Question New Motherboard bundle, fresh windows install freezing after startup

[treacle69]

Please help. I've bought a new motherboard, CPU, RAM and freshly installed Windows onto an old laptop M2 SSD and it keeps freezing.

MB: ASUS TUF GAMING B650-PLUS WIFI (BIOS 1636)

CPU: Ryzen 7 7000

RAM: Corsair DDR5 32GB 6000Mhz CL30

GPU (2017): RX 480 8GB

PSU (2017): EVGA SuperNOVA 650 G2

Windows loads, sometimes I can open programs, but sometimes nothing opens, eventually, within minutes, nothing works. I can move my cursor around, but everything else is useless and I have to shutdown.

I have tried with 2 different M2 SSDs. I have tried both with a fresh Windows 11 install, and one with a fresh Windows 10 install. Each resulted in the above description.

Each time after installing everything was working fine. I downloaded Chrome, Steam, Epic, GOG and nothing froze. I downloaded the ASUS Armory crate and installed the drivers and updated Windows, then they ask to restart and that's when the issues start. Also, the latest attempt is failing and I have not install Armory Crate yet. Google says its not recommended.

I have ran Windows Memory Diagnostics and it passed.

Next thing I want to try is update the BIOS version... not sure if that will help, but it's the last thing I can think off.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

 

[rgd1101]

go to ASUS and download the driver from the motherboard supported page
and yes update the bios

 

[treacle69]

I have updated the bios successfully to the latest stable version. I have the drivers on a USB, but I cannot install them without Windows freezing. I'm going to try a fresh install of Windows, as in its current state, I cannot access the drivers on my USB.

 

[treacle69]

Everything is running fine (because I haven't restarted yet) and I'm installing the drivers manually. Windows has also installed some updates which will kick in after the restart. There are some optional driver updates on Windows Update, but I haven't downloaded them in-case they interfere... not sure if it's best to get them before restarting or wait and see? Everything went wrong after restarting last time.

 

[rgd1101]

how old is the ssd?
what size?

 

[treacle69]

how old is the ssd?
what size?

4 years old... about 1 years professional use, and 3 years unused in a box.
256GB

 

[treacle69]

I thought I'd solved it with the drivers. Everything was working and I did many restarts and it kept working.

Somewhere in the second/third Windows install (we're on 4 now) I removed the RAM cards one at a time (always using the A2 slot as recommended for the board) to test if it fixed it. Neither had an impact and it remained broken.

Back to the 4th install and everything is working fine. I did this whole install with only one RAM card. I put the other back in and when I turned the PC back on the problem was back and everything was freezing. This made me assume it was a dodgy RAM card, but I was expecting everything to work again once I removed the dodgy RAM, but it's still broken.

Am I right that it's the RAM card that's corrupted and causing the issues?

Can dodgy RAM corrupt the whole installation and that's why it's still broken now?

Thanks

 

[treacle69]

The freezing is now intermittent... I have no idea what's causing it. I am running tests, including this user benchmark, which doesn't look great: https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/67524091
CPU/RAM are not overclocked, so these results are actually not bad.

 

[rgd1101]

turn on xmp/docp memory profile in bios?
test with the gpu out?
check cpu temp?