftermarket ones if you haven't done so. It is a known cause for bad quality SATA cable and cable connecters for random freezing. The ones came with the mobo are usually problematic.

Hope this helps.

Bruce

 

[Fatawan]

Hi Fatawon, I believe graphic driver 180.48 might have been more stable then the newer ones; try that. Replace the SATA cables with aftermarket ones if you haven't done so. It is a known cause for bad quality SATA cable and cable connecters for random freezing. The ones came with the mobo are usually problematic.

Hope this helps.

Bruce

Changed the cables and went to 180.48 and it still froze.

So, I cleared the CMOS(why not?) and restarted. Vista then told me my copy was probably counterfeit(I had already activated it). Online activation didn't work. India phone activation didn't work. I waited a few hours and tried again, and online activation now worked. In the meantime, no freeze for 4 hours now. Lots of windows open, monitors going to sleep/waking, etc. and no freeze. My fingers are crossed. Microsoft support also called again to check on things and asked a million questions. The guy suggested that I disable the video drivers as my next step. If I freeze again, that is what I will do.

 

[lordbob75]

Alright. Good to know it sounds fixed for now. Let us know how it works out.

~Lordbob

 

[Fatawan]

To follow up just in case others are in the same boat.......

It appears the reason that a CMOS clear/optimized defaults move worked is because there is some memory compatibility issue. If I manually enter the correct timings for my G. Skill memory(9-9-9-24, 2T, 1333MHz), the freezing returns right away. Optimized defaults loads up 8-8-8-19, 1T, 1066 MHz and it works fine. So, I have the mobo and memory makers' support working on the issue.

 

[lordbob75]

Alright. Sounds good!

~Lordbob