Random freezing..help!

[Sephy]

Not really sure what the deal here is. Here's my stats:
XP2100+
MSI KT3 Ultra(whatever their KT333 board is)
Samsung 2700 512mb DDR
Chaintech GF4 4200 128mb
Santa Cruz
Maxter 40gb
Running XP Pro.
I'm not getting bluescreens, just freezes. They happen pretty frequently. It can't be the video drivers, since it happened before the clean install and the upgrade. It has happened when I've tried to load programs, change songs on winamp, anything.
Help! Please!

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: Sephy
It can't be the video drivers, since it happened before the clean install and the upgrade. It has happened when I've tried to load programs, change songs on winamp, anything. Help! Please!

I don't agree with your conclusion. 9 time out of 10, random freezes are video related and caused. It may not be just the drivers - it could also be the hardware involved. Have you gone into your video trouble shooting and moved the video acceleration slider a notch or two to the left and see if the problem continues?

 

[Vic]

Are you running the RAM at 166MHz? Aggressive timings? If so, either lower the timings or up the vDIMM voltage to 2.7 and see if that helps.

 

[Sephy]

I have tried upping the voltage, no go...this leads me to believe it is something else.
The most common reproduceable lockup is running winamp, loading a song, and then trying to add a song to the list. Locks up right away.
I am just using the auto settings for the DDR, I'm not trying to run it aggresively at all(unless it was set to that)

 

[MikeMike]

um power supply and wattage?

this could cause it too if you dont have an adequate ps for your system, and it is a power hungry machine

 

[Sephy]

Ok, checked the BIOS, the ram is running at 333Mhz(166) but I clocked it down to 133 and it doesn't change.
PSU is 300W.

 

[Sephy]

Antec 1030B case, so same brand PSU.

 

[Vic]

hmm... Antec is a good brand. I doubt that's your problem.
Checked for BIOS update?
Have you tried reducing the RAM speed to 133MHz and reducing timings to the slowest possible?
I have a Santa Cruz and they are a rock solid stable card, so I doubt that is your problem.
Random freezes are video card related "9 times out of 10" if you are running a video app when they happen. In my experience, they are more likely to be caused by memory timing issues or drastic voltage fluctuations caused by inadequate power supply or defective mobo.
So we've pretty much ruled out the power supply (use mbm5 or MSI's included Fuzzy Logic to check those anyway though), it's unlikely to be your sound card, I've worked with a KT3 and they had (in my experience) very stable voltage rails. You say the problem occurred before a reinstall, so it most likely isn't OS or driver related. So I think it must be memory related, probably a timing issue.

 

[Sephy]

Originally posted by: PSYWVic
hmm... Antec is a good brand. I doubt that's your problem.
Checked for BIOS update?
Have you tried reducing the RAM speed to 133MHz and reducing timings to the slowest possible?
I have a Santa Cruz and they are a rock solid stable card, so I doubt that is your problem.
Random freezes are video card related "9 times out of 10" if you are running a video app when they happen. In my experience, they are more likely to be caused by memory timing issues or drastic voltage fluctuations caused by inadequate power supply or defective mobo.
So we've pretty much ruled out the power supply (use mbm5 or MSI's included Fuzzy Logic to check those anyway though), it's unlikely to be your sound card, I've worked with a KT3 and they had (in my experience) very stable voltage rails. You say the problem occurred before a reinstall, so it most likely isn't OS or driver related. So I think it must be memory related, probably a timing issue.

There is a BIOS update, but it doesn't deal with this issue at all.
Yes, I have tried reducing the speed, but I have not tried timings.
I'm going to try memtest86 overnight tonight.
I'll try lowering the timings first hough.
Thanks for your help so far.

 

[Sephy]

OK, I just tried lowering the timing, though I have no idea what the settings mean and what the lowest setting is, but it didn't help.
Memtest won't even make a boot disk, it just makes an unformatted disk.

 

[Sephy]

ok, after running memtest nothing appears to be wrong.
Any insights?

 

[corkyg]

OK - just for the heck of it, try a different video card - or remove the card and reinstall it from scratch.

And here's another gambit - remove WinAmp and see what happens then. I had to remove it on all my systems because it caused too many hangups and malfunctions.

 

[Sephy]

OK, I tried using my old GF2 GTS, and it still froze, but now I put in the GF4 again, and its freezing when I try to install the drivers.
AGGGGHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[112]

I don't know if im gonna be called a dumb@ss for this, but maybe its your AGP slot thats gone bad? My friend was running a Voodoo 3 on his WinXP Pro and it had the same problems you have, so I just placed the video card into a different PCI slot and it worked fine. I don't know much about computers and the difference of AGP and PCI video cards, but just giving my opinion. Maybe you can try putting the Geforce4 into a different computer and seeing if it works in there. I'm pretty sure its not the video card because both your cards are causing problems.