Computer freezes, driving me nuts

[Teknic]

I think the problem is something with my hardware.

My computer will randomly freeze up on me. The screen displayed will be nonresponsive -- I won't be able to use my mouse or keyboard, and everything just pauses. It has even happened before on startup: the computer will freeze during the BIOS initialization, which makes me think it's not a software issue. The weird thing is, it appears to happen less frequently after the computer is warmed up. If I start the computer and walk away for an hour or so, the computer will be frozen. However, after I restart the computer it won't be as likely to freeze up when I use it next, and it has lasted hours without a problem.

I haven't done any hardware changes, but it is happening a lot more frequently now over the past half year. When I look at Windows Event Viewer, it doesn't seem to tell me any useful information: just that the computer faced an unexpected restart of the system.

One random thing I noted. I have a backlit keyboard. Whenever the computer freezes, the backlight turns off on the keyboard. Also, I run some photoediting programs, which are CPU intensive. When I run the program, it seems like it has a much higher chance of causing the system to freeze up.

I think maybe it's the power supply? But that's a total random guess.

System:
CPU: i7-930
Videocard: AMD Radeon 7970
Storage: Operating system on Intel SSD, 2x 1TB Western Digital HDDs for everything else
RAM: 12GB
Motherboard: ASRock X58 Extreme
Power Supply: Corsair VX550

 

[Burpo]

Turn off hardware pre-fetch in CPU section of bios & see if it still happens..

 

[inachu]

Diagnosing can sometimes be the most hairy of situations.

Start thinking if it is hardware or software issues.

If hardware make sure it is clean free of dust.
If software make sure free of malware/virus.

Once confirmed clean of dust then confirm heatsink is sitting properly afixed to the CPU.
Next look for bulging/leaking capacitors.
While in operation make sure you are grounded and touch the pc case then touch each
component to check if any seem to be overheating. Also touch your hard drive(s) as they too can or might have no software issues but could be running hot.

If your hard drives are running very hot then they will not live much longer. at this point you should run a SMART(MTBF) test from the BIOS options. If the smart test fails then start backing up your software now.

If smart test passes then run chkdsk. then defrag.

 

[Teknic]

Turn off hardware pre-fetch in CPU section of bios & see if it still happens..

I checked the BIOS, and there wasn't a section to turn off hardware pre-fetch. Like usual though, since the computer was cold when I just tried doing this, it froze several times while looking through the BIOS options.

 

[Teknic]

Diagnosing can sometimes be the most hairy of situations.

Start thinking if it is hardware or software issues.

If hardware make sure it is clean free of dust.
If software make sure free of malware/virus.

Once confirmed clean of dust then confirm heatsink is sitting properly afixed to the CPU.
Next look for bulging/leaking capacitors.
While in operation make sure you are grounded and touch the pc case then touch each
component to check if any seem to be overheating. Also touch your hard drive(s) as they too can or might have no software issues but could be running hot.

If your hard drives are running very hot then they will not live much longer. at this point you should run a SMART(MTBF) test from the BIOS options. If the smart test fails then start backing up your software now.

If smart test passes then run chkdsk. then defrag.

Thanks for the tips.

I think it's a hardware issue because it occurs even in the BIOS or on computer startup. I had checked for dust earlier, and while there's some dust in the system, it's not a whole lot. Earlier I had checked for obvious signs of blown capacitors, but didn't come up with anything obvious at least. I'll check again later. I've run CHKDSK previously, and that turned up alright, but I'll recheck via BIOS later per your advice.

I haven't touched the components of the computer yet though to test for heat. However, my computer doesn't seem to freeze the longer I run it, so wouldn't that be the opposite of what you would expect if it was overheating? Again, the freezing usually happens only when starting up cold (or maybe when under very high CPU utilization).

Haven't checked the CPU/heatsink yet, but I didn't apply any custom paste to the CPU back when I installed it, as it had some CPU paste already applied. Would the stock CPU paste ever fail?

 

[inachu]

Ok then re-sit a few of the components on the motherboard.

Take out memory and video card. blow air can into the slots then put them back.

Man times resitting ram and video card can make things back to normal.

 

[inachu]

Thanks for the tips.

I think it's a hardware issue because it occurs even in the BIOS or on computer startup. I had checked for dust earlier, and while there's some dust in the system, it's not a whole lot. Earlier I had checked for obvious signs of blown capacitors, but didn't come up with anything obvious at least. I'll check again later. I've run CHKDSK previously, and that turned up alright, but I'll recheck via BIOS later per your advice.

I haven't touched the components of the computer yet though to test for heat. However, my computer doesn't seem to freeze the longer I run it, so wouldn't that be the opposite of what you would expect if it was overheating? Again, the freezing usually happens only when starting up cold (or maybe when under very high CPU utilization).

Haven't checked the CPU/heatsink yet, but I didn't apply any custom paste to the CPU back when I installed it, as it had some CPU paste already applied. Would the stock CPU paste ever fail?

It would dry out if the heatsink was left off of the cpu for any long periods.

So if was left unattached for more than 12 hours then you should reapply new heatsink compound.

 

[Teknic]

Ok then re-sit a few of the components on the motherboard.

Take out memory and video card. blow air can into the slots then put them back.

Man times resitting ram and video card can make things back to normal.

Haha, this sounds like the voodoo behind blowing into a Nintendo cartridge to get it to work. Not saying I don't believe it, I just think it's kind of funny. When I have access to my computer again in about a week, I'll try this and update the thread.

