Windows XP or Motherboard problem?

[DDR333]

A couple months ago I built a p4 1.6A system using a Gigabyte 8SRX motherboard. I did a mild overclock to 115 FSB which caused me to run the PCI bus at 34 or 35 can't remember which one right off hand. Anyway it was only slightly faster than spec.

The machine ran fine for two months with zero problems and then all of the sudden yesterday as I open up Explorer and Yahoo the mouse cursor freezes for about 5 seconds then works for 5 then frezes for 5 off and on, etc, etc. It also caused my NIC card to no longer operate and my pci soundblaster live which had worked fine was not even listed in the device manager.

Reboot and attempts to reinstall the NIC were not succesful. I was able to get the NIC (and another NIC from a different PC) installed fine but on reboot it gave a code 10 error and said the device could not start. I never had a hardware conflict before and did not add any programs or hardware to cause this. Also the SB live when reinstalled was not even recognized...I tried every pci slot but nothing. It worked in a different PC.

I even tried to install a USB Ethernet adapter which installed fine but gave the Code 10 on reboot. Have I screwed up my PCI bus on my motherboard or is there a problem with Windows XP Pro? Before I reinstall Win XP or swap out hardware I thought I would see if anyone had any experience with this problem or any sugestions.

 

[corkyg]

On and off freezing usually suggests that something is taking over the CPU - like searching and not finding. That is usually caused by something running in background. Try this - in XP, run MSCONFIG and go to the StartUp tab and uncheck everything except Explorer and the System Tray. Then reboot and see if it still happens. If that clears it up, then you can add things one at a time until you find the one that is causing the problem.

 

[DDR333]

I will give that a try. Would that cause the SB Live card not to be recognized though? Thanks for your help.

 

[DDR333]

I was able to find out what was sucking the processor power. It appears my DHCP is fubar. When I disable that my system does not freeze. I was able to go into the event viewer and see what happened the afternoon my pc crapped out and I had about 15 event 1003's right in a row. I also occasionally get DHCP, NetBt event 4311 errors. It does not seem like the NIC is able to get an IP address.

Could this still be a hardware problem or is my Win XP Pro DHCP screwed up? I guess I should have tried a different Cat5 cable to my router/switch, maybe that is damaged? Is it possible to reinstall DHCP or fix it without having to do a fresh install of XP?

I did not have time last night to work on the SB Live issue, but I am not sure why that card was having a problem if DHCP is causing the trouble for my NIC? Could those two be related or is it possible hardware damage is causing the DHCP/IP issue? This has been a strange problem and beyond my knowledge of XP/hardware.

 

[tbalon]

Try pulling the NIC out of the system and rebooting.... see if your sound card is recognized then. Also try different PCI slots sometimes they can be picky. Are you sure that your hardware and drivers are XP compatible? There may be a resource conflict between the two cards. check your system properties for conflicts.....