HELP! Freezing Custom Desktop

[Loxley]

Hey everyone,

I have a custom-built desktop, revamped from an older custom-built desktop. I have replaced most of it since my last mobo died, and ever since, I have been getting some strange instances of freezing. It happens fairly often, and doesn't consistently adhere to any patterns of operation, but definitely tends to freeze at certain times.

To clarify, I notice it often happens not long after coming out of sleep mode or powering up. I'll often get a few seconds/minutes of use, then it locks up. I suspect it might be video related since I've noticed 25% of the time, it seems to freeze up once a video starts playing when I'm checking Facebook. Still, these are just things I've noticed, and might be entirely coincidental. I should note that I have replaced the power supply already since my previous one went bad, but it's still behaving exactly the same.

Here's my specs:
Windows 7 Ultimate
Asus z97-ar motherboard
Intel i5-4690K 3.50GHz
8GB 1600 DDR3 memory
Nvidia Geforce 9800 GTX +
2x Crucial Ballistix Sport 4GB
Thermaltake Smart 75OW PSU
Western Digital Black 3 TB HD (master)
Western Digital Black 1 TB (slave)

 

[Bossyfins]

Can you tell me the temperature of the CPU and GPU. The slowness/freezing in pcs are usually related to parts overheating

 

[Loxley]

Can you tell me the temperature of the CPU and GPU. The slowness/freezing in pcs are usually related to parts overheating

I'm currently looking at 39C for the CPU and 62C for the GPU, just after watching a video on Facebook.

 

[Bossyfins]

Your system is not thermal throttling which is good. I think the most reasonable idea is that you have a virus. Download MalwareBytes and scan it a few times. Do the full scan to.

 

[Loxley]

I have already done some very thorough scanning.. I'll do some more, but I don't think that's the issue.

 

[Loxley]

Anyone else?

 

[Bossyfins]

Can you run Prime95/furmark. If the system shuts down from it, that it means something with the hardware is broken,

 

[Loxley]

Can you run Prime95/furmark. If the system shuts down from it, that it means something with the hardware is broken,

I tried Prime95 - it froze once, but that might have been incidental.. the other couple of times were fine. Ran Furmark for 20 minutes without incident as well. I should note that I play video games and it rarely freezes when doing so.

 

[Bossyfins]

It may be the GPU, But i'll have to have another person loo at the thread

 

[damric]

P.M. assist sent.

 

[Bossyfins]

Alrighty, Damric has helped me in figuring this problem out.

"All of his symptoms indicate PSU not regulating or filtering ripple properly, causing freezing, ect." - Damric.

You should replace your PSU with an EVGA(B2, G2, P2), Antec, Seasonic, and/or XFX

 

[Bossyfins]

Refer to this FAQ

 

[Loxley]

Alrighty, Damric has helped me in figuring this problem out.

"All of his symptoms indicate PSU not regulating or filtering ripple properly, causing freezing, ect." - Damric.

You should replace your PSU with an EVGA(B2, G2, P2), Antec, Seasonic, and/or XFX

Are you sure it's the PSU? I just bought this PSU.. I'm not terribly experienced with which ones are good quality vs. bad, but the Thermaltake Smart 75OW seemed to get good customer ratings and what not (I'm not going off of individual hardware reviewers). I'd hate to replace a fairly new part like that unless I'm sure that'll fix it.

 

[damric]

If you just bought it, then it should be easy to return. Thermaltake has a laundry list of contracted PSU OEMs that build the units for them. Why so many? Because they always go with the lowest bidder for the contract. Thus all of thier PSUs are manufactured using every corner cutting method available including using substandard hardware such as third tier capacitors that WILL wear out the dielectric within 18 months to 2 years of normal use.

However it is a possiblility that the PSU is not at fault. The problem is that when troubleshooting electronics, the PSU is nearly always where you start in the elimination process. We can't move on until you have tried a good unit. When I say good unit, there are plenty affordable ones within the $50-70 range and sometimes less when they go on discount.