[SOLVED] Pc constantly resetting, is my CPU the issue ?

Apr 1, 2020
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Video of the issue
Hey all. I've tried creating a post on reddit, and linustechtips, but didnt receive much help. I've tried testing multiple things, except the cpu because I do not have another am4 cpu to test, and just about everything near me is closed so I cant take my PC anywhere to test maybe a new cpu. I ordered a new mobo and rmaed my old one, new mobo did not fix the issue. Down below will be a copy and paste of my description I've put on reddit and LTT, I will also include a link to the video I made of the problem. Thanks in advanced.

Hey all. So little background on the issue. Basically I built this PC 2-3 weeks ago, didnt have any issues except when installing windows 10. I had to sideload the wifi driver to stop it from not starting up all the way. (Found that solution online). Once I had windows 10, all was great since then. About a few days ago, I was live streaming some Diablo 3, when all of a sudden my pc reset maybe, 1 hr 30 minutes into the stream? Tried it again 2 more times, and it reset during stream again, so I tried playing some diablo 3 without streaming and it reset again. So I turned it off, and decided to go to bed. Fast forward to the next day, I played some more diablo 3 but didnt stream too see if the issue would happen, it didnt. (Yay) went to bed that night, went to work the next day. Got home and fired up some Borderlands 3 to play the new DLC 2. Played through the DLC fine without any issues. Farmed some gear, then realized that there was an increased legendary drop rate in MALIWAN Takedwon mode so I thought eh why not farm that for some new 57 gear. Ends in a few days. Had a few runs of that, then we started another and the game froze about 30 seconds into the run, pc didnt reset because on my 2nd monitor I had music playing, and I could see the time still counting down for the number of minutes and seconds left on the current song, so I opened up task manager and closed BL3, reopened it and all was fine for next few hours. Went to bed, and the following day I decided to stream some BL3. (This is now last night where the nightmare begain). Fired it up, went on a different character and farmed a boss from level 53 to 57 while streaming, all was fine. Decided to matchmake for some Takedown, and the game starts crashing. Immediately to desktop, it showed the box that asked if I wanted to submit a crash report so I did. This happened 3 more times almost immediately after loading into the game. So i said screw it, I'm resetting windows. I had an initial feeling that armory crate was causing the reboots of the pc the first go around because that was the ONLY thing that showed an update in event viewer. So decided to redo windows. And since I dont use armory crate I ticked it off in bios so it wouldn't download and install it when I got to the desktop of windows 10. Well now I've got the windows 10 wiped, but I cant install windows 10. No matter what I try, the PC resets during loading, which I basically explain in the video. So sorry for the run on, I just wanted to make sure I could give every possible detail that I can think of. Part list will be down below, I just built this thing 2-3 weeks ago, and it just upsets me a bit since I did spend alot of money on this rig, so again I'm sorry for the run on of details. Just wanted to make sure I stated everything I could remember.
Part list
Mobo- Asus X570 Tuf Gaming Plus (WIFI)
New mobo is Asus ROG Crosshair Hero VIII (Non wifi)
RAM- Trident Z Neo 16 gb kit. (Yes its compatible with ryxen 3900x) if anyone needs the link to the ram, I can provide the link after. Currently on my phone now since I dont have a desktop at the moment
PSU- Corsair RMX 850
GPU- carried over from my old rig GTX EVGA 1070 TI Hybrid SC (roughly 2 years old. Also tried my moms GTX 760 maybe I had a faulty gpu, but same issue comes from it)
CPU- Ryzen 3900x
CPU cooler- Corsair H115i Platinum
If I forgot anything please ask, I will list it asap!
I am going to be calling best buy today at noon when they open in about 20 minutes to see if I can bring them my PC Friday, perhaps they can determine which part is faulty and is causing this. I posted this because maybe you people will have more knowledge than myself, so I could potentially try anything else until I take my PC to best buy friday. Thanks everyone in advanced.

Edit: This post was also posted on reddit, trying to find all of the help I can get. Not sure what to test anymore since I don't really have any other parts I can test with this setup. Also I can't go to best buy due to COVID-19, I did not even think of that, or realize they aren't allowing customers into there store. I am just so upset over this, im not really thinking clearly I guess. I don't think I can RMA whichever part is faulty either, they were all bought back in Febuary ish because I bought parts over time. I am leaning towards the MOBO or PSU as being the issue, I can't really see it being the CPU, I JUST took it out to inspect it, all pins look fine to what I can see. Temps are fine, 36 ish C in bios, and temps were fine as well when my PC was working. 55 ish while gaming in games like Diablo 3, Borderlands 3 & SWTOR. Thanks IA everyone.
 
Solution
Well, any overclocking options will give your system potential instability. Why would you need it on to install windows in the first place. First culprit of instability is cpu or power related. All of your parts are quality. Chance of them being an issue are extremely slim. Bios settings are very numerous and detailed, especially with higher end boards. It’s very important to go through and check all of the options and know what is on and off and what it does.
Apr 1, 2020
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Did you watch the video ? If not please watch it. I cant boot from anything, so I cant even install windows 10 because the pc constantly resets during the boot process of windows 10, or the bootable windows 10 usb to install. Video explains the issue better than my description does.
 
