- Dec 16, 2014
- 52
- 0
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maybe someone can pinpoint the problem, since I'm at the end of my tether
spec:
(new stuffs purchased on 2015, 24th January)
i5-4690k
Asus Z97 Pro
4gb Corsair Vengeance 1600Mhz XMP (x2 pieces)
(purchased on November 2014)
MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G
(old stuffs)
HDD 7200rpm (x2 units, Hitachi 500 GB (purchased 2014) & Seagate Barracuda 1TB (purchased 2012))
DVDRW LG OEM
normal cabled PS/2 keyboard & USB mouse
PSX gamepad on PS to PC Converter adapter
- day one: booting up my PC from shutdown (with power cable unplug), BIOS reported Asus Anti Surge Protection has been triggered to protect components from unstable PSU, press F1 to enter BIOS. entered BIOS, checked the voltages. +5v and +3.3v were in red colour. +5v was around 3v, +3.3v was around 0.__v or 1.__v I forgot the exact number. +12v was not in red but it was around 10v. CPU Vcore 0.84v. hard reset, reenter BIOS, voltage still same low. shutdown, unplugged cable power, left for 10-15mins, got back, plugged in power cable, turn on PC, no Anti Surge report. RAM XMP overclock failed report on BIOS (always happened when shit happened, usually freezes), entered BIOS, looked at voltage, all normal, shrugged it off as mobo BIOS bug, reactivated XMP, reentered BIOS, looked at voltages, still good. enter Windows, looked at AI Suite voltages, good. continued using PC and put this occurrence behind
normal voltages (are these good?):
CPU Vcore = 1.008v (sometimes increase to 1.024v, can be on Core0,1,2,3, mostly on Core 2&3, but only increases in 1-2secs then return to 1.008v and mostly stays here. in AI Suite it's even lower when idle, I've seen minimum 0.75v-0.84v, maybe it's Windows related)
Memory = 1.501v (sometimes decreases to 1.498v, sometimes increases to 1.504v only for 1-2secs then returns to 1.501v and mostly stays here)
+12v = 12.000v
+5v = 5.120v (I've seen this decreases to 5.020v for 1-2secs about 2-3 times then returns to 5.120v and mostly stays here)
+3.3v = always 3.312v
also I just realised that the CPU speed always different in BIOS main tab on every boot: 3510/3507/3504/3501 Mhz, etc. maybe this is normal? I read i5-4690k has a boost feature (stock speed is from 3500 Mhz to max 3900Mhz when needed). so on each boot the last recorded highest speed would be different. maybe. in the right side view of every tab, in the CPU part the frequency is always 3500Mhz though
- day two: play a game for 8 hours non stop. a light game, nothing heavy, low-medium load and temp. stopped the game, left the PC idle for 1hr, returned, plugged in USB modem and started browsing. 1hr later HDD emitted weird sound. it's like the sound of portable HDD with bad cable/insufficient power trying to start spinning then stop, then starts spinning again. I think it's the 500gb primary HDD. every time the case HDD LED blinked, that weird sound can be heard. checked Task Manager, no weird programs running. 10mins passed, weird sound still there, HDD LED keeps blinking for whatever reason. stopped browsing, unplugged USB modem, restarted Windows. opened BIOS, voltage still good. entered Windows, HDD LED not keep blinking, good. but that weird sound still presented every time HDD LED blinked ie. HDD read. tested opening folders, did CRC check on zip files, whatever makes the HDD reads. yup, that weird sound every time. felt Windows explorer become slightly sluggish. tried testing the other 1TB HDD which is for data only. played a 4gb 720p WMV file in that 1TB HDD, felt sluggish too. thought the video looks froze for a split second when playing. thought this 1TB HDD also making same weird sound or was it my imagination? restarted Windows, again. checked voltage in BIOS, still good. entered Windows again. this time everything felt really sluggish, from Windows start loading, opening explorer. closing explorer took a couple of secs. shutdown, unplugged power cable, left for 10-15mins. came back, plugged in power cable, turn on PC, check voltage in BIOS, good. entered Windows, everything was fine. no weird sound on HDDs. everything is silent good. even felt the PC performance kinda faster, or this is just my imagination. what gives?
