Frustration abounds -- random hard locks. Help! [Archive]

View Full Version : Frustration abounds -- random hard locks. Help!

Bloodtoes

23rd June 2010, 05:48 PM

My computer hard locks. There is no pattern to it. It might not happen at all during a day of playing cpu and graphic-intensive games, it could lock up a dozen times in a day.. while idling, browsing the web, listening to music, playing games... at the login screen even. It sometimes locks up while the computer is low-power mode (I guess -- not full hibernation, but with both monitors off and the computer having been idle for a couple hours). It could happen 5 minutes after starting up, or after the machine's been on for hours.

Every time it locks up I feel I'm one step closer to throwing the whole thing out my 3rd story window. I've replaced the video card twice, motherboard, CPU, PSU, and RAM. Maybe I just got really unlucky and happened to replace my malfunctioning hardware with more malfunctioning hardware?

Before I do anything else drastic or spend another dime, I need to try and isolate the problem. I want to be sure what is causing it, so I am looking for some more diagnostic tools or methods or whatever. This is what I've tried so far:

* HDD diagnostic tools provided by WD, no errors on full sector scans of both drives
* Memory test that comes on the Ubuntu Live CD, I ran it for around 16 hours. The machine did not lock up during that test at all (a small miracle given the time span), and the test when I stopped it had found no issues at all.
* Stripped the machine down to its bare essentials -- one hard drive, nothing but the video card connected to the addon slots and only the mouse+keyboard plugged into USB. Rather than having audio input/output jacks right on the board, the motherboard comes with an addon card that plugs into a special slot alongside the PCI slots. I even ripped that out and disabled the onboard audio through BIOS. Still it froze a short while later.
* Every time it freezes I check the temperature readings in the BIOS. Everything is exactly where it should be.
* I updated the BIOS recently and as far as I can tell things are the same or worse.

So what else can I do?

Here's what's in the machine:

Generic DVD-RW drive
Corsair 750W PSU
ASUS Striker II Extreme Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550
4GB Corsair DDR3 RAM
Western Digital 500GB SATA HDD
Western Digital 1TB SATA HDD
EVGA GeForce 480 GTX video card
OS is Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

Although I do want to stress that I had lockups before I had any of these, save for the DVD-RW drive and HDDs. Any of these things have known faults?

tesscaline

23rd June 2010, 06:02 PM

Have you tested for software related issues, like viruses?

Bloodtoes

23rd June 2010, 06:03 PM

Have you tested for software related issues, like viruses?

Yeah. I've done complete OS reinstalls a half dozen times in the past year for one, also I am running an antivirus software (symantec) and have done full system scans. Most of those full system scans end up hard locking and never complete.. but 2 of them have and found no issues.

Bloodtoes

23rd June 2010, 06:13 PM

... I think it's the motherboard. So the answer is bad luck. I should've done this first, but I went to newegg.com and checked the 1-star reviews almost all of which listed very similar problems to my own. If this continues, I can look forward to a CPU INIT error in the future. I should still be within the warranty so maybe I can get ASUS to send me a good one. Hrm.

Policenaut

23rd June 2010, 07:04 PM

Asus seems to have a real problem with their mbs and sound cards/drivers (as well as the latest drivers for ati AND nvidia cards). Do you have Creative software installed by any chance? If so I would try uninstalling it. That seems to be one of the main causes of the dreaded GSOD on some of the new Asus laptops.

Bloodtoes

23rd June 2010, 07:30 PM

Policenaut

23rd June 2010, 08:25 PM

Bloodtoes

23rd June 2010, 08:26 PM

Maybe a strange question but have you tried booting without any usb devices plugged in (try with a ps/2 keyboard)? Also have you manually set the voltage/timing for the ram? I have read this board doesn't play well with stock settings on many ram sticks.

I don't have a ps2 keyboard, so I haven't tried that. I read on their site to try adjusting memory timings according to the memory manual but my memory didn't come with a manual, unless they have one or something.. I can give that a try.

BobK

23rd June 2010, 10:16 PM

I had a somewhat similar problem a few months ago. Though it wasn't as bad as yours seems to be. With mine the monitor would suddenly switch to diagonal multi-color lines and I then had to shut the power off and reboot. This would happen every few days and sometimes twice in the same day. I updated the monitor driver to the latest one from the monitor manufacturer. I had been using the windows default monitor driver for a couple years with no problem at all. The new driver fixed the problem. I suspect one of the monthly windows updates may have caused a minor conflict when using the windows driver with my 7 year old monitor.

Even if that doesn't cure the problem, making sure your drivers are all up to date can't hurt.

Beerina

28th June 2010, 01:52 PM

Every year or so I open 'er up and blow it out with a leaf blower.

A hose on the output of a cannister vac will do the same job.

You'd be shocked how many problems this overcomes. It's a heat issue usually, though it did once correct an HDD electrical-connect issue.

Make sure you hose out the power supply, too.

Bloodtoes

28th June 2010, 01:54 PM

Heh I've been into that machine so many times in the past year, I haven't given it the opportunity to collect much dust. At any rate, heat is certainly not the issue... that was one of the first things I checked for.

It's just a bad motherboard I reckon. The reviews for it on newegg.com show a number of customers with similar issues. I'm within manufacturer's warranty so I am sending it off for RMA.