Question Huge Problem - PC Freezes On Prime95 Test - Which Component Is Culprit?

[LunkerHead]

I just upgraded from my old Asus MB M5A78L-M PLUS to a new (used) Asus 970 Pro Gaming Aura MB. They are both AM3+ socket boards. I have Windows 10 on the M.2 socket and a separate SATA SSD with Windows 7 on it and they both freeze up when running Prime95 (getting set to overclock).

Asus 970 Pro Gaming (AM3+ socket)
AMD FX-8350 (used ebay)
32 GB of DDR3 1866MHz
AMD Radeon RX 6600 (8GB memory)
PSU - Thermaltake 750W

I am using a used CPU I got off ebay - AMD FX-8350. I kind of suspect the CPU. AND I actually have another AMD FX-8350 from my original build that I know for a fact never got overheated and never got fried. I wanted to try the used CPU on my new build before I used my original CPU. But, everything is running sort of fine with the used CPU. Not great though. Some normal programs get slow and almost freeze up the works on just normal CPU usage.

Looking for answers someone mentioned that video reserved RAM setting may be causing the problem. So I switched out my new Radeon RX 6600 with my old video card - Radeon Visiontek card - with 1GB RAM. Still got freezing.

I tried many iterations of settings in the BIOS. Default, Turbo Core on/off, and many others. No bueno.

I also suspected IRQ settings but I don't know much about that.

Is it possible that someone overheated the used CPU that I bought but it still functions somewhat on a low level?

The RAM is brand new I can't imagine that's the problem. And the video card is brand new.

On my old build I had the AMD FX-8350 successfully overclocked to 4.3GHz on the ASUS M5A78L-M PLUS nice and stable and it ran like that for 3 years or more. No problems at all. Now I got a killer MB, Killer RAM, and a Killer Video Card and I can't even get the PC to run Prime95 for more than 15 seconds before it freezes the whole PC.

Update: Problem solved. I went ahead and did what I should have done before I posted. I changed the CPU to my old one that I bought brand new back in the day. No more freezing. Everything runs fast as mess now.

The used CPU must have had some damaged cores from overclocking. Lesson learned. Tell your friends. Never buy a used CPU. You never know how bad it was abused.

 

[kanewolf]

I just upgraded from my old Asus MB M5A78L-M PLUS to a new (used) Asus 970 Pro Gaming Aura MB. They are both AM3+ socket boards. I have Windows 10 on the M.2 socket and a separate SATA SSD with Windows 7 on it and they both freeze up when running Prime95 (getting set to overclock).

Asus 970 Pro Gaming (AM3+ socket)
AMD FX-8350 (used ebay)
32 GB of DDR3 1866MHz
AMD Radeon RX 6600 (8GB memory)
PSU - Thermaltake 750W

I am using a used CPU I got off ebay - AMD FX-8350. I kind of suspect the CPU. AND I actually have another AMD FX-8350 from my original build that I know for a fact never got overheated and never got fried. I wanted to try the used CPU on my new build before I used my original CPU. But, everything is running sort of fine with the used CPU. Not great though. Some normal programs get slow and almost freeze up the works on just normal CPU usage.

Looking for answers someone mentioned that video reserved RAM setting may be causing the problem. So I switched out my new Radeon RX 6600 with my old video card - Radeon Visiontek card - with 1GB RAM. Still got freezing.

I tried many iterations of settings in the BIOS. Default, Turbo Core on/off, and many others. No bueno.

I also suspected IRQ settings but I don't know much about that.

Is it possible that someone overheated the used CPU that I bought but it still functions somewhat on a low level?

The RAM is brand new I can't imagine that's the problem. And the video card is brand new.

On my old build I had the AMD FX-8350 successfully overclocked to 4.3GHz on the ASUS M5A78L-M PLUS nice and stable and it ran like that for 3 years or more. No problems at all. Now I got a killer MB, Killer RAM, and a Killer Video Card and I can't even get the PC to run Prime95 for more than 15 seconds before it freezes the whole PC.

Update: Problem solved. I went ahead and did what I should have done before I posted. I changed the CPU to my old one that I bought brand new back in the day. No more freezing. Everything runs fast as mess now.

The used CPU must have had some damaged cores from overclocking. Lesson learned. Tell your friends. Never buy a used CPU. You never know how bad it was abused.

I would start by simplifying. Drop to a single DIMM. That should eliminate memory as the culprit.

 

[DSzymborski]

Used CPUs tend to be pretty dependable. You were unlucky in this case.

I do have to admit the whole build confuses me and I have so many questions; why is an RX 6600 being used with a platform from 2012? Why did you buy a used FX-8350 when you already had one? Why are you putting money in a platform this old with a motherboard upgrade?

