Dear Tom's Hardware,
I am asking you all in vain to potentially fix this damn issue that's been haunting my desktop for nearly 2 years now.
Here's the problem: My PC locks up at random moments every now and then. There's no specific events causing the freezing, but the computer freezes and the sound starts buzzing like its stuck on the same time. Sometimes it freezes for 30 seconds or around 2 minutes, some other times it remains stuck until I manually restart it. And a few other times, it bluescreens. It can happen while I'm browsing on file explorer or Chrome (or any other low demanding task), as it can happen when I'm gaming. There is absolutely no pattern!
Even the event viewer can't display anything relevant to the problem. The only hint I can get is the Performance viewer in Windows Task Manager showing the CPU spiking at 100% after every lockup (when it unfreezes), whilst the RAM usage remains at 3gb or so.
The issue appeared around 2 years ago. Nothing in particular changed back then, the hardware was the same as before, it just began all of a sudden.
Here's what I tried: EVERYTHING.
When the issue first appeared. I started scanning for viruses/malware using AVG, Avast and Malwarebytes. Nothing.
Second, I ran some Disk checks and Memtests, as well as Burntest (can't remember the exact name, but it ran every component to the top), nothing.¨
I switched every wire (Sata, Power cords, unplugged every USB device). Nothing
I switched every Hard Drive and formatted Windows at least twice. I tried installing Windows on all three of my drives (1TB Sata, 3TB Sata and an old 250gb Sata). The symptoms were still appearing and the very few failures shown on each drive had no correlation whatsoever with the lockups (different times, different symptoms = none).
I tried switching the GPU with the stock one that came with my system: Not a single change.
I tried changing the thermal paste and switching the fans, nothing. Temperatures were constantly at 40-45°C after lockups. Same for the motherboard and GPU (and every other component).
I EVEN borrowed a brand new power supply from a nearby computer store to test it. No hope.
I updated every driver both manually and automatically (acquiring them from their manufacturers or letting Windows update it automatically). No change.
I switched every Ram stick out, one by one, to see if there wasn't a faulty stick. All perfectly fine.
I unplugged as many components as possible and ran on the Motherboard's GPU on Safemode, still froze.
So I gave up, took my PC to the computer store that provided the PSU to get it checked. Turns out the Intel Sandybridge was worn out, and the chipset froze everytime it reached 47°C. So I had to take big measures:
-Bought a new LGA 1155 motherboard (pain in the a** to find...)
-Bought a new Phantom Case to fit it
-Bought a new 600W PSU as my older one was more or less healthy based on them (and I lacked plugs for the motherboard)
Everything ran just fine just before a few weeks later, it started freezing in the very same ways, more and more often. And now I just can't open anything without it locking up 5 minutes later on.
My current specs are:
-Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
-CPU Intel i7 2600K 2nd Gen 3.4GHz
-Motherboard ASUSTek Computer Inc, P8Z77-V LX LGA 1155 socket.
-GPU ATI Radeon HD 6950 2048 MB
-3TB WD 7200RPM Sata Drive
-1TB Seagate 7200RPM Sata Drive
-RAM 8GB Dual Channel DDR3 (4 x 2)
-1 Optical Drive
The system used to be a 2011 Dell XPS 8300 desktop. I contacted both Intel and Dell to see if my model was part of the Sandybridge recall and none of them said so.
Please people. I want to get done with this machine on which I spent so much.
Sincerely,
a user who would like to spend more time using his computer than fixing it.
I am asking you all in vain to potentially fix this damn issue that's been haunting my desktop for nearly 2 years now.
Here's the problem: My PC locks up at random moments every now and then. There's no specific events causing the freezing, but the computer freezes and the sound starts buzzing like its stuck on the same time. Sometimes it freezes for 30 seconds or around 2 minutes, some other times it remains stuck until I manually restart it. And a few other times, it bluescreens. It can happen while I'm browsing on file explorer or Chrome (or any other low demanding task), as it can happen when I'm gaming. There is absolutely no pattern!
Even the event viewer can't display anything relevant to the problem. The only hint I can get is the Performance viewer in Windows Task Manager showing the CPU spiking at 100% after every lockup (when it unfreezes), whilst the RAM usage remains at 3gb or so.
The issue appeared around 2 years ago. Nothing in particular changed back then, the hardware was the same as before, it just began all of a sudden.
Here's what I tried: EVERYTHING.
When the issue first appeared. I started scanning for viruses/malware using AVG, Avast and Malwarebytes. Nothing.
Second, I ran some Disk checks and Memtests, as well as Burntest (can't remember the exact name, but it ran every component to the top), nothing.¨
I switched every wire (Sata, Power cords, unplugged every USB device). Nothing
I switched every Hard Drive and formatted Windows at least twice. I tried installing Windows on all three of my drives (1TB Sata, 3TB Sata and an old 250gb Sata). The symptoms were still appearing and the very few failures shown on each drive had no correlation whatsoever with the lockups (different times, different symptoms = none).
I tried switching the GPU with the stock one that came with my system: Not a single change.
I tried changing the thermal paste and switching the fans, nothing. Temperatures were constantly at 40-45°C after lockups. Same for the motherboard and GPU (and every other component).
I EVEN borrowed a brand new power supply from a nearby computer store to test it. No hope.
I updated every driver both manually and automatically (acquiring them from their manufacturers or letting Windows update it automatically). No change.
I switched every Ram stick out, one by one, to see if there wasn't a faulty stick. All perfectly fine.
I unplugged as many components as possible and ran on the Motherboard's GPU on Safemode, still froze.
So I gave up, took my PC to the computer store that provided the PSU to get it checked. Turns out the Intel Sandybridge was worn out, and the chipset froze everytime it reached 47°C. So I had to take big measures:
-Bought a new LGA 1155 motherboard (pain in the a** to find...)
-Bought a new Phantom Case to fit it
-Bought a new 600W PSU as my older one was more or less healthy based on them (and I lacked plugs for the motherboard)
Everything ran just fine just before a few weeks later, it started freezing in the very same ways, more and more often. And now I just can't open anything without it locking up 5 minutes later on.
My current specs are:
-Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
-CPU Intel i7 2600K 2nd Gen 3.4GHz
-Motherboard ASUSTek Computer Inc, P8Z77-V LX LGA 1155 socket.
-GPU ATI Radeon HD 6950 2048 MB
-3TB WD 7200RPM Sata Drive
-1TB Seagate 7200RPM Sata Drive
-RAM 8GB Dual Channel DDR3 (4 x 2)
-1 Optical Drive
The system used to be a 2011 Dell XPS 8300 desktop. I contacted both Intel and Dell to see if my model was part of the Sandybridge recall and none of them said so.
Please people. I want to get done with this machine on which I spent so much.
Sincerely,
a user who would like to spend more time using his computer than fixing it.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram