My computer is having all sorts of problems still

[Soapy Bones]

I posted about a week back about all of the troubles that I was having on my computer. I thought I had narrowed the problems down and fixed everything. I was sure wrong.

Here is what I have done since then, and at the end I will link the old post for a little history. I changed my generic "allied" power supply (400 watts) to an Antec True Power 430 watt PSU. I got 2 new case fans and my temps have been averaging high 40's to low 50's C for the CPU, an AMD XP 2100. I am running 1 gig of RAM which has been tested with memtest86 to have no problems.
I am currently on a fresh install of windows XP WITHOUT service pack 2 (to see if that was a problem) and i feel as though i have had less trouble with that at this point. I have only my essential programs installed, and i cannot imagine any of these causing problems.
Program list:
Adobe Photoshop 7
Microsoft office 2k3
Ares
Windows media player 9
AIM
Yahoo IM
Adobe Acrobat Reader 7.0

I have a sound blaster audigy (not sure of series, using autoupdate to download drivers for it online) and a visiontek xtasy GeForce 4 ti4200 128 MB video card with Svideo and DVI out. I am currently running on an 80 gig WD hard drive, and have a second one that is a backup drive currently. I do have 2 other drives installed that are not doing anything other htan backup right now. I also have 3 optical drives, Toshiba DVDRom, Plextor CDRW, Pioneer DVDrw.

And now here to the problem. I have had two completely random crashes in the past two days. I will have both IM programs open, IE, Ares (downloading music) and wmp 9 playing that music. After about a half hour or 45 minutes, my sound will go insane and play scratchy horrible sounds, and the computer will show an error (unclear of what) and restart.
The first time it came back and went back to normal. This most recent time it required me going in under safe mode and disabling startup programs (asus motherboard monitor, adobe startup, viewmgr.exe and mixer.exe
With all of this, i was able to restart and the computer came on and was just fine now.

I have just no clue, I am about to take the entire box somewhere and get it examined but I absolutely hate to because I know that this is within my realm of being able to fix. I almost considered buying a new system just a day and a half ago when it went nuts on me yet again. PLEASE help me!

** EDIT **
The Motherboard is an Asus A7V266 E model

 

[Plumcuda1]

I would identify your soundcard .. uninstall it in the device manager and download the right drivers, not the ones windows loads. reboot and good luck!

 

[Soapy Bones]

I guess i was vague about that, I know its a soundblaster audigy and I do know the model number however if you go to creative's website they have an automatic download that supposedly identifies the card you have installed and downloads the drivers automatically for them.

Are you suggesting that I should go back to the old fashioned way and download the drivers for my model as opposed to their system?

 

[daniel49]

try uninstalling all audigy drivers and installing web drivers only also any creative software you have is renown for causing problems also.
in my case when i first installed an audigy 2 zs it was getting random rebooting and win xp was having system errors. uninstalling all sb drivers and software and reinstalling web drivers only!!! made card behave.
may not work but worth a try
gl dan

 

[UsandThem]

Take out everyting except (or disable in BIOS):

CPU
Ram
One hard drive (the one that your OS is being installed to).
One CD/DVD drive of your choice.

Install Windows
Install SP2
Install chipset drivers (USB and all the stuff that you need to)
Install graphic driver

Enable hard drives (one at a time) in your BIOS. Restart. After Windows assigns drive letters, restart and enable or reconnect your additional CD drives (one at a time).

In between adding each hard drive and CD drive, install programs and test for stability.

If it is good at that point, add your sound card and other cards. Make sure there are no conflicts listed in Windows. If there are conflicts, switch the cards to different PCI slots.

Windows, when it restarts doesn't give you any codes or messages on why it shut down? Thermal, conflicts, drivers?

 

[slpaulson]

My roomate had the exact same problem last year. Every so often it would hard lock, and his speakers would make a horrible sound.

I don't think he ever fixed it, but I know he was using an Audigy soundcard. I'd try moving it to a different slot to make sure it isn't sharing an irq.

