View Full Version : Arsing PC build
ARGH - Problem below fixed, but New problem involving random crashes. - unsolved
I've put all the pieces of kit together and turned it on.
Fans start, lights on motherboard light up, but nothing on the screen, and the keyboard lights dont come on (caps or scroll).
I figured the case may be shorting the mobo somehow so I pulled it out and led it on a static proof bag - same thing.
Disconnected everything (except the cpu - cos that scares me with thermal gunk) and still nothing, tried each memory stick individually, still nothing.
I've tried a CMOS wipe too with no result.
Anyone got any other ideas? I have no way of testing CPU or memory in another system...curses. - Solved
Noo - don't put it on a static proof bag, they're conductive. Use a piece of cardboard.
Any beeps or anything like that?
Thermal gunk scares me too, which is why I'm glad my build worked first time, but I get the impression you might end up being forced... :(
Can you hear any beeping or anything like that, or does it do its usual POST beep?
Sounds to me like a RAM-related problem or similar. You checked to make sure the mem is in the right slots as the motherboard wants it?
Well a spark of inspiration last night in bed made me wonder if there was another power lead in addition to the 24pin ATX - turns out there was:embarassed: .
This is why I shouldnt attempt a build late at night after a **** day at school :'( .
Dymetrie
18-05-2007, 07:34
Well a spark of inspiration last night in bed made me wonder if there was another power lead in addition to the 24pin ATX - turns out there was:embarassed: .
This is why I shouldnt attempt a build late at night after a **** day at school :'( .
n00b :p
Dymetrie
18-05-2007, 07:49
Shush you!
Did you plug the power cable into the GFX card?
Stan_Lite
18-05-2007, 08:01
n00b :p
Seconded :p (even though I've done it myself a couple of times :embarassed: ).
Stan :)
Justsomebloke
18-05-2007, 16:21
Did you turn it off & on again :D
;D Noob.
Did you plug the power cable into the GFX card?
Its integrated gfx - which is what made me think "Ohh" in bed. Most normal people think more exciting thoughts whilst in he boudoir.
Did you turn it off & on again :D
Pikey, the trainee Windows engineer:)
Wonderful - now it would appear that windows is corrupt and needs to be fixed.
Humpf
Well its "repaired" and rolled back to a previous state. However, since then its randomly rebooted once (which it had done before) and come up with "start windows normally, safe mode etc".
Not convinced its all ok in there :/
- System
- Provider
[ Name] EventLog
- EventID 6008
[ Qualifiers] 32768
Level 2
Task 0
Keywords 0x80000000000000
- TimeCreated
[ SystemTime] 2007-05-20T12:40:23.000Z
EventRecordID 3369
Channel System
Computer Media
Security
- EventData
13:38:47
20/05/2007
1529
D7070500000014000D0026002F007203D7070500000014000C 0026002F007203600900003C00000001000000600900000000 0000B00400000100000000000000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Binary data:
In Words
0000: 000507D7 00140000 0026000D 0372002F
0008: 000507D7 00140000 0026000C 0372002F
0010: 00000960 0000003C 00000001 00000960
0018: 00000000 000004B0 00000001 00000000
In Bytes
0000: D7 07 05 00 00 00 14 00 ×.......
0008: 0D 00 26 00 2F 00 72 03 ..&./.r.
0010: D7 07 05 00 00 00 14 00 ×.......
0018: 0C 00 26 00 2F 00 72 03 ..&./.r.
0020: 60 09 00 00 3C 00 00 00 `...<...
0028: 01 00 00 00 60 09 00 00 ....`...
0030: 00 00 00 00 B0 04 00 00 ....°...
0038: 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........
Not very helpful that doesn't appear to be...
Just tells me the power off was unexpected... as If I didnt know.
well I'm still trying to resolve this problem, but I've just noticed that Vista is saying I have not activated it.
I go to activate it, and it tells me my key is already in Use?!?!?!
I've had to reinstall a couple of times and I know i've sucessfully activated it before - so whats all this crap about?!