Apr 1, 2020
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Tried a fresh instal of Windows to ensure it’s not a bad install? And if you changed motherboards you should reinstall anyway to prevent driver conflicts.
Also I can sit in bios fine for hours on end, literally only resets when trying to boot something. Windows HDD, or usb.
 
Apr 1, 2020
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So I went into bios and disabled PBO (Prescison Boost Overdrive). There was 3 different sections for it, I disabled them all, as well as the Auto CPU Boost. So far now windows usb boots and I am installing windows to my NVME, I will test the features 1 at a time later and see which one causes the issue. Will post back later, if anyone has any thoughts as to why PBO or auto boost would cause this issue, please write away your thoughts. Also I changed bolted voltage from auto which was reading anywhere from 1.4 to 1.48 volts, to 1.325. Thanks in advanced
 
Well, any overclocking options will give your system potential instability. Why would you need it on to install windows in the first place. First culprit of instability is cpu or power related. All of your parts are quality. Chance of them being an issue are extremely slim. Bios settings are very numerous and detailed, especially with higher end boards. It’s very important to go through and check all of the options and know what is on and off and what it does.
 
Solution
Apr 1, 2020
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Well, any overclocking options will give your system potential instability. Why would you need it on to install windows in the first place. First culprit of instability is cpu or power related. All of your parts are quality. Chance of them being an issue are extremely slim. Bios settings are very numerous and detailed, especially with higher end boards. It’s very important to go through and check all of the options and know what is on and off and what it does.
I understand this. But it seems very weird that this was my issue. Pbo is on by default on both my boards, why work for 2 ish weeks and then give me issues ? I am 100% positive it is pbo as I disabled some other OC stuff from auto to disabled, and then put those back on auto(except docp for ram) and all seems to work fine, except pbo. Once that's set to auto, my pc goes to <Mod Edit> and infinite loop of boots again. I was just curious as to why I guess this seems to be my issue when it worked fine for 2 weeks, I didnt know about the feature in bios until I was poking about. Thanks for the reply! Also i see alot of mixed reviews online, people saying auto voltage is fine for 3900x, some say no more than 1 3 volts, I have 1.325 set, think this is fine? CPU temp is idle around 36-40. Same as it was 2 weeks ago when the build was working fine
 
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I understand this. But it seems very weird that this was my issue. Pbo is on by default on both my boards, why work for 2 ish weeks and then give me issues ? I am 100% positive it is pbo as I disabled some other OC stuff from auto to disabled, and then put those back on auto(except docp for ram) and all seems to work fine, except pbo. Once that's set to auto, my pc goes to <Mod Edit> and infinite loop of boots again. I was just curious as to why I guess this seems to be my issue when it worked fine for 2 weeks, I didnt know about the feature in bios until I was poking about. Thanks for the reply! Also i see alot of mixed reviews online, people saying auto voltage is fine for 3900x, some say no more than 1 3 volts, I have 1.325 set, think this is fine? CPU temp is idle around 36-40. Same as it was 2 weeks ago when the build was working fine
With as many features as they put in the bios now there’s no telling. Each CPU acts completely different as well, RAM could be a hang up on XMP, no telling. You just have to mess around with each setting and find what works best. Anything over stock is an overclock and they aren’t guaranteed to work. Sometimes you get lucky and everything works out if the box, sometimes things need tweaking and sometimes things work for a bit and then something goes wrong. Could have been partially unstable before but didn’t show it, really nobody knows lol.
 
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Apr 1, 2020
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With as many features as they put in the bios now there’s no telling. Each CPU acts completely different as well, RAM could be a hang up on XMP, no telling. You just have to mess around with each setting and find what works best. Anything over stock is an overclock and they aren’t guaranteed to work. Sometimes you get lucky and everything works out if the box, sometimes things need tweaking and sometimes things work for a bit and then something goes wrong. Could have been partially unstable before but didn’t show it, really nobody knows lol.
Alright. Appreciate the feedback and input! I will continue to hope that this is my issue as it seems to be. Also wont pbo being disabled though mean that my CPU wont boost to 4 3 anymore? 🤞🤞
 
Alright. Appreciate the feedback and input! I will continue to hope that this is my issue as it seems to be. Also wont pbo being disabled though mean that my CPU wont boost to 4 3 anymore? 🤞🤞
PBO is a more intelligent boosting. I’m not a big Ryzen expert as I’ve only owned intel so far. You should be able to still have it boost just not with PBO. You can also set it to a static speed if you wanted which is what most overclockers do. I am about to be working for a while but I’ll look more into it after wards and see what I can come up with for you.
 