 

[Bozo Galora]

this sounds like the same old Creative - nVidia PCI latency fight thats caused screeches howls ticks stuttering in video and spoots - spontaneous reboots. Basically, there are 256 possible latency clock ticks on the PCI bus. Creative sets all their sound cards at 248 and nvidia does also. Both cards hog the bus so the other has to fight to pass the data during the 8 free cycles, depending on who has the higher IRQ rating at that second which is passed around dynamically in WinXP with APIC. The answer is to kick one or both down to like 96 or something so they share nicely. Finally there is an app to do this easily........
Note that there are some quirks to make it stick, so I have posted the tweak info also.

PCI Latency Tool 2.0
2.0
2005-01-10 09:23:03
http://pciids.sourceforge.net
200kb
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=951


you didn't set it right if the pci latency tool didn't keep it after reboot

you have to right click and click change setting which will show the new setting box

and enter your preferred value

then click quick change and set the value so its your preferred value now

then go to settings and click apply on startup and then click save

presto

pci latency values set at startup


thats how i done it Toxic Warrior

so thats the way its done

quick set just changes it for that session or untill reboot

STEP 1. open the pci latency tool

STEP 2. Rightclick on your graphics card and click change setting(s)

STEP 3. change to desired setting and hit ok

Step 4. click settings and select apply at startup so it has a tick next to it

STEP 5. click settings and select save so everything you have just done is saved

STEP 6. right click on your video card and click quickset latency (if you want to set it straight away)

=================

http://www.mark-knutson.com/t3/downloadbuy.html

==================
Note also that some mobo allow changing PCI latency in BIOS - but THEY DO NOT WORK!

P.S.: You left off most important info - motherboard.

 

[Haipyng]

Originally posted by: Bozo Galora
this sounds like the same old Creative - nVidia PCI latency fight thats caused screeches howls ticks stuttering in video and spoots - spontaneous reboots

You get the same conflicts between Creative and VIA. I've had a Creative card in every machine I've built since '94, the last 3 have had issues. The original Audigy was my last (clicks, crackles and other assorted garbage). I've just been running onboard audio since with no complaints.

 

[Bozo Galora]

Originally posted by: Haipyng

Originally posted by: Bozo Galora
this sounds like the same old Creative - nVidia PCI latency fight thats caused screeches howls ticks stuttering in video and spoots - spontaneous reboots

You get the same conflicts between Creative and VIA. I've had a Creative card in every machine I've built since '94, the last 3 have had issues. The original Audigy was my last (clicks, crackles and other assorted garbage). I've just been running onboard audio since with no complaints.

Actually, I meant nVidia vidcards, not chipset
He didnt even mention motherboard involved.
There also seems to be a "refresh" issue with VIA, that for the new cards to work (6800GT 6600GT) one has to delete system devices in dev manager (CPU-PCI PCI-PCI etc) reboot and relaod chipset drivers (4 in 1)
In other words the system driver bundle has to see the correct vidcard FIRST to load the correct drivers.

 

[Soapy Bones]

Sorry for the confusion
I have an ASUS A7V266E motherboard via chipset
Nvidia video card.

 

[Soapy Bones]

Bump for more help, I am in the process of doing a systematic check of whats going on with this.
Its to the point where I can only get online via safe mode so im getting worse and worse i would say.

 

[Soapy Bones]

So today I decided to take my Sound Blaster Audigy card out as well as some extra USB ports that were taking up space in my PCI Slots and just like that, the system has come back on just as it was before with absolutely no trouble. I have onboard audio on my motherboard and am using that at the moment, is it really noticeable as to the different or quality? I am running the audio through a Sony home theater in a box anyways at the moment and i think it sounds alright.

Also, I added and replaced my 2 case fans and with my side on the computer I am getting a MD (case?) temp of 84 degrees F/29 degrees C .
I am getting CPU Temps of 61 degrees C / 141 degrees F with a load on.

The CPU is an AMD XP2100, are these acceptable ranges?

 

[Infohawk]

Is "sucks at life" some new expression?