Vista Ultimate Keeps Freezing - Help!

[Power Junkie]

I could swap the cable I'm using for the 720 for the one on the H2C.
If the 720 starts to crap out, then I guess it's solved.

The 720 isn't using HDMI but VGA so I'll go give that a go.
Hopefully if it's the cable, it'll show up as a problem sooner than later.

 

[richc46]

I think that is the best bet, for now, give it a try and let me know either way.

 

[Power Junkie]

Swapped the cables over...it still froze.

I'm completely out of ideas.
Perhaps swap over GFX cards?

One's a Zotac GTX 285 and the other's a GTX 8800.

Surely there's something else?

 

[richc46]

There is definately something else, and it will be the last thing that we think of before the computer is fixed. I will research and post as I find different possiblities.

 

[richc46]

Turn off your anti virus. That is often a cause of problems, for a short time as a test.

Go to the website of your Hard Drive Mfg. and take the test to be sure that it is not the problem.

 

[richc46]

Troubleshooting Computer Freeze (Lockup) Problems

Here is a good list, many items we did not discuss.

 

[Power Junkie]

Anti-virus = Vista crashed before I could even install it.

Hard drive = I swapped over the old 750gb for a fresh 250gb - still crashed.


The one thing I'm avoiding is removing the ram and reseating it.
It's definitely hardware but the inside of a 720 H2C is a cable nightmare.

 

[richc46]

Im back

At the next freeze type, event viewer, in search. Check for errors at the time of the freeze, do that several times and tell me what you find.

 

[wheelsmith]

hi, chaps new here. but have you thoughtly checked out the psu for correct voltage (under load) and the m/b for any bad caps?. another thought is have you tried running the memory at a lower clock speed and voltage as that dell m/b has a known bug on supplying a reliable voltage on mem at 2.1-2.2v

 

[richc46]

hi, chaps new here. but have you thoughtly checked out the psu for correct voltage (under load) and the m/b for any bad caps?. another thought is have you tried running the memory at a lower clock speed and voltage as that dell m/b has a known bug on supplying a reliable voltage on mem at 2.1-2.2v

Welcome your input is very much appreciated, any help is welcome. It was my opinion that it would not be the capcitors since the problem seems to happen at random and not under heavy drive activity. I did not ask, but it appeared that it is not a RAID situation. SCSI is a possibliity.

I could be mistaken but wouldn't memory problems be discovered in the memory diagnostics, regardless of the cause?

I agree, that I missed the possiblility of checking the PSU.

Any comments?

 

[richc46]

@Powwerjunkie. Until we hear from our reinforcements, I think that the PSU should be checked. All the comments made by wheelsmith can be valid. You can see my comments and thoughts. If we cannot get this thing working, all of the suggestions should be tried. Right now the PSU appears as a very good candidate.

 

[Power Junkie]

Hey Wheeelsmith, thnks for joining in.
I can't say I know much, if anything, about voltage, caps or clock speeds.

I know that the PSU is 1kw and the processor is a Q6800 running at 2.93Ghz.
It's got 4gb of Dominator ram but as standard, Vista only shows or allows for 3gb.


To check a PSU problem, would I have to replace it or is there an alternative method I could try?


Thanks again for the help chaps.

 

[wheelsmith]

hi pj you could try a basic tool like the antec psu tester if you have some low voltage or spikes it may show up on the led indicators but only test bench tools will show whats happerning under load. unfortunately a bad cap may not show any visable signs to be faulty, only test meters will reveal that. best bet is to swop out with know good working parts to see what results you get. another thought is to reset the bios to defaults and while your at it refresh the battery as well. its possible a minor component on board has aged/failed and a reset bios may reveal it.

 

[Power Junkie]

I think I'm going to have to brave the ram and reseat it.

A couple of new things to mention.
When I click 'Shut Down', it just hangs at the shutting down screen and I have to manually power off.

And earlier on, just before it froze, it started beeping every time I moved the mouse.
The cursor didn't so much as scroll, but jump across, and then it finally froze.

I doubt that helps, but hopefully it means something?

 

[wheelsmith]

not getting a clean shutdown shouldnt be a problem just amatter of finding what is hanging and changing the shutdown timer for it.
is the beep coming from the motherboard or speakers and am wondering what are the system temps like at mo?

 

[richc46]

I think that we may be able to get this puter up and running, real soon

 

[Power Junkie]

The beep's were coming from the motherboard and the temps did not spike.

The clock speed hasn't been altered or overclocked. It's as standard for the machine.


I'm tempted to swap the GTX 285 for the GTX 8800 and see if the problem continues. I know that the 285 is an overclocked card.

Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps?

 

[danieldebest]

I have also had problems with freezing, but first you need to let it freeze for a long time and see if a blue screen appears (with me it did) and read the error that is given. I solved my problem by updating the serial ata controller driver. I would say try looking for bad sectors on your hard disk and if it then immediately freezes, we know that your hard disk is causing the problem...

If the problem is not your harddisk, then unfortunately i cannot help you