Apr 1, 2020
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PBO is a more intelligent boosting. I’m not a big Ryzen expert as I’ve only owned intel so far. You should be able to still have it boost just not with PBO. You can also set it to a static speed if you wanted which is what most overclockers do. I am about to be working for a while but I’ll look more into it after wards and see what I can come up with for you.
Much appreciated
 
Apr 1, 2020
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Couple of thoughts. 1. Have you connected both the 8 pin AND 4 pin CPU power cables? 2. New bios update on 3/3/2020, did you install this?
I do not have the additional 4 pin cpu, just the 8 pin. I read online, and even in my motherboard manual that that was for the extreme overclocking. Yes I have the new bios installed. I do believe that my cpu is the issue. Pbo being off made it work for a little bit, but I also had to disable auto boost for the cpu other wise itd just reset again after a bit. So my cpu wont boost last 3800 mhz. I believe that my cpu is defective, and perhaps after 2 weeks of usage something went wrong, even without any OC stuff, the chip should have no issues auto boosting to its advertised boost speeds, but I had to disable that to make the system run stable.
 
I do not have the additional 4 pin cpu, just the 8 pin. I read online, and even in my motherboard manual that that was for the extreme overclocking. Yes I have the new bios installed. I do believe that my cpu is the issue. Pbo being off made it work for a little bit, but I also had to disable auto boost for the cpu other wise itd just reset again after a bit. So my cpu wont boost last 3800 mhz. I believe that my cpu is defective, and perhaps after 2 weeks of usage something went wrong, even without any OC stuff, the chip should have no issues auto boosting to its advertised boost speeds, but I had to disable that to make the system run stable.
I mean, it’s kinda unfair to state your CPU is the problem but you haven’t tried using both power connectors that go to it. Will that solve your problem, possibly not but idk why anyone wouldn’t try it. Mine has 2 8 pin for my 9900k and you best believe I plugged them both in. Your power supply has the connectors, why wouldn’t you use them?
 
Apr 1, 2020
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I mean, it’s kinda unfair to state your CPU is the problem but you haven’t tried using both power connectors that go to it. Will that solve your problem, possibly not but idk why anyone wouldn’t try it. Mine has 2 8 pin for my 9900k and you best believe I plugged them both in. Your power supply has the connectors, why wouldn’t you use them?
I didnt use both of them because my PSU didnt come with a 4 pi
I mean, it’s kinda unfair to state your CPU is the problem but you haven’t tried using both power connectors that go to it. Will that solve your problem, possibly not but idk why anyone wouldn’t try it. Mine has 2 8 pin for my 9900k and you best believe I plugged them both in. Your power supply has the connectors, why wouldn’t you use them?
Well my PSU didnt come with the 4 pin cable, just the 8 pin cpu power one, I'd have to buy the 4 pin online separately if I wanted too test that, but according to what others say and the manual, it is not needed. It is just there for extreme overclocking. My cpu out of the box should have no issues auto boosting to the advertised boost speeds, so perhaps I just received a bad one, and it only lasted me 2 weeks.
 
I didnt use both of them because my PSU didnt come with a 4 pi

Well my PSU didnt come with the 4 pin cable, just the 8 pin cpu power one, I'd have to buy the 4 pin online separately if I wanted too test that, but according to what others say and the manual, it is not needed. It is just there for extreme overclocking. My cpu out of the box should have no issues auto boosting to the advertised boost speeds, so perhaps I just received a bad one, and it only lasted me 2 weeks.
Getting a “bad” processor is about as rare as winning the lottery. An 850 watt PSU should have 2 CPU 8 pin cables, it won’t have a 4 pin you are right. You connect half of the 2nd 8 pin. If it TRULY didn’t come with one, which I seriously doubt, another reason I’d only buy Seasonic power supplies. Guess you can RMA your CPU and see what luck you have with a 2nd one.
 
Apr 1, 2020
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Getting a “bad” processor is about as rare as winning the lottery. An 850 watt PSU should have 2 CPU 8 pin cables, it won’t have a 4 pin you are right. You connect half of the 2nd 8 pin. If it TRULY didn’t come with one, which I seriously doubt, another reason I’d only buy Seasonic power supplies. Guess you can RMA your CPU and see what luck you have with a 2nd one.
I did not know I could use half the 2nd 8 pin. I will give that a shot later and let you know.
 

Hutcheh

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Nov 29, 2014
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I was having a similar issue a few weeks ago with my brothers computer. It ended up being a bad storage drive. I watched your video and noticed that there were still some bootable drives attached to the system. Try removing them all and only using the USB.

With the issue we were having, even if we selected the USB as the boot drive, the computer would attempt to start and restart in the same manner.

EDIT: It wasn't until we removed all of the storage drives and tried to boot from the USB that we noticed that it would boot normally.
 

Hutcheh

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Nov 29, 2014
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If you’re installing windows yeah only the hard drive your installing to should be hooked up.

I agree with you. In our case though the computer had been running fine for almost 6 years. It wasn't until we removed all of the drives and only had the USB boot drive installed that we could get it to boot. Then we used trial and error to find the bad drive.