It would dry out if the heatsink was left off of the cpu for any long periods.

So if was left unattached for more than 12 hours then you should reapply new heatsink compound.

From the very beginning I've never removed the CPU from the heatsink; once I acquired the CPU several years ago, I mounted it and have since never touched it. I take it that this probably won't be the problem then?

 

[mikeymikec]

IMO it's a board or power supply problem.

By all means reseat as much hardware as possible first (any issue that is more likely to happen due to a component warming up could be fixed by reseating), and clean out the dust.

Next, I would do simple tests of each component e.g. memtest86, prime95, chkdsk on SSD, etc.

After that, get hold of another power supply (which is powerful enough to handle your hardware) and test with that.

A secondary possibility is an oddly failing graphics card, RAM, SSD, CPU etc.

The annoying thing about your situation in terms of troubleshooting is that you need to wait for the system to return to ambient temp before retesting. My usual technique for that is to unplug the system from the mains overnight and to run a test once a day each morning, though you might get away with testing once in the morning and once in the late evening with lots of ambient ventilation in between.

If you can reproduce the issue in the BIOS with a different graphics card, minimal RAM etc, then that allows you to disconnect all the other hardware and rule it out a lot more easily.

The worst case scenario IMO is that you'll end up with a dodgy board problem which is difficult to nail down, but be careful to test everything else before coming to that conclusion.

 

[inachu]

Haha, this sounds like the voodoo behind blowing into a Nintendo cartridge to get it to work. Not saying I don't believe it, I just think it's kind of funny. When I have access to my computer again in about a week, I'll try this and update the thread.



From the very beginning I've never removed the CPU from the heatsink; once I acquired the CPU several years ago, I mounted it and have since never touched it. I take it that this probably won't be the problem then?

It would be good to inspect the compound then. If dry then clean and add new.
It is one of the cheapest fixes one can do for a pc next to buy a can of air.

 

[Ketchup]

Power supply is the best guess so far, as it performs better when warmed up. One test you can do it to undo any overclocks you have set and see if it does better, but I can't guarantee that will make a difference.

Another test would be to plug it directly into the wall (nothing between the power source and the computer) and see if the behavior changes.

 

[Teknic]

Thanks for the tips. I'll be going on a short trip soon; I will attempt to try most of these things when I get back and I'll update the thread at that time.:thumbsup:

 

[Teknic]

Okay, so I got back from my trip. It was a nice day outside, so I took my computer outside and used one of those air blower things for DSLR that's used to remove dust from the cameras to instead blow out the dust out of the computer case.

-There wasn't a whole lot of dust in the computer, but there was a bit of dust on the CPU heatsink. Blew out most of dust from the heatsink, and most of the dust out the enclosure. Overall, it was a pretty clean case -- I've seen far, far, dirtier computers.

-As suggested, I also reseated the RAM: I took it out, plugged it back in.

-I rechecked the capacitors, and they all look fine.

Plugged my computer back in, and started running it. I don't believe it. It's been half an hour so far, with no freezes and nary a problem. It's like some kind of record. I'm going to run this computer overnight to see what happens.

 

[Teknic]

Okay, well 3 days later, I've started the computer cold every single day and no signs of any freezing or rebooting. I'm going to tentatively say it appears to have resolved! Though I'll admit I totally didn't think that cleaning the dust and reseating the RAM was going to work. I thought for sure the issue was the PSU.

Thanks guys!!

 

[mikeymikec]

When you say there was "a bit of dust in the CPU heatsink", do you mean a little carpet of dust so that you could barely see (or see between) the CPU heatsink's fins?

 

[Teknic]

When you say there was "a bit of dust in the CPU heatsink", do you mean a little carpet of dust so that you could barely see (or see between) the CPU heatsink's fins?

I could clearly delineate between the different CPU heatsink fins. Definitely pretty obvious which fins were which, and they were relatively shiny fins. To be fair, the CPU heatsink was the area which had the most dust in it, and had a few small "chunks" of dust in between some of the fins, but I didn't think it to be excessive dust.

Let me put it this way: had I taken a cellphone picture from say, two feet away, you probably couldn't tell there was dust in the case. Unless maybe the cellphone I used was that Windows Phone with the 41megapixel sensor, ha.

 

[mikeymikec]

Hmm, it is an older processor and a fairly warm one IIRC. Is it the standard Intel stock heatsink you've got on there, and is this the first time you've cleaned it out since you built it?

 

[Teknic]

Hmm, it is an older processor and a fairly warm one IIRC. Is it the standard Intel stock heatsink you've got on there, and is this the first time you've cleaned it out since you built it?

That's correct on all counts: it is the stock Intel heatsink with the stock thermal paste that comes with it and it was the first time I've cleaned it out since I've built it a few years ago.

However, the computer is not used every day, and I taped up the small holes in the case to drive all the air through the filters in the front of the case to reduce dust accumulation. In my opinion it worked pretty well, considering the amount of dust in there after a number of years. Since the case has a clear side to it, I can just look inside and see how much dust is in there at any time. I would've cleaned it earlier if I thought it was too dusty.

 

[mikeymikec]

I would make a note of how long it's been this time, then clean it out in half the time in the future. While the processor can handle a fair bit of punishment, it doesn't necessarily mean that the components around it like those sorts of temps.

Normally I personally would periodically check fan speeds and temps, except the cpu fan speed sensor on my board is on the fritz.

 

[Burpo]

edit; never mind..