System Rebooting Randomly

[Zadillo]

Hi all,

This has actually been a somewhat ongoing problem for me, but recently it has become even more frequent. It's getting to a point where 5 minutes after I've booted, the system will just mysteriously reboot sometimes.

When Windows XP loads back up again, it gives an error saying "The system has recovered from a serious error". The only details in this error are:

BCCode : 100000d1 BCP1 : 44C871E3 BCP2 : 00000002 BCP3 : 00000000
BCP4 : F4826D98 OSVer : 5_1_2600 SP : 2_0 Product : 768_1

Not sure if that can be interpreted to explain what the problem is or not.

To explain my setup, it's an MSI K8T Neo2 FISR with an Athlon 64 3400+ (a CPU I bought from someone here on anandtech), 1GB of Kingston HyperX memory, an Antec NeoPower 480 PSU, 3 hard drives, a DVD burner and a DVD/CD-RW combo drive.

I've actually had this type of problem ever since I put in the Athlon 64 3400+ I bought here, but the person I bought it from had a good reputation, and I don't think they would have sent me something that wasn't functioning.

But the problem has generally been where it would just randomly reboot maybe once every few days.

It's worth noting that recently I also had some partition issues (I had gotten the partitions messed up, and had to use a recovery disk to make my windows partition "Active" again), and this problem seems to have become more frequent since I fixed that, but I don't know that it's related.

Does anyone have any ideas on what the problems might be, or what I might be able to do to verify what the problems are? I don't know if its bad memory, a bad CPU, or something else.

Is there a way to tell from the error message above what the problem is?

Thanks!

-Zadillo

 

[Zadillo]

I have some more information that might shed some light on this, hopefully.

Since I posted that last post, I didn't have any reboots.

However, I decided to try downloading a file (the Auto Assault beta client, using FlashFXP), and within a few minutes of starting the download, the computer rebooted.

I've noticed that sometimes previous reboots would also happen while having some intensive download going, but I can't say it's universal (i.e. I've been able to leave Azareus running all night sometimes without it rebooting).

I am using a LinkSys Wireless-G USB adaptor, and I get around 80k/sec max.

Not sure if this could somehow have something to do with it..... something about the downloading process that is causing the machine to reboot.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Zadillo

 

[daveybrat]

Sounds more like your primary hard drive is failing. Download the manufacturer's diagnostic utility from their website and it will create a bootable floppy disk that you can test your drive with.

 

[LiLithTecH]

Have you checked the EVENT LOG?
(Start \ Run then type: eventvwr.msc)

 

[Zadillo]

From looking at the System Error that shows up in the Event Log, it says this:

Error code 100000d1, parameter1 321864c7, parameter2 00000002, parameter3 00000000, parameter4 f4826d98.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

And then the error under that in bytes is:

0000: 53 79 73 74 65 6d 20 45 System E
0008: 72 72 6f 72 20 20 45 72 rror Er
0010: 72 6f 72 20 63 6f 64 65 ror code
0018: 20 31 30 30 30 30 30 64 100000d
0020: 31 20 20 50 61 72 61 6d 1 Param
0028: 65 74 65 72 73 20 33 32 eters 32
0030: 31 38 36 34 63 37 2c 20 1864c7,
0038: 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 32 00000002
0040: 2c 20 30 30 30 30 30 30 , 000000
0048: 30 30 2c 20 66 34 38 32 00, f482
0050: 36 64 39 38 6d98

And in Words:

0000: 74737953 45206d65 726f7272 72452020
0010: 20726f72 65646f63 30303120 64303030
0020: 50202031 6d617261 72657465 32332073
0030: 34363831 202c3763 30303030 32303030
0040: 3030202c 30303030 202c3030 32383466
0050: 38396436

Does this mean anything?

Re: the hard drive failing. I don't actually have a floppy drive in my system. Can I boot from a USB floppy drive, or do I need to install an internal floppy drive?

To clarify, what would the problem drive most likely be? The drive I am booting from is actually a Windows installation on my D: drive, which is an 80 gig Maxtor HD.

I am downloading the file to my C: drive, which is a 120 meg Western Digital.

These are just IDE drives.

Do Western Digital and Maxtor have diagnostic utilities then for checking this? Is it possible to run these from a bootable CD instead to see if my HD is failing?

 

[Zadillo]

For what it's worth, after I posted a 1:17 AM last night, I decided to try downloading again, and it actually was OK until 1:53 AM, at which point it rebooted again.

After that, I left it on, but didn't start any downloads (either using FlashFXP or Firefox).

When I checked again just now, the system hadn't rebooted.

So it does seem like there is some sort of connection between activity.

I have also had this happen while doing things like burning a DVD.

The odd thing is, sometimes I have been able to just run something like Azareus in the background all night without it rebooting, so it isn't necessarily universal.

