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PC randomly freezing

Tags:
  • FX
  • Random
  • Freezing
  • CPUs
  • AMD
  • PC
  • 8350
  • Freeze
Last response: in CPUs
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September 8, 2014 11:34:17 PM

Hello everyone.

Before I begin, here's my system spec.

CPU: AMD FX-8350
GPU: Sapphire R9 290
RAM: Corsair Vengeance 1600MHz 16GB (4x4GB)
Mobo: Gigabyte FXA990 UD3
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 1TB
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Upgraded to Windows 8.1 x64
PSU: Corsair Enthusiast Series TX750 V2 (750W)

About 6 months ago, I upgraded my CPU to a FX-8350 (Previously used an AMD Phenom II x4).
Everything was running smoothly for the first week or so. Then the freezing started. And they were happening quite frequently (At least 3-4 times a day).
At first, I thought the CPU was faulty so I instantly did checks in that area.
I noticed that the CPU had it's turbo boost feature already enabled in the BIOS and turned that off.
Boom. The freezing had stopped.
Then they started again but this time, they don't happen so often (Roughly once or twice a week).
At that point, I just gave up trying to figure out what was going on and ignored the freezing.

6 months later, something new has happened.
While watching a video, my entire system froze but this time my mouse didn't for roughly 5 seconds.
I found it rather odd that after 6 months of instant freezing, this time was different.
So it peeked my interest to start looking for the root of this issue and hopefully fixing it.

The freezing doesn't happen while doing particular things. They are completely random.

Examples of times frozen:
Watching a video either on YouTube or VLC.
Browsing the internet.
Playing a video game.
After boot up.
Doing nothing.

Now you're probably going to be shouting at the screen now because I don't think the CPU is faulty. Freezing aside, it's survived running the latest games on max settings, it's survived stress tests (Hot CPU tester multiple times), I've put it through video rendering (H.264 codecs mainly), 3D animation renders, the lot, and it's never crippled under the pressure.
I have checked the pins on the CPU and they are all fine.
Temps never go above 70C (And it hardly ever gets the chance to reach 70C).
And no new unusual programs have been installed (unusual = programs I have never used before).

The only thing I cannot do is test the CPU on another system as I do not have the parts to build a second.

So I now need the opinions and expertise of other tech savvy people.
Are there things I haven't tried that I should?
Is there a program that could possibly record a computers entire session in a log so I may be able to pin point what causes the crash?

More about : randomly freezing

September 11, 2014 4:54:50 PM

Update: I went into my BIOS and noticed that my RAM has been underclocked.
It has gone from 1600MHz (base clock) to 1333MHz.
Is it possible that this is the cause?
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a b à CPUs
September 11, 2014 5:01:14 PM

It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?
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September 11, 2014 6:36:16 PM

Update BIOS.
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September 11, 2014 8:55:34 PM

thunderdan602 said:
It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?

Well I never underclocked the RAM as I don't know anything about under/overclocking so I can only assume that my BIOS did that automatically.
And no errors appear. My PC just locks up. Have to force restart in order to get my PC working again.
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September 11, 2014 8:55:58 PM

iamlegend said:
Update BIOS.

It is up to date.
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September 11, 2014 9:06:01 PM

Check for CPU updates.
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September 11, 2014 10:27:49 PM

iamlegend said:
Check for CPU updates.


Those don't exist...
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September 11, 2014 10:33:34 PM

Lol, device manager>>CPU>>right click updates
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September 11, 2014 10:50:15 PM

iamlegend said:
Lol, device manager>>CPU>>right click updates


CPU's do not have drivers.
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September 12, 2014 8:20:13 AM

nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?

Well I never underclocked the RAM as I don't know anything about under/overclocking so I can only assume that my BIOS did that automatically.
And no errors appear. My PC just locks up. Have to force restart in order to get my PC working again.


Ok. So let me make sure I understand, did you try running your pc under load after you fixed your RAM settings in the BIOS? And if you did, did you still have issue's?

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September 12, 2014 9:47:30 AM

Which CPU cooler are you using? Any Corsair Liquid cooling kits (H80i,H100i etc) ?And if yes,are you monitoring them via Corsair Link?
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September 12, 2014 11:02:32 AM

thunderdan602 said:
nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?

Well I never underclocked the RAM as I don't know anything about under/overclocking so I can only assume that my BIOS did that automatically.
And no errors appear. My PC just locks up. Have to force restart in order to get my PC working again.


Ok. So let me make sure I understand, did you try running your pc under load after you fixed your RAM settings in the BIOS? And if you did, did you still have issue's?



I don't know how to make my RAM run at base clock again. I don't know how to over/underclock.
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September 12, 2014 11:03:00 AM

absxiith said:
Which CPU cooler are you using? Any Corsair Liquid cooling kits (H80i,H100i etc) ?And if yes,are you monitoring them via Corsair Link?


Using stock cooler.
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September 12, 2014 3:47:07 PM

nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?

Well I never underclocked the RAM as I don't know anything about under/overclocking so I can only assume that my BIOS did that automatically.
And no errors appear. My PC just locks up. Have to force restart in order to get my PC working again.


Ok. So let me make sure I understand, did you try running your pc under load after you fixed your RAM settings in the BIOS? And if you did, did you still have issue's?



I don't know how to make my RAM run at base clock again. I don't know how to over/underclock.


Okay, I don't know about the Gigabyte BIOS, but on my Asus Sabertooth, I had to enable the "XMP" setting in the BIOS to get my board to read the stock speed of my Corsair Dominator memory. For Gigabyte, look for extreme memory profile in your BIOS and enable it.
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September 13, 2014 11:12:40 PM

thunderdan602 said:
nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?

