Question Help to figure out test results

[GuiRitter]

Hi everyone.

My Windows 7 desktop is freezing occasionally. Most of the time it unfreezes after a while.

Last time, I force rebooted it and it didn't booted back up. I messed around and it booted, but got stuck on the Windows logo screen. Some more messing around and it booted like nothing had happened.

I have 1 SSD and 2 old school HDDs. I used HD Tune to test. One of the HDDs (E: ) seems to be better after more than 3 years, so no issue there.

I didn't test the other HDD (D: ) when it was new, but it probably looked like this, which was taken from the previous D:, which got replaced due to failure:

I think the current D: was purchased in 2017. Now D: is like this:

I also hear a periodic slipping noise from time to time, but it's unpredictable so I can't disconnect one to confirm whether it's from D: or E:. It should be from D:, but E: is older, so I can't be certain.

I'm almost certain that I have to replace D:. However, I also tested the SSD (C: ) and got some pretty weird results. This is how it was in 2016-08-27:

Today it's like this:

I also tested between these two dates and got an intermediate result.

The Windows 7 that I use is in C: with most programs in E:. D: contains a big NTFS partition for data and a small partition with Xubuntu.

When I was messing with the drives, I booted into it (not particularly slower than normal) and got an "SRST failed" error, but didn't took the time to find out where it was coming from.

So, what should I do? Replace C:? D:? Both?

Thanks in advance.

 

[fzabkar]

Can you show us the SMART attributes?

CrystalDiskInfo is a better SMART tool, IMHO.

 

[Ralston18]

First and foremost: remember that anything you do could cause a drive failure and data loss.

You do have backups - correct?

Update your post to include full system hardware specs including PSU.

To find out more about the freezes look in Reliability History/Monitor and Event Viewer for error codes and warnings that precede or correspond with the system freezes.

Have you opened the case for cleaning and inspection? Double check that all cables, cards, RAM, jumpers. etc. are fully and firmly seated. Blow out dust and debris and ensure that there are no airflow blockages.

==============

C: drive -that is the 120 GB SSD, Windows 7 Boot drive - correct?

How full is C: drive?

Disconnect D: and E: drives one at a time. When the slipping noise stops then you should know which drive is making the noise.

You can also run the applicable drive manufacturer's disk diagnostic tools on each drive. Again, remember that doing so could cause damage and data loss.

 

[popatim]

It's difficult to get a decent benchmark on your boot drive without booting from another drive and then running the benchmark, especially after all these years. Many people do not realize how much stuff is actually accessing your drive or even that their PC is really uploading files (torrents) too.

 

[GuiRitter]

Sorry for the delay. I thought I had enabled email notifications. They are enabled now.

Can you show us the SMART attributes?

CrystalDiskInfo is a better SMART tool, IMHO.

The name of each drive are in the images.

First and foremost: remember that anything you do could cause a drive failure and data loss.

You do have backups - correct?

Yeah, I have backups. The most important stuff are on the cloud. The HDs are pretty full, but I can afford to lose everything.

Update your post to include full system hardware specs including PSU.

Motherboard: Gigabyte H61M-S1
CPU: Intel Core i3-2100
RAM: XTR133D3/4GB, one stick of 4 GB DDR3 RAM *
GPU: nVidia GeForce GTX 550 Ti
PSU: EVGA 500 W 80+

* funny story: went to Google for my memory stick. First thing I found: a post from myself from 2014 from when my mobo went bad...

To find out more about the freezes look in Reliability History/Monitor and Event Viewer for error codes and warnings that precede or correspond with the system freezes.

Reliability History: Interesting! I wasn't aware of this tool. The graph is full of ups and downs, but I recognize mostly everything that it shows. Nothing due to the HDs.

Event Viewer: I already knew this one. Way too much data. Looking at a glance, I couldn't find anything related to hardware. Specifically, Hardware Events is empty.

