Checking the CPU socket

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Craig234

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Apr 23, 2006
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To diagnose why two of four RAM slots don't work, I'm frustratingly going to 'examine the CPU socket for bent pins' on a new build, as unlikely as it seems that'd be fixable.


Am I right that means removing the Hyper 212 heatsink, taking it off the CPU, and no matter what happens having to remove the old thermal paste and re-apply it to test again?

I don't see any alternative, but what a hassle.
 
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Thank you - but now bad news.

It's a cruel system.

Windows 10 installed, up and running.

And it's unstable. It gets frequent hardware freezes.

They don't seem random, but they are fundamental. I tried to download a large game - freeze. I tried to run the Sapphire R9 390 driver install from their web site - every time as it finishes, hang.

I've tried at least 6 times on the drivers, same hang. Have to power off.

If I press the reset on the MB it acts like it's restarting but there is no graphic signal. Have to power cycle.

I hate this. This is not going to be easy to diagnose or fix, it's in the 'bad MB probably or GPU' category.
 
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I left the system running overnight and it didn't hang, so it's not a general instability - it's something that causes it. That game install worked on a re-try, so the AMD driver install is the only clear reproducer currently.
 
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Right however I've had an issue with the new install. Its happened to me in the past as well. Installing the last version can prove if its an issue or not.
 
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Hm. I rebooted, and it had Windows updates to do saying 'do not turn off your PC'. OK.

It got to 30% then rebooted. Was that a bad reboot or part of the update process?

But then on the reboot it got a hw hang where the circle of dots froze and I had to power cycle,

Bad news - but when I did it continued the updates and finished. So hm.
 
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Just keeping an eye still. I left it alone a few minutes and came back and there was no video signal. I hit a key to see if it was sleeping, no.

So I hit the power button to turn it on and Windows popped up 'powering off'.
 
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Thanks. I'll run the memory test, good thing I bought an extra USB I guess, so many things want a bootable USB that destroys whatever was on it - Windows, disk utility, memory test.

I think it's the pin issue. I saw at least one out of place when I installed but had no way to repair it further. It's just good enough to not say 'system broken, replace motherboard, hire someone to build this time' but just bad enough to feel 'this problematic never being able to reboot, always having to power off 30 seconds to reboot, and who knows when else it'll hang'.

Thanks for keeping an eye on the thread as I keep running into things.

Ideally I'd just replace the MB and start over, but I really do not want to do that.

This build was not easy. I'm amazed I even got the heatsink back on (the second try)
 
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Will do.

What seems likely right now:

Run memory test, no problem found (it's new, and there have been no random problems of the type you'd expect from a memory issue). Perform steps to try to fix hard disk configuration so I can use SSD boot drive and HD data drive (you'd think that would be trivially easy today, far from it). Run system monitoring for any further instabilities, power cycling whenever I need to reboot.

And then over whatever period of time, having whatever little problems the CPU imperfection keeps causing finally cause me to buy a new $160 MB and be tempted to hire a build this time. This CPU pin thing seems overly delicate.
 
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