Well I never underclocked the RAM as I don't know anything about under/overclocking so I can only assume that my BIOS did that automatically.
And no errors appear. My PC just locks up. Have to force restart in order to get my PC working again.


Ok. So let me make sure I understand, did you try running your pc under load after you fixed your RAM settings in the BIOS? And if you did, did you still have issue's?



I don't know how to make my RAM run at base clock again. I don't know how to over/underclock.


Okay, I don't know about the Gigabyte BIOS, but on my Asus Sabertooth, I had to enable the "XMP" setting in the BIOS to get my board to read the stock speed of my Corsair Dominator memory. For Gigabyte, look for extreme memory profile in your BIOS and enable it.


My memory doesn't come with XMP profiles so that option is unavailable.
I'm using Corsair Vengeance 1600MHz memory.
It's also the Award BIOS.
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September 19, 2014 3:47:18 PM

thunderdan602 said:
nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
nate vongrimm said:
thunderdan602 said:
It could be. Did you try running your pc after the change in the RAM settings to see if you get that same error?

Well I never underclocked the RAM as I don't know anything about under/overclocking so I can only assume that my BIOS did that automatically.
And no errors appear. My PC just locks up. Have to force restart in order to get my PC working again.


Ok. So let me make sure I understand, did you try running your pc under load after you fixed your RAM settings in the BIOS? And if you did, did you still have issue's?



I don't know how to make my RAM run at base clock again. I don't know how to over/underclock.


Okay, I don't know about the Gigabyte BIOS, but on my Asus Sabertooth, I had to enable the "XMP" setting in the BIOS to get my board to read the stock speed of my Corsair Dominator memory. For Gigabyte, look for extreme memory profile in your BIOS and enable it.


UPDATE: I have found the XMP option in my BIOS but it wasn't called XMP. It was called DRAM E.O.C.P.

I have enabled XMP and used the default 1600 profile.
It has obviously set the RAM to 1600MHz and also upped the voltage from 1.5V to 1.605V.

Got through POST with no issues.
Now here's to hoping this fixes my freezing issue.

I will post again in about a week (unless my PC freezes again).
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September 22, 2014 8:41:10 PM

So unfortunately, my PC has frozen again.
So that rules the RAM out of the equation.

I decided to install Windows 8 x64 to replace Windows 7.
Everything was fine for 2 days. Then it froze again. So that also rules out programs (As I had basically none installed).

So I can only blame the CPU now.
But I find it strange that after all the heavy loads it has gone through over 6 months, the crashing hasn't gotten worse.

Is my CPU faulty or could it just be bad BIOS settings?
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September 23, 2014 7:32:47 AM

It may be a PSU problem. My new system was having the same issue, and I changed to a stronger PSU and the freezes just stopped. You may wanna have a look at that, and see if you're getting enough power.
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September 23, 2014 1:06:51 PM

mouta said:
It may be a PSU problem. My new system was having the same issue, and I changed to a stronger PSU and the freezes just stopped. You may wanna have a look at that, and see if you're getting enough power.


I have a Corsair 750W PSU.
I calculated how much power I would be using in total. It came up to roughly 520W+.
I calculated with extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine, msi.com/power-supply-calculator, and coolermaster.outervision.com/PSUEngine2.
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September 25, 2014 12:12:43 AM

Here are my current BIOS settings.


Does this look right or should I adjust some settings?
I know it says ***** System Voltage NOT Optimized!! *****
It's been saying that since I buffed up the RAM voltage and will only revert to optimized when RAM is at 1.5V (But at the cost of not being able to run at 1600MHz)
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October 9, 2014 12:22:13 AM

I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.
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October 9, 2014 12:34:59 AM

nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.
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October 9, 2014 10:21:46 AM

AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.
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October 9, 2014 10:35:45 AM

nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.


That is correct, yes.
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October 9, 2014 11:55:02 AM

AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.


That is correct, yes.


Thank you. I shall increase by 0.12 and I will post again if nothing changes or if things appear to be more stable.
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October 9, 2014 12:10:54 PM

AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.


That is correct, yes.


I've increased by 0.125 as that was the only option closest to 0.12.
I will post again in a week if there are no freezes.
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October 9, 2014 12:27:01 PM

nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.


That is correct, yes.


I've increased by 0.125 as that was the only option closest to 0.12.
I will post again in a week if there are no freezes.


Good luck, I hope it goes well :D 
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October 15, 2014 4:07:26 PM

AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.


That is correct, yes.


I've increased by 0.125 as that was the only option closest to 0.12.
I will post again in a week if there are no freezes.


Good luck, I hope it goes well :D 


After a week after the voltage change, I haven't experienced a single freeze so it has definitely done the trick.
Thanks a bunch =D
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October 16, 2014 1:20:42 AM

nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
AdmiralDonut said:
nate vongrimm said:
I'm still having this issue. Could someone check my BIOS settings (check pictures above) and make sure they are right or if some things need changing please.


Look for the CPU/NB voltage setting in the bios and raise that by +0.12. That is the voltage to the memory controller, so it should help stabilize things a little.


So raise the CPU NB VID control by 0.12?
I just want to make sure I change the correct setting as this is uncharted territory for me.


That is correct, yes.


I've increased by 0.125 as that was the only option closest to 0.12.
I will post again in a week if there are no freezes.


Good luck, I hope it goes well :D 


After a week after the voltage change, I haven't experienced a single freeze so it has definitely done the trick.
Thanks a bunch =D


Hey there! I'm really glad it's all worked out for you and no more freezing, and thank you for selecting the solution that worked for you. With any luck, if anyone else experiences a similar problem they will be able to find this thread and possibly solve their own issue as well :) 
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