Have you opened the case for cleaning and inspection? Double check that all cables, cards, RAM, jumpers. etc. are fully and firmly seated. Blow out dust and debris and ensure that there are no airflow blockages.

Yeah, I open it every few months to vacuum the dust and reapply thermal paste, if needed. It gathers a lot of dust where it sits. I always take the opportunity to check all connections.

C: drive -that is the 120 GB SSD, Windows 7 Boot drive - correct?

How full is C: drive?

That's correct. 11,6 GB out of 111 GB. Windows still shows blue.

Disconnect D: and E: drives one at a time. When the slipping noise stops then you should know which drive is making the noise.

Problem is that it doesn't always happen. In fact, it have happened only a few times in the last few months.

You can also run the applicable drive manufacturer's disk diagnostic tools on each drive. Again, remember that doing so could cause damage and data loss.

Will do that in the next few days.

It's difficult to get a decent benchmark on your boot drive without booting from another drive and then running the benchmark, especially after all these years. Many people do not realize how much stuff is actually accessing your drive or even that their PC is really uploading files (torrents) too.

For that, I think I'll need a bootable USB drive with Linux, and then find a good Linux benchmark tool. Will do that later.

 

[Ralston18]

Not sure about the Crystal Disk Info results per se.

But I am wondering why there is no rotation rate data for D:?

Could be Firmware, Standard, or Features related maybe....?

There are other differences in the reported Attribute Names.

I.e., some issue with D: that is not tested/reported.

In any case, maybe just try some new, known working data and power cables before trying other tools.

Determine if the new cables change the Crystal results for either HDD.

 

[GuiRitter]

Hi everyone. Sorry for abandoning this thread, but I got bogged down in higher priority stuff. Now I can continue trying to solve this issue.

For that, I think I'll need a bootable USB drive with Linux, and then find a good Linux benchmark tool. Will do that later.

I used a Live Xubuntu USB to run gnome-disks from the gnome-disk-utility package. Here are the results:

C:

D:

I couldn't measure the write rate because of Error opening /dev/sdb: Device or resource busy (udisks-error-quark, 0).

E:

Not sure about the Crystal Disk Info results per se.

But I am wondering why there is no rotation rate data for D:?

Could be Firmware, Standard, or Features related maybe....?

There are other differences in the reported Attribute Names.

I.e., some issue with D: that is not tested/reported.

In any case, maybe just try some new, known working data and power cables before trying other tools.

Determine if the new cables change the Crystal results for either HDD.

I ran CrystalDiskInfo with the SATA cables swapped. First, every cable to the left. Then, every cable to the right (from the original position). Apparently, nothing important changed, except for 2 warnings on the D: drive that didn't exist before.

I'll post the previous results again to make it easier to compare:

Spoiler: C:

Spoiler: D:

Spoiler: E:

Something that has started happening is that, sometimes, the E: drive disappears from Windows. It comes back after a reboot. It should point out to the fact that the E: drive is the one responsible for my troubles, but it is the D: drive that shows worse results from the tests, so I'm still unsure.

Another thing that happened was a Blue Screen yesterday. However, it restarted automatically and, apparently, it didn't left a log where it was supposed to, so I couldn't search for the error code.

Also, today, after getting these new test results, I booted into C: and it was as slow as if I had booted in the old Windows that's still installed in E:. I turned the PC off, disconnected the power, held the power button for a few seconds, turned it on again and it was as fast as expected for an SSD.

 

[Ralston18]

Starting to wonder about that 500 W PSU....

How old is the PSU? Heavy gaming or production use?

Tally up the wattage requirement for all components. If a wattage range is provided, use the high value.

Use the recommend PSU wattage for the GPU for the GPU's value.

Once the wattages are tallied, add 25% more.

How close is that final total to 500?

 

[GuiRitter]

Starting to wonder about that 500 W PSU....

How old is the PSU? Heavy gaming or production use?

Tally up the wattage requirement for all components. If a wattage range is provided, use the high value.

Use the recommend PSU wattage for the GPU for the GPU's value.

