[SOLVED] PC randomly crashing since CPU/Mobo upgrade

[P_Lav]

A couple months ago I upgraded my PC from a i5 3570k to a i5 9600k. The CPU, and motherboard were sourced locally off Kijiji. At the same time I bought new DDR4 3200 mHz RAM, and a 1TB NVMe M.2 SSD. Since then I've experienced constant hard crashing/freezing. The screen will stay on, but frozen at what it was last displaying, my RGB will also freeze. Only a manual shut down by holding the PWR button will reset the system. It sometimes will go days without crashing, or happen 4 or 5 times during an hour, it doesn't seem to matter the load or the task, but I did experience more crashes while trying to play Space Engineers last week, it would consistently crash after 10 minutes or so. That's what sparked my latest attempt to fix this, otherwise I've just lived with it for the past month or so. The only fault I've managed to find so far was the #2 SATA connectors on the mobo will not detect the drive.

What I've tried:
Re-applying Thermal compound, and inspected the CPU/mobo pins
Removing one stick of RAM at a time and swapping DIMM slots (either stick will still crash)
Disable/Enable C States in BIOS
Disable/Enable XMP at 2666 mHz as my chipset allows
Replaced 80+ Bronze PSU with brand new 80+ Gold
New Windows install on M.2
Boot from old Windows install on SATA SSD
Clear CMOS to remove any possible tweaks from previous owner
Checked Event Logs (no record of errors or fault events, only when the PC restarts it will say unexpected shut down)

System Specs:
i5 9600k @ 3.7 gHz (BIOS set to auto)
ASUS B360M-A running BIOS 3202 (most recent 2021/07/24)
16GB 3200mHz DDR4 Corsair Vengeance RGB (CMN16BX4M2E3200C16 - not on QVL)
MSI 1660Ti
EVGA 650W 80+ Gold Fully Modular PSU
WD 1TB NVMe M.2 SSD (new Windows 10 64 bit install version 20H2)
KINGSTON 128 GB SSD (old Windows 10 64 bit install)
WD 1TB SSD
ADATA 500GB SSD
WD 1TB HDD

I've tried running memtest86, but was unable to get the flash install past verification on 2 USB drive (they are quite old) I was going to try buying a new flash drive and trying again, but after I removed each stick independently with no improvement I thought what are the odds of having both sticks faulty. I've ordered a new surge protector to try to eliminate that as well, but my old system was completely fine, this only started when I upgraded the CPU/mobo/RAM/M.2, so I doubt highly that this is the issue. I'm considering just pulling the trigger on a new mobo, Newegg (yes I know) has a good price on a "brown box" Z390 board for $69 (nice) after mail in rebate, otherwise a replacement board is almost not worth it, and I could find a newer CPU combo as my RAM will support it.

Open to pretty much any suggestion at this point.

 

[Darkbreeze]

SATA 2 is disabled when an M.2 drive is installed, so that is normal.

Are you using the same Windows installation that you had before you upgraded to the 9600k, or did you do a FULL CLEAN install of Windows after the upgrade? Do you have both of these drives with Windows installed on them both connected to the system?

Did you buy this motherboard and CPU new or used?

 

[P_Lav]

SATA 2 is disabled when an M.2 drive is installed, so that is normal.

Are you using the same Windows installation that you had before you upgraded to the 9600k, or did you do a FULL CLEAN install of Windows after the upgrade? Do you have both of these drives with Windows installed on them both connected to the system?

Did you buy this motherboard and CPU new or used?

It's a clean Windows install on the M.2, I still have my old Windows SSD connected and have tried booting that drive and it makes no difference which drive/windows install I use, still get the random crashes.

And I bought the motherboard and CPU used. Seller said he never had any issues. But they all say that.

 

[Darkbreeze]

I'd try completely disconnecting all of the other drives except for the M.2 drive with the OS on it, and see what it does. If it still does the same thing with ALL of the other drives disconnected, then take the M.2 drive out and try booting from the SATA SSD by itself and see what happens there.

It's definitely possible this is a board problem, and yes, they do all say that, but before convicting the board or anything for that matter, it's better to do a little testing to eliminate things until all that's left really is the board.

How To - Motherboard bench testing

Finding the problem through bench testing If you are here then it’s likely you have encountered a serious hardware issue and have been unable to resolve it using the standard no-POST troubleshooting procedures. If you have not yet attempted to resolve your issues using the no-POST...

forums.tomshardware.com

 

[mdd1963]

Pick one SSD, be it SATA, or NVME, and disconnect/remove all other drives...(no power or SATA data cables connected) EDIT: I see that step suggested above, sorry! Try the NVME, as the SATA SSD is already about too small for use as a WIndows OS drive these days )

Do a fresh 'nuke and pave' reinstall to that one remaining SSD.

(install all available chipset drivers from mainboard manufacturer (chipset, LAN, sound, etc, then install GPU drivers, GeForce Experience, etc..)

See if system still freezes randomly.

Might want to install HWmonitor and check CPU speeds/temps under an all-core load.(CPU-Z/bench/stress CPU will bring it to 100% load on all cores, and heat the CPU a bit to make sure it is under decent load, and, then you can check temps/clock speed after 10 minutes or so; you should see 4.3 GHz or so sustained under load with temps under 75C if cooling is good, and under 85C is cooling is 'marginal', and 98C if cooling is inadequate....(Not that should contribute to hard system hangs/freezes, as technically it should throttle to lower clock speeds keeping temps below 100C)

See what core voltage is noted/supplied in HWMonitor under full load....(just making sure the BIOS is not supplying low voltage, which would be rare anyway, as normally they swing towards .1V too much, if anything)

 

[P_Lav]

I have nothing connected but the essential USB connections, the new NVMe, and still froze. Ran 2 passes of memtest86, no errors, did 20 minutes of Prime95, saw a max core temp of 72* c and no errors.

I did some googling and found some weird issues reported with this particular mobo, it would be great to find out exactly what is causing this, but I'm pretty much convinced it has to be related to the motherboard, and spending hours and hours trouble shooting this board isn't worth my time. I will repost if I continue with errors after swapping the board, if I do not repost, assume the new board fixed the issue.

 

[Darkbreeze]

So, before you buy a board there is one additional step I'd take because I'm going to assume you did the new Windows installation on the NVME drive WITH the other drives connected to the system, which means, as we've seen time and time again, it's very likely that might have an effect on the system EFI and boot partition. If you did the clean install with ONLY the one drive attached, then I'd probably proceed with a new board since this one is an unknown quantity having been purchased used, but if not, I'd at least TRY that first. And if you've already ordered a new board, be sure to do a clean install once you get it. Trying to use a Windows installation that was done with a different board in play usually leads to nothing but problems due to differences with the core hardware such as the storage controller, network adapters, etc.

Sometimes it works fine, usually it doesn't, and when it doesn't it's usually weird oddball problems that result. Nothing you can really directly point a finger at, although, sometimes it will be glaringly obvious something is wrong too.

How to associate your windows 10 license with a Microsoft account

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and in case you should ever need to do a CLEAN install of Windows, this guide will help to ensure it gets done properly.

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