PLEASE HELP, Computer freezes when playing games.

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DarkwingMkII

DarkwingMkII

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Feb 28, 2014
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So I have a store assembled computer, its not stock. I got it 5 or so years ago, and it has had a few bumps along the way. It originally was a windows vista computer, with a GeForce GTX 260 video card and two gigs of ram. This computer would shut down when playing games and would make it hard to run anything high powered.
About Christmas this year, I upgraded the computer. I will write current specs below. But first let me explain, because my old specs were making the computer shut down when playing games, I assumed it was the graphics card overheating, or the power-supply not being sufficient enough.
So I upgraded all of this in the last year or so, putting windows 8 on the computer, and getting a new power-supply and graphics card. However, now the computer freezes during playing games, and I cannot move anything on screen, and the sound starts buzzing loudly with the certain part of the sound it was playing when it froze. It will generally unfreeze after a long period of time, about half an hour to an hour. PLEASE HELP. I am really desperate to get this fixed as I haven't been able to play games on a high resolution properly for ages now. Thank you so much

Current Specs:
Windows 8.1 (64 bit)
4GB Ram
Processor: AMD Phenom II x4 810
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Ma770T-UD3P
Video Card: AMD Radeon HD 7800 series
Monitors: BenQ G2412HD
 
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Ra_V_en
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Ra_V_en

Ra_V_en

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Jan 17, 2014
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You did correct assumptions it could be the PSU or GPU... but it seems it wasn't. Still CPU, RAM and mobo are under suspicions.
Test ram with Memtest, CPU with some SuperPI or similar software... if both will be fine then the last resort is mobo which cant be tested so easily.

I'm just guessing we are talking about build in sound card? If its dedicated like Audigy or Xifi or Xonar then it can be the issue as well.

The other thing could be a HDD which can make long term freeze if reading a bad sector... you can try a Hdsentinel software in trial mode to check the hdd.
 
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DarkwingMkII

DarkwingMkII

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Feb 28, 2014
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Thanks for replying Raven, and I used Memtest, and the test passed with no errors.
Also HD sentinel said this:
"Performance:100%
Health: 84%
Maximum Temperature (Entire Lifespan): 54 degrees celsius.
There are 16 bad sectors on the disk surface. The contents of these sectors were moved to the spare area.
At this point, warranty replacement of the disk is not yet possible, only if the health drops further.
It is recommended to examine the log of the disk regularly. All new problems found will be logged there.
No actions needed."
How can I find out if it is a built in sound card or not
 
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Ra_V_en

Ra_V_en

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Let me just guess ... you have Seagate drive? I wouldn't care about the sound card anymore.. this HDD is almost certain suspect now.
If its indeed Seagate then this gonna get worse, I've had 2 similar OS drives like that and with both of them i had certain issues with stability.
OS was freezing without any typical reason, even while watching some movies there was some hangs, during gaming the was some sound cracks and other weird behavior like unexpected crashes. I've searched the for reason quite some time until I realized it has to be it.
Remember HDSentinel is a third party software and it only shows information basing on the SMART data. I'd recommend to download HDD dedicated software and run all test to be assure you can RMA is asap. Unfortunately even such software throws conservative response... and while it shows drive is good indeed its not and far from being such. But the only way to get the RMA ticket is to run that software which is quite unfortunate.
In my scenario i was putting constant load on that drive to wear it off even faster, until SeaTools finally threw out errors, which took over a month.
Obviously after i bought a new drive all those issues went away.... so there is quite some chance you have similar situation atm.

Edit: Id suggest to start doing back up of an important data.. this instability doesn't come from nowhere... some files which were stored on that sectors can be already damaged.
 
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DarkwingMkII

DarkwingMkII

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My HD is a 1.0 Terrabyte ST31000528AS ATA Device.
And also what is RMAing?
By the way I turned my Graphics Card fan speed up and it so far hasn't crashed AS much as it used to. Not sure if this is useful.
 
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Ra_V_en

Ra_V_en

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So indeed its a Seagate drive... everything seems to match now.
Now I'm 99% positive its that HDD, RMA means returning the faulty drive for repair or replacement due to warranty rights. To do this you need to download SeaTools from Seagate web page and run it until it throws RMA code thus giving you possibility to create drive return ticket on the Seagate site.
If it doesn't give you the error code I'd recommend to put a heavy load on that drive so it will get even more bad blocks and eventually break even more, so the SeaTools will throw the code. Ofc you should make a backup of an important data before starting such.
After you get the code you need to send the drive to the local Seagate branch within your country or directly to the headquarters. You need to pack it well before sending, usually air bubble foil and some cardboard box is enough, there are also HDD drive transparent plastic boxes which can be used if you have one.
There is more information on the Seagate site about this, so you will just follow the steps.
The whole process is quite easy and you can do it yourself instead o giving the drive to the shop you bought it, which will only make it take longer.

Despite that you should consider buying new drive as far as the repaired or replaced one will be with "refurbished" status which means its far from being a fully efficient drive. They usually send other drive of the same capacity with repaired disk platters but the speed is far from being as at a new drive. I just bought 1TB Caviar Blue, which had quite good random access speed and is just fine for an OS drive and when i get back the Seagate, it was used just to store some junk.

Btw i had exactly the same model you have, i still remember the model number since I've tested it quite some time and seen this number many times... its known for stupid and unstable behavior, loud cracking noises.. etc.
Put "ST31000528AS noises" on the google.. you will see I'm not bluffing here.

There is still slight chance i could be wrong with that drive tho.. but considering the amount of information now, the fact i had the issues with this drive as well and it was behaving very similar to what you are writing... i really doubt that, the logic points on that direction I'm afraid.
 
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