- day three: plugged in USB modem, browsing with Firefox. clicked a download link, IDM took over, IDM download window popped up, but it hasn't finish its animation, then froze. the window stuck in transparent trapezoid shape. just froze in the middle of the screen, can't click it. then Firefox froze too, not responding. clicked the X to close, infinite loading. right clicked on taskbar, opened Task Manager. Task Manager didn't show up, or it maybe show up, but got blocked by Firefox which stuck on top. still can ALT+TAB among Firefox, frozen IDM window, desktop, no Task Manager though. can't show desktop, again maybe coz Firefox get stuck on top. CTRL+ALT+DEL, clicked on Task Manager, then everything totally froze. hard reset, entered BIOS, look at voltages, normal. entered Windows, checked AI Suite voltages, normal. replugged USB modem, reopened Firefox, clicked a download link, IDM window showed up fine. everything was good. used PC till night, all smooth
- day four: thought that funny freezes yesterday was coz of malware. downloaded 5 different cleaners, updated em. entered Windows Safe Mode. started scanning with 1st cleaner. around 40%, the PC froze... hard reset, can't reboot! power on, fans spinning, mobo whines like tick tick tick, then immediate shutdown. then it self power on again, whines again, self shutdown again, this cycle is ad infinitum. mobo LED indicator on RAM was on! aha! RAM! shutdown, unplugged power cable. pull off all RAM. put RAM#1 on slot A2, successfully boot on. report on failed RAM XMP, pffft... the usual. shutdown, this time put RAM#1 on B2, boot success. not testing slot A1 coz it's blocked by Cooler Master heatsink, thus will not test slot B1 too. tested RAM#2 on slot A2, mobo beeping furiously. yes, jackpot! I thought. tested RAM#2 on slot B2, boot success, wtf? retested RAM#2 on slot A2, boot success, really wtf. continued testing each RAM on each slot, all boot success now. even the XMP failed report stopped show up, and it's always 1600Mhz now. weird. in the end I put back RAM#1 on slot A2 and RAM#2 on slot B2 as they originally were. XMP still not failed, it's always 1600Mhz without I have to reactivate. checked voltage on BIOS, AI Suite, all normal. entered Windows, all fine. resuming cleaner scanning, no freeze this time. wasted hours on scanning with 5 cleaners, result: no malware, clean. great...
so... what gives? mobo? RAM? PSU? drives me nut. any idea? all was good b4 these new mobo+CPU+RAM came... hell, maybe the 1st Anti Surge report happenstance wasn't related to others. RMAed mobo, will RMA RAM, will buy new PSU. if it still freezes then I'll...
truth to be told since I've got new CPU+mobo+RAM weird things have happened since day 1 after purchase. here are some:
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2508481/weird-asus-z97-pro-bios-behaviours.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2139079/asus-z97-motherboards-official-support-thread/page-5.html#15156717
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2781201/mobo-gpu-emitting-loud-noise-grinding-whining-bootup-shutdown-wake-sleep.html
the last link is rather long. the culprit of the grinding sound was a faulty 10cm fan. better read from the 10th paragraph: "to be honest since I changed into this new mobo since the 1st time, there were already weird problems..." for more problems, which are certainly not caused by a faulty fan: freezes, RAM XMP profile overclock often failed, weird BIOS behaviour (that freeze the 1st time, laggish control), funny Windows explorer moment (can't delete file), Windows slow, Windows stuck on Welcome screen, incompatibility with certain DVDRW, USB slots often failed to recognize device
all these happened right when I start use new CPU+RAM+mobo. surely the old components didn't just break on 1 day, from using old CPU+RAM+mobo to the new one on the same day. I suspect the new elements...