 

[Zadillo]

Also, I am still wondering if there's a way to find out if it is the CPU. As I mentioned, this problem of random restarts did start when I installed the Athlon 64 3400+ (which I bought from someone here........ he said it was used, but only barely). Again, he had good feedback, so I didn't have any big reason to doubt him. I would like to try and verify if it is the CPU or not though. '

If it matters the CPU runs at around 45 degrees celcius, although I've seen it get higher during intense activity. I am using an Arctic Cooling Freezer 64, and I had put on some Arctic Silver 5 thermal compound, although I admit that I am still unsure of whether I put on too little or too much (I'm pretty new at this when it comes to building your own system).

Anyway, not sure if any of that matters or not.

At this point I think I'd like to just try and track down exactly what is causing these reboots and fix or replace it (whether it's the CPU, or memory, or a hard drive, or what).

 

[flippe]

I would check into your BIOS and see if your cpu is getting the right voltage, most AMD64's use 1.5v so if its not at 1.5v set it there and see if helps any.

 

[Zadillo]

Thanks. Haven't checked my BIOS yet, but using the MSI CoreCenter utilituy, it seems to have the vCore set at 1.550v, and it says that the actual vCore seems to be ranging from 1.46v to 1.47v (although I've seen it fluctuate more, from 1.44v to 1.49v)

 

[Zadillo]

I have some more info that might help.

I turned off the "Automatic Restart" function in the Startup and Recovery settings, which I picked up on from another thread.

This time, when it crashed, it showed me a dark blue diagnostic screen explaining that an error had occurred.

The error it reported was:

DRIVER_IRQL_NOT+_LESS_OR_EQUAL

For Technical Info, it said:

STOP: 0x000000D1 (0x3199E43B, 0x00000002, 0x00000000, 0xB8117D98)

WUSBGXP.sys - Address B8117D98 base at B80EE000, DateStamp 4069f4da).

I am pretty sure this is a driver for my Linksys Wireless-G USB Adaptor, model WUSB54G.

For what it's worth, I've noticed every now and then after recovering from one of these reboots, it might give some error when trying to load the LinkSys Wireless USB driver, about an address violation.

It seems like if this is the problem, it would also explain why it would happen in the middle of extensive downloads that are pushing the system at 80-90k/sec.

I guess the question would be, what would my next step be? I think the drivers are current, but I'll check. Would it be best to switch to another wireless adaptor?

I actually wanted to get a PCI wireless adaptor anyway, since it seems like that would be easier to use in Linux.

What do you think?

EDIT: I checked the LinkSys site and verified that the driver version I have installed is the one that they say is the latest version:

http://www.linksys.com/download/driver.asp?dlid=139&osid=6

I'm actually not totally sure how to verify if this is the right thing. The actual model number of my adaptor is just WUSB54G. The setup CD does say ver 2.0, but I don't know if that means it is version 2.0 of the setup wizard, or that the wireless adaptor is version 2 (LinkSys lists an original version, a ver 2 and a ver 4 on their site).

 

[flippe]

Something is not right with some settings in your bios either that or you got bad drivers for a card you have installed, and/or a card is having porblems or is broken. Usually I see this mostly on overclocking issues when an overclock is not stable or the cpu is not getting enough voltage or sumthing. Also a fix for this is also to change the pci slot around for your card cuz, aside from o/c'ing, something like the agp sometimes uses irq resources that a certain pci slot may use and this can cause a conflict. I dont have any actual IRQ tables on me which say exactly which slot uses which IRQ, all I can say is 1. Have your BIOS reset to default values. 2. If that still doesnt help, try moving your linksys card from pic slot to pci slot and see what happens.

 

[Zadillo]

It's a wireless usb adaptor, not a PCI card.

My BIOS are also at default values.

-Zadillo

 

[Zadillo]

One thing I'm going to try...... I am using it with the onboard USB from my motherboard (an MSI K8T Neo2 FISR). I also have a third party PCI card which has USB 2.0 on it, and I will try and see if that makes a difference.

I'm not sure what to do if its bad drivers. I'm using the latest drivers from LinkSys for the WUSB54G USB wireless-g adaptor.

 

[LiLithTecH]

Are you sure you downloaded the correct version for your card (there are 3)?
(no version #, V2 & V4)

 

[Zadillo]

I'm pretty sure, although one thing I've been wondering is how to determine exactly which version of the hardware you have. The actual model number on the unit is just WUSB54G. However, the install CD does have "ver 2.0" on it, but I couldn't tell if that was the hardware rev or the the version of the software on the CD.

One thing, just as an update. I moved the wireless USB adaptor from a USB port from my motherboard (which has 4 ports on the back), to one of the USB ports on a Belkin firewire+usb 2.0 PCI card that I have.

Interestingly enough, I was able to sit there downloading the full 1.16 gig file without it rebooting. I am going to have to try more, but it seems like that might have made a difference. I'm not totally sure what that would mean though. I am still running the latest BIOS for the MSI K8T Neo2 FISR. Not sure if there are separate drivers for the on-board USB.