Though in the end, it only matters that you're happy. Just one of the odder builds I've seen this year, so I was curious if there was a purpose here I'm not grasping.

 

[Misgar]

Most of the used CPUs I buy on eBay are fine. You obviously got stuck with a "lemon". Mind you the FX-8350 is a power hungry beast, so more likely to have suffered damage from overheating or ESD.

When your second hand CPU arrived in the post, was it packed in an ESD (anti-static) plastic clamshell or an ESD bag (good), or wrapped in static inducing bubble wrap (bad).

ESD damage is insidious and some people don't know about (or can't be bothered with) correct ESD handling procedure when posting used CPUs and RAM.

So saying, most of the CPUs and RAM I've received in bubble wrap (no ESD bag) have worked, but you never know when they're going to drop dead.

 

[LunkerHead]

Used CPUs tend to be pretty dependable. You were unlucky in this case.

I do have to admit the whole build confuses me and I have so many questions; why is an RX 6600 being used with a platform from 2012? Why did you buy a used FX-8350 when you already had one? Why are you putting money in a platform this old with a motherboard upgrade?

Though in the end, it only matters that you're happy. Just one of the odder builds I've seen this year, so I was curious if there was a purpose here I'm not grasping.

Well you asked for it, so here's the story. The thing is my son was having problems running some PC games on his old rig about 2 years ago. Yeah, this starts back 2 years ago. At the time we both had rigs with the ASUS M5A7 Plus MB and FX-8350 CPU's. So when he told be he was having problems I wanted to help him upgrade his PC with the least amount of cash instead of him throwing down like over 1k for a better PC. So, without even asking/telling him I thought the least costly upgrade would be to keep the FX-8350 CPU and upgrade to a board with an M.2 slot that had the AM3+ CPU socket. That turned out to be the ASUS 970 Pro Gaming MB. So without telling my son about it I bought an ASUS 970 MB used off Newegg, 32GB's of RAM for it and a SATA SSD (around $500) and not even a M.2 HDD yet as I wanted to see if the SATA SSD would be enough. I figured the NVidia video card he had was ok.

Well in the meantime he decides to buy a rig from a friend of his that was way better than the one he had. Consequently those new PC parts have sat around unused in their boxes for 2 years. I just decided a couple weeks to go ahead and use those parts to either build a secondary rig or just yank my old board and use the new parts for a 1 rig upgrade. Instead of having two rigs I just decided to upgrade my current PC with the "upgrade" parts and went ahead and got an M.2 HDD for it also. I reused my old case, CPU and PSU but the video card I had was way WAY old. A Radeon Visiontek with 1GB of memory that I bought back in 2013 for our very first build. So that's why I bought the Gigabyte RX 6600 video card. It was only $200 which is pretty cheap for a VC these days and it's a massive upgrade compared to old Radeon Visiontek

So why did I buy a used FX-8350 when I already had one? At first I decided that I was gonna build a separate rig with the parts that I bought for my son and have two rigs so I went ahead and got another FX-8350 off ebay. Then... I changed my mind and decided to yank my old board and use the new parts to upgrade my rig and have only 1 rig. So now I've put those parts to use that were sitting around for so long and I have a better PC.

It's pretty nice rig for my world....

BTW, I hung onto Windows7 all the way up until I upgraded the rig with those parts a couple weeks ago. I hated Windows10. Now I'm running Windows10 on my upgraded rig and I've found out MS is gonna cease updates for it in 2022 haha. I don't know if you can tell but I hate change.

 

[LunkerHead]

Most of the used CPUs I buy on eBay are fine. You obviously got stuck with a "lemon". Mind you the FX-8350 is a power hungry beast, so more likely to have suffered damage from overheating or ESD.

When your second hand CPU arrived in the post, was it packed in an ESD (anti-static) plastic clamshell or an ESD bag (good), or wrapped in static inducing bubble wrap (bad).

ESD damage is insidious and some people don't know about (or can't be bothered with) correct ESD handling procedure when posting used CPUs and RAM.

So saying, most of the CPUs and RAM I've received in bubble wrap (no ESD bag) have worked, but you never know when they're going to drop dead.

Yeah it was actually wrapped in an anti-static bag. It actually worked ok except when I hit with Prime95. I hated to do it but I actually threw it in the trash. I can't re-sell something that I know is defective. I ain't like that.

 

[LunkerHead]

I would start by simplifying. Drop to a single DIMM. That should eliminate memory as the culprit.

I ran Memtest86 on the RAM from a boot disk and got no errors so then I knew it had to be the CPU.