Never ending BSOD & reboot cycle

[bitcoinhodler89]

Hi,
Looking for some help with my PC... Windows 10 Professional but I'm not sure the OS is relevant anymore (see below).

It seems to have crashed yesterday and so I booted it up again and it worked no problem.
A few hours later it crashed again... I tried to boot it up but it is stuck in a continual reboot cycle.
Pressing power results in the power light turning on and a beep. A few seconds later there is 1 more beep that I don't believe it's typically had before. But this does not correspond to anything in the manual and there are no lights that flash up suggesting an issue either.
It will POST, and starts to load the OS and shortly after will crash to a BSOD repeatedly with a different error code each time. I have gotten to the login screen once after multiple multiple tries.
Some codes I've seen:

APC INDEX MISMATCH
KERNEL AUTO BOOST LOCK ACQUISITION RAISED WITH IQRL
CRITICAL PROCESS DIED
UNEXPECTED STORE EXCEPTION
Googling these codes have left me with no fix that has worked.

What I've tried so far:
- I tried the hard drive on another PC and it booted no problem so I'm thinking by that it isn't an issue of the hard drive.
- I "repaired" that same drive with a Windows restore USB drive
- I've also tried to boot a Windows restore USB drive with Windows 10 on the trouble computer but I get a BSOD even when attempting to load that.... which makes me think it is a hardware failure? I tried to boot from the Windows USB key with no hard drive plugged in and same thing.
- I can't get the PC to boot in Safe Mode to try that if it is a driver/software issue.
- I also tried to boot with nothing plugged in, graphics card removed, using internal graphics, same issue.
- I can load the BIOS and play with settings no problem, I flashed my BIOS to the latest revision but no fix.

At this point I'm suspecting either RAM or CPU... anyone have any experience with something like this?
Is it possible for it to POST if there is an issue with either but not to the point they've failed and won't POST?
System was over clocked but the BIOS flash removed the OC and again, same issues.

Thanks for any help or suggestions. I will try switching out the RAM (I believe I have another stick I can try in its place) when I get home today, but I can't really try a new CPU as I don't have another i7 8700k lying around (or a similar socket CPU)....

 

[flobernd]

It's definitely a hardware fault, if the system boots without any problem in another PC and fails to boot from a USB drive on the other hand. But you just might have been lucky ... do you use an Intel SSD? There were massive problems with the latest Win 10 Build 1803 update.

If the system works with the replacement RAM, then you should try to remove all RAM bars except for one at a time. It might just be a single defective stick. A memcheck might be helpful as well.

 

[bitcoinhodler89]

It's definitely a hardware fault, if the system boots without any problem in another PC and fails to boot from a USB drive on the other hand. But you just might have been lucky ... do you use an Intel SSD? There were massive problems with the latest Win 10 Build 1803 update.

If the system works with the replacement RAM, then you should try to remove all RAM bars except for one at a time. It might just be a single defective stick. A memcheck might be helpful as well.

I am using a 7200 RPM 1 TB HDD.
I only have 1 stick of RAM in this PC so hoping I have a similar stick in another PC at home I can swap it out with and try... Is it possible to do a memcheck without being able to boot into anything? Not even command prompt on a USB Windows stick?

 

[flobernd]

You should definitely give it a try. The memtest86 tool should still work (if it's not your CPU that is defective).

 

[bitcoinhodler89]

You should definitely give it a try. The memtest86 tool should still work (if it's not your CPU that is defective).

Oh cool, I can boot it from a USB drive. I'll try that as well and see what happens. If I'm unable to boot into this then I'd think it is my CPU...

 

[bitcoinhodler89]

You should definitely give it a try. The memtest86 tool should still work (if it's not your CPU that is defective).

Hey so I’m running memtest right now. Did a first pass on the only 8GB stick in this machine with no errors.
The program also hasn’t crashed which I guess is a good sign for the CPU? But that leaves me not knowing anything else. I do actually have another 1151 socket CPU but it’s installed in another computer and I don’t want to have to remove heat sinks, paste, etc from both just to try it.. :S

 

[bitcoinhodler89]

I have tried memtest.
I have tried changing the ram stick for a good one.
I have tried stresslinux but it seems to freeze and I can’t run any diagnostics.
I have tried reseating the CPU.
Tried another 1151 socket CPU however it didn’t boot because it’s Skylake in a Coffee Lake MOBO. Oops.
I’ve just tried the Intel Processor Diagnostic Test and it seems to hang up here: https://i.imgur.com/nlR06oy.jpg
Anyone have any ideas? It seems like it had stopped somewhere it shouldn’t have.
Not sure what to try from here. I think it’s either CPU or MOBO.
Edit: just tried a working PSU. No change. Isolated to CPU or MOBO...

 

[bitcoinhodler89]

Solved.
i7 8700K CPU died I guess.
Swapped for a cheap G4900 and no boot issues.