Well, I've removed one stick of RAM, and the system hasn't rebooted yet *crosses fingers* Although now I'm running with 767 MB :S
semi-pro waster
26-05-2007, 11:29
It seems you must have your graphics card set to take 256mb then if you only have that much left, hope that sorts it though. Other than that as I've said I'm pretty much out of ideas.
As for the Windows thingy I don't know if you might have to phone them up and let them know the reason you have had to reactivate it. :)
got windows sorted..
Stuck the second stick back in and its only rebooted a couple of times - a lot better I think. Has frozen more now though :S
If your ram is iffy, download memtest
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download1247.html
Leave that running for 12+ hours and come back. The best time would be to start it Monday night, go to work Tuesday and on getting back see if there are any errors. That will give it a long time to hammer the memory
Have run memtest for 12 hours straight with no errors.
However, since messing around with the memory sticks, the computer no longer reboots itself, but now freezes. Again, once it has happened, it appears to not take much for it to happen again.
(Tends to happen when several windows are open - according to pheebs).
Sodding thing.
things to try still: Install XP, try a different PSU.
PSU would be my bet if you're happy the memory is good.
This will sound weird but have you tested the HD?
I had a very similar problem for ages, changed the memory and the PSU. Turned out to be the HD on the way out even though it was meant to be brand new and worked fine (According to the ex admittedly).
If not I'd go with trying out a different PSU, just thought I'd throw out a random thing that happened to me :p
I would think that after all the crashes before, your install of xp is probably trashed.
Are you running a raid? Just incase it is raid drivers. I have just had the same thing happening on my server when running a raid 1 array after reinstalling windows. For some unknown reason it decided to ignore the driver from the FDD and use its own, thereby causing all kinds of random stuff. In the end I had to reinstall windows and its running fine now. Most odd and I can think of no reason for it
I would think that after all the crashes before, your install of xp is probably trashed.
Are you running a raid? Just incase it is raid drivers. I have just had the same thing happening on my server when running a raid 1 array after reinstalling windows. For some unknown reason it decided to ignore the driver from the FDD and use its own, thereby causing all kinds of random stuff. In the end I had to reinstall windows and its running fine now. Most odd and I can think of no reason for it
Back before I tested one memory stick at a time and then put them both back in (albeit swapped the slots they were in around) when they were reboots rather than freezes, I reinstalled vista twice with no change in outcome. Are you saying now that its freezes could be a different problem caused by previous reboots? I still get no recorded errors which still makes me think its hardware rather than software.
I have no RAID set up, as frankly HDD configurations scare me :embarassed:.
Haly, I have installed vista on a different SCSI HDD rather than the new SATA one with the same problem. At one point I was convinced it was the HDD but this fact made me think otherwise.:undecided:
Ahh ok, I'd go with the PSU at fault then.
And Zirax is right, your xp install will be knackered, I know mine was when it was freezing all the time.
*cough* vista - I only stress this as I've not tried the current hardware on an XP install - this will be something to try in the future. Also afraid of reinstalling vista and it telling me the product ID key is already in use again :s
It might be something to try now if you suspect driver foul play. Drivers for XP will be more mature than those for Vista.
My moneys on the PSU though.
semi-pro waster
31-05-2007, 20:04
It does sound like a PSU issue, what are your PSU specs?
If it is based on the system that Pickers asked about before it is an Antec Fusion so it has a decent Antec 430w in there. But then even the best go wrong occasionally. :)
Yeah, they do. I've had two Antecs die. :(
Might be worth checking the system monitor/health status in the BIOS.
Had a BSOD yesterday - but I don't think it managed to save the dump or whatever the correct terminology is - i.e I think the BSOD froze :eek:
Thanks for all the suggestions, unfortunately I've still not had chance to tinker inside as I'm using the other computer (with the PSU I'd test) to write my final assignment meaning not enough free time, nor do I want to risk crippling the computer when I have assignments to write.
May have to wait for next weekend to actually get back inside the case.
What would I be looking for in BIOS? voltages? temp in health check seems fine.
RIght - BSOD which froze:-
http://roger.picton.googlepages.com/bsod1.jpg
health check screen immediately after reboot
http://roger.picton.googlepages.com/bios1.jpg
Upon getting back into windows and going to event logger, the system BSOD'd again but this time appeared to complete the dump and rebooted itself
(I noticed this time it didnt say "driver_IRQL..." etc, but was something different, which I didnt manage to catch. When I got back into windows and event viewer, I couldn't find the dump from this :angry: .
