Win 7 x64 crashes/restarts (no BSOD)

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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Nov 8, 2013
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My PC crashed while gaming last week, restarted and began a consistent crash/restart with no BSOD till I manually shutdown. Everything worked fine until two days later when it happened again. Now the system crashes/restarts anywhere from 10 minutes to 15 seconds into boot. It doesn't seem to matter if I start normally or in safe mode. I thought it was from gaming at first but TF2 isn't pushing heavy graphics. The majority of the crashes have been while checking the net for solutions so I don't think it is a software issue of conflict.

Windows says that it is up to date, although MSI Live says there are BIOS, audio, graphics updates that I have not been able to install because of crashes.

I have reseated my memory, started with each stick individually and have done Memtest86 on the matching pairs, all with the same result... crash. I am able to get through the first test on Memtest but the longer it works it eventually crashes.

I have noticed that my C drive is hot to the touch, E drive is not. Is there a way to test the hard drive? Testing seems to be a problem if I can't get this to stop crashing. All fans are working and I can feel no massive amounts of heat from any of them.

Everything was newly purchased within the last 4-5 months aside from the AMD processor and Obsidian RAM:

MSI 970A-G46 motherboard
GForce GT630 graphics card
AMD Athlon II X3 435 Rana 2.9GHz Triple core processor
Corsair TX750 750W PSU
2x2GB Corsair DDR3 RAM
2x2GB OCZ Obsidian DDR3 RAM
Maxtor DiamondMax 250GB SATA HD
WesternDigital WD20EARX 2TB SATA HD


I'm trying to be as thorough as possible but I may have missed something. I'm eagerly waiting to fix this as I have some freelance work coming down the line.
 
Solution
N
Try to reset you CMOS - BIOS reset jumper
Try then few tests , OS , load some 3D tests - to load you PC at 100%
Also inspect you motherboard for faulty Capacitors - you can find info here in TH about that
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Thank you for the reply Nikolay. I tried this and survived the first pass of Memtest, second pass crashed at bout 21%.
 
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Nikolay Savov

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You need to test all RAM`s one by one for 1-2 passes Memtest86
- use only one slot for all test
If you find some faulty ones - remove them from the mobo
Install the ones that pass Memtest86
Run the test again - 1 -2 pass
If you get NO errors -> bad memory module
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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I tested each individually and all of them would crash on the first pass. A friend came by to try and help and we found that the processor heat sink had a blanket of dust. Ouch! Sprayed everything out and reseated everything that attaches to the mobo and finally had a successful Memtest86 with over 3 passes. I even let my pc run over night with no crashes. Everything was great with minimal use over the past few days until tonight.

Tonight PC crashed while I was updating my TF2 workshop, no game play, just uploading and updating files. It re-booted to a recovery screen which Win could not reset to a previous backup. Afterwards I tried to shutdown and Win logged out but the PC never turned all the way off. Fans and lights were still running even while I held the power button on the front. I finally had to switch off the PSU.
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Reset CMOS and ran FurMark for about 20 minutes with no problems. Jumped in Left4Dead2 for a few hours with a friend and then let the PC run over night and through mid day here and have had no problems thus far.

Thank you so much for all your help Nikolay! You've made me a happy dude.
 
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Nikolay Savov

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Nice job :)
10x - i`m happy i`v helped :)
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Is there a way to re-open this ticket? The one thing I didn't want to see just happened tonight, my PC crashed yet again. This is after days of use in Photoshop and normal use.

Tonight I had Steam launching Tomb Raider for the first time and as it was looking for the configurable's the machine crashed to black and restarted as before. I got to the Win logo and then it crashed again but it did not restart. Fans kept running as well as LED lights but when I held the power button the machine would not fully shut down. I had to flip the PSU.

I'm starting to wonder if I need to reinstall Windows or something??
 
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Nikolay Savov

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It looks like you have CMOS battery problem !
Try to change the Motherboard CMOS battery !

If you manage to compleate HW test with no errors then the HW is OK
The way you describe it it could not be OS- Windows problem
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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I'll have to get a new battery tomorrow and try that out. Can you give a little more detail, why would it crash because the battery went bad? Wouldn't the PSU keep the machine running? I'm just trying to better understand why.
 
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Nikolay Savov

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The mobo battery keeps curent to the CMOS so you can keep you custom BIOS settings in without loosing them.
If you power off you System the PSU is power off too.
SO keeping this data is battery job.
It also make possible to power on you system - you can try to power on with battery removed to see ...
When you power on they got charged but after few years of usage they got old and in some cases they disturbing the Motherboard operation - cant tell exactly how but changing the battery helps solving sporadic problems leading to the motherboard suspected issues.
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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I changed the battery and let the PC run through the day. I'm not sure at what time but the system crashed again. When I returned tonight I was in system recovery mode again. After a few scans it came up unsuccessful and with an error code= 0x490, reason "patch is preventing the system from starting"
 
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Nikolay Savov

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I think you have Motherboard problem with the faulty Capacitors - you may not see them but it acts like the same problem ...

The only thing left is to take all out from the Case and reassemble it out side of the Case
- some times there are cross circuit in the bottom .......
- also some minor mechanical twist over the motherboard will do the magic and you may fix it for an while.....
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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I took everything out including the mobo and did a thorough inspection of the capacitors and found no leaks or bulges. Not sure if it matters but my MSI 970-a46 mobo has solid capacitors, so it may be hard to tell if one is faulty. MSI site states "solid capacitors do not have any liquid materials inside, and thus will not suffer a leak which would infringe upon the product’s stability".

One off my friend's are looking into gabbing their extra mobo from storage so I can test that out. I may just take advantage of MSI's 3 year warranty and exchange the motherboard. I'd hate to do that if that wasn't the problem.


What are your thoughts?
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Appologies on the delay, work has been very consuming lately. It seemed to be working great for a few days and finally crashed again. Nothing like losing part of a project to get you back on debugging mode. I will try this out over the weekend but a few questions:

What should I set this on? Would my wood table suffice for a surface or should I use an anti-static bag? Dose the mobo need to be elevated to keep it from heating up?
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Nov 8, 2013
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Appologies on the delay, work has been very consuming lately. It seemed to be working great for a few days and finally crashed again. Nothing like losing part of a project to get you back on debugging mode. I will try this out over the weekend but a few questions:

What should I set this on? Would my wood table suffice for a surface or should I use an anti-static bag? Dose the mobo need to be elevated to keep it from heating up?
 
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Bradimus

Bradimus

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Nov 8, 2013
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I took everything out and reassembled out side of the case and had noticed that my Corsair TX750 fna not running. After some research I read that it is a fanless PSU, meaning it only turns on when needed and to test with 3DMark. The fan seems to work when pushing the system and I had no crash in the mean time. I'm a little worried it may be the PSU since it didn't kick on till the Fire Strike test, the video was all kinds of choppy. The three previous tests were semi heavy and the fan would jitter from time to time but never spin till the Fire Strike test. Here's the results if needed:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/1819496?

Still thinking the Mobo? What's your thought Nikolay?
 
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