Motherboard or Processor?

[Foamfoot]

first i wanted to thank those that responded in the technical support area and with walking me through Memtest 86. after a few days of troubleshooting it seems clear to me that my prob is either the processor or motherboard.

To quickly sum up my probs, out of nowhere on Easter Sunday (great weather no storms, lightning, etc..), my PC started to reboot and reboot and reboot. sometimes it would reboot during the reboot, other times i could get into Windows and actually get on the internet for a few minutes trying to find a fix before it would crash and reboot. to summarize, my system is a self built:

P4 2.53 w/Alpha HS
Asus P4PE MB
512 Corsair XMS 3000 RAM
WD 80 GIG HD
WD 40 GIG HD
Hercules Radeon 9700
Turtle Beach Santa Cruz Sound Card
Antec True Power 480 W PS
5 panaflo/sunon case fans (so good cooling)
Running Win XP

so far, thanks to the help of many here, ive:

- tried running memtest 86 on my corsair, it Passed without any errors
- swapped in a 256 stick of crucial to replace the corsair RAM, no luck, system rebooted
- tried an EVER 300 W PS instead of my Antec 480W - no luck, reboots
- tried a different Antec True 480W, no luck reboots
- tried another Radeon 9700 Video Card, no luck reboots
- tried unplugging every non-essential component (CDROM, CDRW, second HDD, sound card), no luck reboots
- tried using my work West Dig 80 gig HDD that also has WINXP, no luck reboots (this was only HDD connected)
- tried removing my Alpha HS and fan and reseating the P4 chip (reapplied Arctic Silver too), no luck reboots

anyway, my temps have always been good (low 30's for CPU) and its not like im getting crashes after minutes or hours of gaming. reboots would immediately occur even after PC sat unplugged and off the entire night before.

Based upon everything ive tried, it seems clear to me that either my P4PE or P4 Chip suddenly crapped out.
unfortunately, both of my other systems are Athlons so i cannot drop in a new chip to see if that helps.

My Questions:
(1) is there any other way to check if the MB or Chip are bad other then trying another?
(2) if you had to pick which one was the culprit, what would you replace first (i really dont have the $$ to buy both a Chip and Board tomorrow, so im gonna pick one and hope it works).

for whats its worth, i never had a lockup or crash until Sunday. went from rockstable to cant stay on for more then 4-5 mins without a reboot. is my chip fried or motherboard shorted?

thanks so much again for all of your feedback

 

[mechBgon]

Before biting the bullet and buying a new mobo or CPU, did you try running the mobo outside the case while lying on cardboard (the mobo, not you 😀)?

You might also look over the surface of the mobo for as long as you can stand to stare at it, and see if any surface-mounted devices are askew or missing. I knocked a surface-mounted capacitor loose on my A7V333-R and it got very unstable under load as a result. My attempt to solder it down failed (the soldering iron yanked it right off the board, I should've used a fine strand of copper wire for an extension 😛🙁).

 

[Foamfoot]

thanks for the advice, i have not tried taking the MB out of the case yet but will give it a shot. ill also give the board a good staredown.

thanks..

assuming i dont find anything, what would you guess? what would be more likely to short or crap out after running stable for months?

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: Foamfoot
thanks for the advice, i have not tried taking the MB out of the case yet but will give it a shot. ill also give the board a good staredown.

thanks..

assuming i dont find anything, what would you guess? what would be more likely to short or crap out after running stable for months?

My guess: the motherboard is the more likely to fail than the CPU, although I have had an Intel CPU have a partial die failure on me before (a P3 450 whose SSE capabilities failed, everything else worked fine).