The system isn't stable Picks, nothing in a crash dump will help you. I'll let someone with more experience comment on those voltages, it's not something I've had to look at for a very long time.
just tried a differnt PSU and it still crashed... now installing XP home to see if its software issues...
if this doesnt work, will try adding a gfx and scrapping the onboard
if that doesnt work.. well.. I'm stumped
It would appear that xp runs without crashing...
Now, my dilema.
the second computer currently had XP installed - so I will have to uninstall it if I keep the media PC with XP installed otherwise I have 2 xp installs on the same product key.
Do I install vista onto the other PC and try it out?
Problem then is that there are no drivers for the Printer currently connected for vista (RX420)
... and I have an old version of office (like, 2000 or something) which I'm not sure will run on vista.
ARGH!!!
just tried a differnt PSU and it still crashed... now installing XP home to see if its software issues...
if this doesnt work, will try adding a gfx and scrapping the onboard
if that doesnt work.. well.. I'm stumped
It would appear that xp runs without crashing...
Now, my dilema.
the second computer currently had XP installed - so I will have to uninstall it if I keep the media PC with XP installed otherwise I have 2 xp installs on the same product key.
Do I install vista onto the other PC and try it out?
Problem then is that there are no drivers for the Printer currently connected for vista (RX420)
... and I have an old version of office (like, 2000 or something) which I'm not sure will run on vista.
ARGH!!!
If you want to run XP instead of Vista, thats fine as long as you have a valid copy of Vista. You just need to ring Microsoft for a new activation key. I believe this is called a downgrade and a lot of people are doing this because Visat is a pile of pants atm.
Remind us again of what components you have? What processor, board, ram
If you want to run XP instead of Vista, thats fine as long as you have a valid copy of Vista. You just need to ring Microsoft for a new activation key. I believe this is called a downgrade and a lot of people are doing this because Visat is a pile of pants atm.
Remind us again of what components you have? What processor, board, ram
So I ring up microsoft, and the VSITA key that I have will work for windows XP? WIll I be able to use it for vista at a later date for free?
Specs:
Abit NF-M2 nview board (onboard geforce 6250 or something)
AMD x2 4600+
2gig generic ram
180Gig SATA II seagate HDD
erm.. thats it...
So I ring up microsoft, and the VSITA key that I have will work for windows XP? WIll I be able to use it for vista at a later date for free?
No, you get a new key off Microsoft for XP and then when you wish to upgrade to Vista, you use the original key I believe.
No, you get a new key off Microsoft for XP and then when you wish to upgrade to Vista, you use the original key I believe.
Cool - could I downgrade to XP pro 64 bit?
Edit: forget that, I dont have the install disc for that :p
Stan_Lite
23-06-2007, 20:13
Haven't looked at this thread for a while.
A couple of things to try:
1) Your Vcore looks to be a bit low (4600+ stock Vcore is 1.30V iirc) try upping that to 1.30 or so - also, your RAM (DDR2) voltage is a bit low - try putting that up to 2.1V or so.
2) Try updating the BIOS for your motherboard -maybe a newer BIOS will be more "Vista friendly".
I haven't been able to find any compatibility issues with your board and Vista (apparently the Vista drivers work better with the onboard graphics than the Nvidia ones).
If none of that works, we'll have another look.
Stan :)
Cheers Stan - it all seems stable uinder XP so I may stick with that for now :p
Will make note of all suggestions for the future though
Stan_Lite
23-06-2007, 20:23
Cheers Stan - it all seems stable uinder XP so I may stick with that for now :p
Will make note of all suggestions for the future though
Fair enough.
1) probably wouldn't make any difference under Vista - I just thought it would be something to try.
2) probably would make a difference - so, if you do decide to try again with the same rig, try that first :)
Stan :)
I'm not sure downgrade licenses apply to OEM, but Jinks is right, certainly on retail and volume licenses you are ok to downgrade to the last major OS release under the terms of your licensing agreement. The same is true of Office.
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