Question PC freezing before windows

[CluelessNomad]

Hi,
I've found similar issues in existing threads but have been unable to fix my issue.

I have a new-ish PC with the following hardware:
-AMD Ryzen 5 5800X 3.7 GHz 6-Core Processor
-MSI MAG B550M MORTAR WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard
-Crucial Ballistix 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory
-Corsair SF600 600 W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully Modular SFX Power Supply
-SK Hynix Gold P31 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 3.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive
-MSI 3070 ti GPU

The 5800X is the new part. On the previous CPU (a 5600X), this PC worked just fine. And as an aside, I'm only upgrading because my wife suggested swapping mine out to upgrade her PC, but I digress.

The PC turns on but never gets past the MSI MAG logo. It freezes there - the spinning circle stops and it stays there indefinitely. Other times, the screen never even gets a signal. Every few restarts, it will successfully go into repair mode (blue, Windows interface) and gives me the option to restart or advanced options. I can get into the bios by pressing delete, and I can see that the new CPU is recognized.

I have tried:

• Resetting the CMOS. This motherboard has both a CMOS and BIOS reset switch on the back. The CMOS battery and jumper themselves are inaccessible under a shroud I cannot seem to remove (it's an SFF motherboard). But there's an audible click when I reset it using the buttons.
• Updating the bios to the latest version (after doing the above reset). I can confirm in the bios that the new version installed.
• 1 RAM stick. 1 storage drive.

I have not yet tried:
- Going back to my old CPU. I need thermal paste.

I feel like I'm out of options to work on the motherboard in the meantime. Anything else I can try?

Thanks for any help.

 

[Nephern]

try each ram stick in the A2 slot, you could try moving that drive to another computer, you could check a wattage overload as that 600w does not seem sufficient for a 3070 ti.

i believe that the new cpu you chose uses about 20 more watts than the old one.

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

Corsair SF600 is a little light for your setup.

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

I would go to the 850w range.

 

[Nephern]

i agree.

 

[CluelessNomad]

All of you might be right about power draw when it ramps up (gaming, etc.), but it peaks at only 109 Watts from the wall during start-up. Just tested it - it doesn't seem to be a lack of power that's causing the freeze (it may be a problem otherwise - thanks).

 

[CluelessNomad]

try each ram stick in the A2 slot, you could try moving that drive to another computer, you could check a wattage overload as that 600w does not seem sufficient for a 3070 ti.

i believe that the new cpu you chose uses about 20 more watts than the old one.

I tried swapping the two RAM sticks into A2 - no dice.

The SSD also works fine in my wife's computer.

And as I noted in my other comment - power draw doesn't get anywhere close to the PSU's rated 600W.

Thanks for the suggestions!

 

[Nephern]

Well even if it doesnt get close to the psu rating that psu will cause problems in the future with that cpu and gpu, 850w is the way to go.

 

[CluelessNomad]

Well even if it doesnt get close to the psu rating that psu will cause problems in the future with that cpu and gpu, 850w is the way to go.

Yes, I agree. Like I said - that's a separate problem and I'll look into it more once I'm into windows and see what my power draw gets to.

Right now, I'm hoping for advice about the stuck bios/windows transition.

 

[Nephern]

are you using an nvme, ssd or hdd?

 

[CluelessNomad]

are you using an nvme, ssd or hdd?

I'm using an NVME SSD in one of the motherboard's M.2 slots. I've moved it between the two slots to see if it would boot - no.

 

[Nephern]

what nvme is it?

 

[CluelessNomad]

It's a SK Hynix Gold P31 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 3.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive

 

[Nephern]

have you tested the nvme in another system?

 

[CluelessNomad]

Yes, I have. It gets to Windows in a diferent system.

 

[CluelessNomad]

An update since yesterday - I reinstalled my previous CPU (5600X) and the PC still fails to start. I'm therefore moving away from suspecting the CPU is at fault. Somehow the bios software was messed up when I switched the CPU, and now it remains broken. Or I physically damaged the MB during the installation, though I was exceedingly careful.

Any advice for reinstalling the bios on a board that has a bios reset button? I think I'll try again to reinstall the newest bios.

 

[CluelessNomad]

And my final update: flashing and re-flashing the bios lead me nowhere. So either a hardware fault or Windows related. Windows should have been fine because I booted into this SSD on another computer just fine - the installation wasn't corrupted.

But I couldn't 'repair' the Windows install at all in Windows recovery mode - not by rolling back the updates, not by resetting it. It all failed. So I downloaded Windows onto a flash drive and reinstalled it, even though the SSD worked just fine in another system. It worked.

My BEST GUESS is that the CPU swap somehow corrupted the TPM or something, breaking the handoff between the bios and Windows. Heck if I know.

 

[Nephern]

You need to install the newest bios to run your new cpu, depending on what bios is on the mobo it can interfere with drivers or other things.

 

[CluelessNomad]

You need to install the newest bios to run your new cpu, depending on what bios is on the mobo it can interfere with drivers or other things.

Thanks for your reply. The newest bios was not the solution in this case, though that is what I suspected at first as well.