Once the wattages are tallied, add 25% more.

How close is that final total to 500?

I don't think I can figure out when it was purchased, but it's at least 6 years old.

Medium gaming and some programming work.

According to this, the recommended PSU Wattage is 403 W. Adding 25% it hits 503,75 W.

 

[Ralston18]

With that information the PSU is certainly suspect.

You can try disconnecting data drives, maybe try running with just the motherboard's GPU - all in all just running with as small of a power demand as possible.

Hopefully the freezes will diminish and, if so, then the PSU probably needs to be replaced.

If not, the PSU may be too far gone to even handle a reduced load. Likewise warrants replacement.

 

[GuiRitter]

With that information the PSU is certainly suspect.

You can try disconnecting data drives, maybe try running with just the motherboard's GPU - all in all just running with as small of a power demand as possible.

Hopefully the freezes will diminish and, if so, then the PSU probably needs to be replaced.

If not, the PSU may be too far gone to even handle a reduced load. Likewise warrants replacement.

I replaced the PSU for a Cooler Master RS-700-ACAA-B1, 700 Watts. It started buzzing after Windows booted up. After some investigation, I found out that the power cable had arcing damage. Replaced the cable by a brand new one and the buzzing hasn't returned yet.

Will inform if the freezing will return.

 

[SkyNetRising]

Your drives are overheating. You have to improve cooling inside pc case.
40C for a HDD is fine. 50C is too much.

Plus 750GB seagate drive has developed one pending sector. This is not good.

 

[GuiRitter]

Your drives are overheating. You have to improve cooling inside pc case.
40C for a HDD is fine. 50C is too much.

Plus 750GB seagate drive has developed one pending sector. This is not good.

Indeed! I almost burned my hands rellocating them inside the case. I should mention that we've been having some pretty hot days as of lately, something around 35–38 °C . To make matters worse, the room where the case rests gets even hotter.

For the record, all these tests have been performed with the case open, in order to handle the drives as necessary.

Also, I forgot to mention that I thoroughly cleaned the case and everything inside when I installed the new PSU.

About the pending sector, I read about it and it seems like I'll have to replace the D: drive regardless of whether I'll have to replace the E: drive. I recently found someone with a spare drive and I'll look forward to make this replacement. Then we'll see what happens.

Off topic, but, about the PSU, the buzzing came back, but it's intermittent. Mostly it doesn't buzz.

 

[GuiRitter]

Indeed! I almost burned my hands rellocating them inside the case. I should mention that we've been having some pretty hot days as of lately, something around 35–38 °C . To make matters worse, the room where the case rests gets even hotter.

For the record, all these tests have been performed with the case open, in order to handle the drives as necessary.

Also, I forgot to mention that I thoroughly cleaned the case and everything inside when I installed the new PSU.

About the pending sector, I read about it and it seems like I'll have to replace the D: drive regardless of whether I'll have to replace the E: drive. I recently found someone with a spare drive and I'll look forward to make this replacement. Then we'll see what happens.

Off topic, but, about the PSU, the buzzing came back, but it's intermittent. Mostly it doesn't buzz.

The freezing came back.

While I waited until I could get an HD to replace D:, I took the whole case to the shop where I purchased the new PSU to see about the buzzing. After 2 days, it didn't buzz there...

Plus, they reported a blue screen and the SSD stopped being recognized after that...

I got the new HD and replaced D:. While I formatted it using gparted, I noticed that the buzzing changed to a different tone when I moved the slider to set the partition size. If I moved the mouse without moving the slider, or if I moved the mouse by dragging any other window, the buzzing remained in the "default" tone. I removed all peripherals connected to USB ports and the GPU and the buzzing continued.

I'll get a new SSD and install Windows again. Then, I'll see what happens about the freezing. The problem is that I will have replaced two drives, so it might be tricky to rule one or another out.

However, due to COVID-19, tomorrow might be my last chance to purchase a new SSD, since the non essential places are supposed to close starting next Monday.