A few days ago I began having system crashes. My machine will power up and run for a while but then will freeze up and/or crash. The screen goes to black the sound either cuts out or distorts and continues on in a distorted fashion. Sometimes it will power-cycle by itself to come back on other times it won't. I am not getting a BSOD, I get no errors to the screen at all. There are no errors in the Windows Event Log under system, application, etc. that gives me any clues about what might be failing.
My machine is self-built and just over a year old.
AMD 3800+ X2 (Manchester)
ABIT AN8-Ultra mobo
2GB OCZ Platinum PC3200 RAM (2x1GB)
eVGA 7800 GT 256MB PCIe
Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 hard drives (2x250 GB in RAID 0)
Audigy PCI card (the original Audigy card from my old PC)
Antec NEO HE 500 PSU
The only issues I've had with this machine previously is that the original PSU, Antec Neo-480, failed about two months ago. It took Antec a long time to replace it but I finally got the new power supply about a month ago and things were running smooth since then until these crashes started occurring.
My first thought was that a component might be overheating and causing the crash since my PC will generally run for a while before crashing - sometimes up to an hour or longer. I monitored the CPU, system, PSU and GPU temperatures while my machine is up and the hottest component is my GPU at about 55 C - the other temperatures are all lower 40-50C. I do not over-clock at all. I have replaced the stock GPU fan/heatsink with the Zalman VF700-CU because the stock fan was starting to get loud after a few months. I'm running Windows XP Pro SP2.
After a few crashes, when booting, it would report that my system was starting in a "fail-safe" state and to check my CMOS/BIOS settings. I checked the settings and they had been wiped out. I changed the settings I had configured before (not many - boot-order, RAID 0 settings and memory timings) and then the system would boot again. Howerver, I was still getting that same error about being in a "fail-safe" state. I had to reset my BIOS via the jumper on the mobo to get rid of that error but after a couple more crashes it would come back. Is my mobo battery dead? I wouldn't think that could cause crashes like this.
At one point my system wouldn't boot no matter what and the post code indicated my RAM, I tried booting with just one of 1 GB sticks, with either stick I got the same post code error. After waiting five minutes and putting both sticks back in it booted and I haven't had that post code error again but the crashes persist.
Normally I would troubleshoot these types of issues by replacing components until the crashes stop but this is a newer machine and I don't have spare parts that are compatible with this system. Does anyone know of any obscure logs or files I can check to find out what component might be failing. This definitely seems to be a hardware issue, not software. I haven't even updated any drivers in months. I suspect it's either the GPU, mobo or RAM but I just don't know. A few of the crashes had the video go out first, followed by the sound so I'm slightly inclined to think it might be the GPU but this symptom could be caused by another problem as well.
Sorry for the long post but I wanted to provide as much information as possible. Does anyone have suggestions about what may be wrong or anything else I could to try to troubleshoot this problem? I would be very appreciative. If more information is needed or if there are some tests I could run and post again with results that might help I'd be willing to do that as well.
Thanks in advance,
Feakbeak
My machine is self-built and just over a year old.
AMD 3800+ X2 (Manchester)
ABIT AN8-Ultra mobo
2GB OCZ Platinum PC3200 RAM (2x1GB)
eVGA 7800 GT 256MB PCIe
Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 hard drives (2x250 GB in RAID 0)
Audigy PCI card (the original Audigy card from my old PC)
Antec NEO HE 500 PSU
The only issues I've had with this machine previously is that the original PSU, Antec Neo-480, failed about two months ago. It took Antec a long time to replace it but I finally got the new power supply about a month ago and things were running smooth since then until these crashes started occurring.
My first thought was that a component might be overheating and causing the crash since my PC will generally run for a while before crashing - sometimes up to an hour or longer. I monitored the CPU, system, PSU and GPU temperatures while my machine is up and the hottest component is my GPU at about 55 C - the other temperatures are all lower 40-50C. I do not over-clock at all. I have replaced the stock GPU fan/heatsink with the Zalman VF700-CU because the stock fan was starting to get loud after a few months. I'm running Windows XP Pro SP2.
After a few crashes, when booting, it would report that my system was starting in a "fail-safe" state and to check my CMOS/BIOS settings. I checked the settings and they had been wiped out. I changed the settings I had configured before (not many - boot-order, RAID 0 settings and memory timings) and then the system would boot again. Howerver, I was still getting that same error about being in a "fail-safe" state. I had to reset my BIOS via the jumper on the mobo to get rid of that error but after a couple more crashes it would come back. Is my mobo battery dead? I wouldn't think that could cause crashes like this.
At one point my system wouldn't boot no matter what and the post code indicated my RAM, I tried booting with just one of 1 GB sticks, with either stick I got the same post code error. After waiting five minutes and putting both sticks back in it booted and I haven't had that post code error again but the crashes persist.
Normally I would troubleshoot these types of issues by replacing components until the crashes stop but this is a newer machine and I don't have spare parts that are compatible with this system. Does anyone know of any obscure logs or files I can check to find out what component might be failing. This definitely seems to be a hardware issue, not software. I haven't even updated any drivers in months. I suspect it's either the GPU, mobo or RAM but I just don't know. A few of the crashes had the video go out first, followed by the sound so I'm slightly inclined to think it might be the GPU but this symptom could be caused by another problem as well.
Sorry for the long post but I wanted to provide as much information as possible. Does anyone have suggestions about what may be wrong or anything else I could to try to troubleshoot this problem? I would be very appreciative. If more information is needed or if there are some tests I could run and post again with results that might help I'd be willing to do that as well.
Thanks in advance,
Feakbeak
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