PC Freezes for no apparent reason ?

[ihsaan96]

Okay now at this very moment I'm VERY annoyed. So basically here are the specs:

AMD FX 4170 @4.2Ghz
AsRock 990FX Extreme3
XFX Radeon 6790
OCZ Agility 3 SSD 60GB
1TB Seagate Barracuda
500W OCZ ModXStream Pro

So what's happening? Well basically when I'm using the browser or just the internet etc the PC suddenly freezes , all the music etc in the background is still playing but then the PC freezes or the screen turns to grey screen with light grey vertical lines , or it just blacks out. And then I get no display for quite a while so I have to turn off the PC and leave it for a while then it comes back. I've been changing the parts to see what is culprit but not able to find out yet ? Anyone help me ? Really irritated by this !

Thanks in advance

 

[Bromeh]

I would say it's a driver issue or a graphic card issue, try with no graphic card if you have a onboard video or another graphic card (Nvidia if possible). AMD drivers are not that good ...

If that dosen't solve the problem it may be because of that psu (your processor is overclocked + high end video card + 2HDD = more than 500W) Your graphic card needs 500W MINIMUM so with that overclocking you are absolutely getting over it

If it's nothing of the above, put everything on another board and try it

If you can't afford another psu and it's the problem just get down your overclock a bit to the normal clocks, vcore too

 

[ihsaan96]

Hi mate thanks for the message. My CPU isn't overclocked , that's the stock speed and I used a calculator and the max my system should be taking in is about 400W. I'm using a Nvidia card at the moment but the system did freeze once but come back on. I'll be running it for a little while longer taking out different parts to see what's wrong. I THINK it might be one of my sticks of ram. Not sure though.

Thanks

 

[Bromeh]

Try another psu bigger than 500W then

maybe that Nvidia card needs 500W, try a cheaper card instead or try with on board video ... if it still do the same MAYBE that's because your windows is unstable because of the power supply you used whit that amd card ... if you have the possibilty and the time, reinstall windows and see if something changes


i wouldn't be using a 500W in a gaming rig that requires 500W minimum that's crazy and reduce your psu life a lot, 700W minimum


ahh yeah and those calculator are not so precise i wouldn't trust them

 

[iam2thecrowe]

check temps with HWmonitor. make sure nothing is overheating. I would say its probably faulty RAM. Try re-seat the ram in the slots first. Then try removing one stick and see how it runs, if it fails, try the other stick. There is a tool called memtest86+ that can find ram faults, although its not lways 100% accurate its pretty good.

 

[ihsaan96]

@Bromeh I'm using a pretty old Nvidia card so I know that is taking barely any power. Like it's a REALLY old card. Windows can't be stable since I did a clean install of Windows 7...and have done a new install of Windows 8 today. Like I said the MAX it should actually be taking is 400W so I still have 100W spare.

@iam2thecrowe my temperatures are fine my idle is 33 degrees. I'm thinking that it's faulty ram as I've taken a stick out and so far running fine. I'm going to put back in my AMD card and see if the PC freezes anymore. Hopefully it's the ram as it's cheaper than a new card + I used memtest86+ and did one run and found no problems. Take a long time though.

 

[Bromeh]

What is your ram brand and speed ? It might have compatibility issues ... If it keeps doing it it's the motherboard or windows itself .... wrong drivers can cause everything ....

 

[ihsaan96]

It's Corsair XMS3 2000Mhz CL 9-10-9-27 1.65

so far the system is running fine now with one stick. So I THINK that I've found the the faulty stick but not sure yet.

 

[Bromeh]

your motherboard support that kind of ram right ? and did you used it in dual channel ?

 

[ihsaan96]

Yeah my motherboard supports this kind of ram I checked & yeah it's running in dual channel mode.

 

[Bromeh]

i'm not a pro in ram but if the processor dosen't support more than 1600mhz ram, shouldn't the 2000mhz not be working ok ?

 

[ihsaan96]

The system underclocked my ram to 1333Mhz so should be running fine. Even when it's running at 2000Mhz the system would crash anyway. So not sure why , but seems that one of the sticks are defective.

 

[Bromeh]

well since it's 2000 in 1333 there might be compatibility issued

at that point is it working well with one stick ? if it runs for more than an hour with that one stick try the other one to see if that's because of the ram, or because of a dimm port 😛

Hope it helps

 

[ihsaan96]

Yeah so far the stick is running the PC fine. Although chrome does freeze sometimes. I'm going to run it back at 1800Mhz~ and then see what happens.

Thanks !