can't believe I was able to hold on, be patient, and kept using them despite all the kinks for a year, until day one-four happened, then I snapped
spec:
(new stuffs purchased on 2015, 24th January)
i5-4690k
Asus Z97 Pro
4gb Corsair Vengeance 1600Mhz XMP (x2 pieces)
(purchased on November 2014)
MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G
(old stuffs)
HDD 7200rpm (x2 units, Hitachi 500 GB (purchased 2014) & Seagate Barracuda 1TB (purchased 2012))
DVDRW LG OEM
normal cabled PS/2 keyboard & USB mouse
PSX gamepad on PS to PC Converter adapter
- day one: booting up my PC from shutdown (with power cable unplug), BIOS reported Asus Anti Surge Protection has been triggered to protect components from unstable PSU, press F1 to enter BIOS. entered BIOS, checked the voltages. +5v and +3.3v were in red colour. +5v was around 3v, +3.3v was around 0.__v or 1.__v I forgot the exact number. +12v was not in red but it was around 10v. CPU Vcore 0.84v. hard reset, reenter BIOS, voltage still same low. shutdown, unplugged cable power, left for 10-15mins, got back, plugged in power cable, turn on PC, no Anti Surge report. RAM XMP overclock failed report on BIOS (always happened when shit happened, usually freezes), entered BIOS, looked at voltage, all normal, shrugged it off as mobo BIOS bug, reactivated XMP, reentered BIOS, looked at voltages, still good. enter Windows, looked at AI Suite voltages, good. continued using PC and put this occurrence behind
normal voltages (are these good?):
CPU Vcore = 1.008v (sometimes increase to 1.024v, can be on Core0,1,2,3, mostly on Core 2&3, but only increases in 1-2secs then return to 1.008v and mostly stays here. in AI Suite it's even lower when idle, I've seen minimum 0.75v-0.84v, maybe it's Windows related)
Memory = 1.501v (sometimes decreases to 1.498v, sometimes increases to 1.504v only for 1-2secs then returns to 1.501v and mostly stays here)
+12v = 12.000v
+5v = 5.120v (I've seen this decreases to 5.020v for 1-2secs about 2-3 times then returns to 5.120v and mostly stays here)
+3.3v = always 3.312v
also I just realised that the CPU speed always different in BIOS main tab on every boot: 3510/3507/3504/3501 Mhz, etc. maybe this is normal? I read i5-4690k has a boost feature (stock speed is from 3500 Mhz to max 3900Mhz when needed). so on each boot the last recorded highest speed would be different. maybe. in the right side view of every tab, in the CPU part the frequency is always 3500Mhz though
- day two: play a game for 8 hours non stop. a light game, nothing heavy, low-medium load and temp. stopped the game, left the PC idle for 1hr, returned, plugged in USB modem and started browsing. 1hr later HDD emitted weird sound. it's like the sound of portable HDD with bad cable/insufficient power trying to start spinning then stop, then starts spinning again. I think it's the 500gb primary HDD. every time the case HDD LED blinked, that weird sound can be heard. checked Task Manager, no weird programs running. 10mins passed, weird sound still there, HDD LED keeps blinking for whatever reason. stopped browsing, unplugged USB modem, restarted Windows. opened BIOS, voltage still good. entered Windows, HDD LED not keep blinking, good. but that weird sound still presented every time HDD LED blinked ie. HDD read. tested opening folders, did CRC check on zip files, whatever makes the HDD reads. yup, that weird sound every time. felt Windows explorer become slightly sluggish. tried testing the other 1TB HDD which is for data only. played a 4gb 720p WMV file in that 1TB HDD, felt sluggish too. thought the video looks froze for a split second when playing. thought this 1TB HDD also making same weird sound or was it my imagination? restarted Windows, again. checked voltage in BIOS, still good. entered Windows again. this time everything felt really sluggish, from Windows start loading, opening explorer. closing explorer took a couple of secs. shutdown, unplugged power cable, left for 10-15mins. came back, plugged in power cable, turn on PC, check voltage in BIOS, good. entered Windows, everything was fine. no weird sound on HDDs. everything is silent good. even felt the PC performance kinda faster, or this is just my imagination. what gives?
- day three: plugged in USB modem, browsing with Firefox. clicked a download link, IDM took over, IDM download window popped up, but it hasn't finish its animation, then froze. the window stuck in transparent trapezoid shape. just froze in the middle of the screen, can't click it. then Firefox froze too, not responding. clicked the X to close, infinite loading. right clicked on taskbar, opened Task Manager. Task Manager didn't show up, or it maybe show up, but got blocked by Firefox which stuck on top. still can ALT+TAB among Firefox, frozen IDM window, desktop, no Task Manager though. can't show desktop, again maybe coz Firefox get stuck on top. CTRL+ALT+DEL, clicked on Task Manager, then everything totally froze. hard reset, entered BIOS, look at voltages, normal. entered Windows, checked AI Suite voltages, normal. replugged USB modem, reopened Firefox, clicked a download link, IDM window showed up fine. everything was good. used PC till night, all smooth
- day four: thought that funny freezes yesterday was coz of malware. downloaded 5 different cleaners, updated em. entered Windows Safe Mode. started scanning with 1st cleaner. around 40%, the PC froze... hard reset, can't reboot! power on, fans spinning, mobo whines like tick tick tick, then immediate shutdown. then it self power on again, whines again, self shutdown again, this cycle is ad infinitum. mobo LED indicator on RAM was on! aha! RAM! shutdown, unplugged power cable. pull off all RAM. put RAM#1 on slot A2, successfully boot on. report on failed RAM XMP, pffft... the usual. shutdown, this time put RAM#1 on B2, boot success. not testing slot A1 coz it's blocked by Cooler Master heatsink, thus will not test slot B1 too. tested RAM#2 on slot A2, mobo beeping furiously. yes, jackpot! I thought. tested RAM#2 on slot B2, boot success, wtf? retested RAM#2 on slot A2, boot success, really wtf. continued testing each RAM on each slot, all boot success now. even the XMP failed report stopped show up, and it's always 1600Mhz now. weird. in the end I put back RAM#1 on slot A2 and RAM#2 on slot B2 as they originally were. XMP still not failed, it's always 1600Mhz without I have to reactivate. checked voltage on BIOS, AI Suite, all normal. entered Windows, all fine. resuming cleaner scanning, no freeze this time. wasted hours on scanning with 5 cleaners, result: no malware, clean. great...
so... what gives? mobo? RAM? PSU? drives me nut. any idea? all was good b4 these new mobo+CPU+RAM came... hell, maybe the 1st Anti Surge report happenstance wasn't related to others. RMAed mobo, will RMA RAM, will buy new PSU. if it still freezes then I'll...
truth to be told since I've got new CPU+mobo+RAM weird things have happened since day 1 after purchase. here are some:
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2508481/weird-asus-z97-pro-bios-behaviours.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2139079/asus-z97-motherboards-official-support-thread/page-5.html#15156717
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2781201/mobo-gpu-emitting-loud-noise-grinding-whining-bootup-shutdown-wake-sleep.html
the last link is rather long. the culprit of the grinding sound was a faulty 10cm fan. better read from the 10th paragraph: "to be honest since I changed into this new mobo since the 1st time, there were already weird problems..." for more problems, which are certainly not caused by a faulty fan: freezes, RAM XMP profile overclock often failed, weird BIOS behaviour (that freeze the 1st time, laggish control), funny Windows explorer moment (can't delete file), Windows slow, Windows stuck on Welcome screen, incompatibility with certain DVDRW, USB slots often failed to recognize device
all these happened right when I start use new CPU+RAM+mobo. surely the old components didn't just break on 1 day, from using old CPU+RAM+mobo to the new one on the same day. I suspect the new elements...
can't believe I was able to hold on, be patient, and kept using them despite all the kinks for a year, until day one-four happened, then I snapped
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