*sigh*.....what can i try next?

[lordaardvark2]

hello all,

i apologize for posting in the middle of the forum's finnickey behavior, but i would really like to be working on this problem

a few months ago my friends scrounged up some junk and built me the computer i now sit at. its specs are as follow:

Soc. A Sempron 2500+ (1.75ghz)
Gigabyte 7nf-rz mobo
768 megs of mismatched ram (heh)
1 hdd
1 cd drive
1 floppy
radeon 9550 agp (256 meg, i believe?)
AWFUL stock dell psu from god knows where
win xp home sp2

so the deal is, when i'm computing and randomly going about my business, the computer exhibits these symptoms:

- short, stutter-like hangs at random, lasting about a second or 3

- longer system freezes, in which it seems time has stopped (task man doesn't register spikes in ram or cpu usage, or odd processes)

- catastrophic system freezes, where an odd noise can be heard first, some sort of error in like the onboard sound or something, and then a restart-worth system freeze that to my knowledge will not work itself out (i can't walk away, come back, and get on)

these symptoms are very annoying, i just want my computer to WORK, is that so much to ask??

the larger freezes seem to accompany taxing computing, like when i'm on youtube or google video, or when i'm opening cs:s or hl2. a week or so ago, i could do either just fine.

i've tested my ram multiple times, the most recent of which was a 10h 34m memtestx86 run (in dos or w/e), 23 passes, 0 errors. i've also run...uh.... whatsitcalled.... prime95. and another memtest, that i ran in windows. ram seems to check out.

i believe it is the 175 watt psu. i think that, although it can squeeze out enough juice to support the system, it fluxuates, causing all the freezes. i have no evidence to support this theory, but what is the significance of the freezes accompanying vid watching and gaming? usage of graphics card?

i've ordered a new psu, and some fans. temps are also not a problem. i've reinstalled windows, still have hangs. is there anything else that i can try? flashing bios? will that have any effect?

i'm getting desperate.....


sorry for such a long post, thank you very much for your help, and i hope you can make some more sense out of this than i can.

 

[Mousemonkey]

A good PSU won't harm your system at all so no worries there when the new one arrives slip it in and rest easy, the mismatched RAM is what I would wonder about, how are they mismatched?, different brands?, speeds?, sizes or what?

 

[mustangman311]

Yeah, I'm thinking it could be the RAM or the PSU. A PSU problem can cause problems in every aspect of the PC, so it's good you've gotten a new one... But yeah, like mousemonkey asked, how are the RAM sticks mismatched?

 

[RTsa]

You could try not posting the same thread three times next time! :trophy:

 

[AMDThunder]

You could try not posting the same thread three times next time! :trophy:

It's the forums, goofball. Not the poster.

 

[lordaardvark2]

You could try not posting the same thread three times next time! Trophy

yeah, yeah, i hear yah... i heard that the forums were being glitchy, but i was like, "oh, i am far superior, i never make mistakes!" and then BAM there are like 50 of my threads.... felt pretty stupid, and i'm trying to take care of it. sorry.

Yeah, I'm thinking it could be the RAM or the PSU. A PSU problem can cause problems in every aspect of the PC, so its good you've gotten one... But yeah, like mousemonkey asked, how are the RAM sticks mismatched?

yeah, i'm really thinking its the PSU now, and i'm really looking forward to getting the new one. i just hope that this current one isn't dying, as i've heard they can take out other components with them.... 8O

below you will find my response to mousemonkey.

A good PSU won't harm your system at all so no worries there when the new one arrives slip it in and rest easy, the mismatched RAM is what I would wonder about, how are they mismatched?, different brands?, speeds?, sizes or what?

alright, i have 3 256 sticks. two are a pair, they match, and a third is uh.... well... not. heh. anyway, in cpu-z, it sez i have 1280 mb of ram, which unfortunately isn't true. it reports the two matched sticks as 512s, pc2700 (166 mhz) and manufactured by 0000000000. yeah, when i saw the manu, i got kinda worried, but idk. then the third stick is by micron, reported corrrectly as 256, and operating at pc2100 (133mhz).

so, that being said, they are mismatched by brand and speed. their actual sizes are the same, b/c stickers on them all say 256, however the fact that those two are misreported still throws up red flags for me.....

the thing is, tho, that i've tested the crap out of these sticks. i'm gunna run another prime95 here in a bit, but i've done 2 memtests and even trial-and error. i booted with each stick individually and there were no atleast boot errors, like with the beeping and the not booting and stuff.

so what else should i try to isolate the problem, if it is my ram?

 

[AMDThunder]

What does your mobo run at? If it's 166, yank the 2100 ram. You're slowing down your 2700 sticks. If it's 133, it's not hurting anything slowing you down. Might yank it anyway to see if it solves anything. Losing that 256 isn't going to hurt you much.

Your pc can only run as fast as it's slowest part.

 

[lordaardvark2]

Your pc can only run as fast as it's slowest part.

lol i can relate as an athlete... never been directed at me fortunately, but its hurt our team before... :lol:

anyway, when you mean my mobo, do you mean my main fsb? as in what the cpu is set to? b/c i actually underclocked the proc a bit, i have no clue what its meant to be b/c i got it as a handmedown so god knows what it was stock, but currently the cpu is 133 mhz. so, i've got a synchronous fsb between ram and cpu of 1:1. i actually tried running without a 256, and i think it may have helped, i'm not sure, i know i could get some rounds of cs:s in with my friends, this was back at thanksgiving. but i memtested them...! oh well, i'm taking it out, b/c i think it worked better w/out the extra one in, and although i can totally tell the diff between 768 and 512, i'll tough it out or something.

actually i think i'm gonna start that prime95 first, and then take it out after that.

thank you though for the posting and the helping.... would you still say ditch the sore-thumb stick?

 

[pshrk]

What does your mobo run at? If it's 166, yank the 2100 ram. You're slowing down your 2700 sticks. If it's 133, it's not hurting anything slowing you down. Might yank it anyway to see if it solves anything. Losing that 256 isn't going to hurt you much.

Your pc can only run as fast as it's slowest part.

I don't agree with you, aardvark doesn't have very much ram to begin with, losing 256M may cause a significant increase in virtual memory usage.

I don't believe that your RAM is causing the instability, but everyone else here does so maybe i'm missing something.


My advice: go ahead and take out your 2100 RAM, if it doesn't help and your hard drive starts thrashing then put it back in. I think it's the PSU, but sometimes my computer starts to hang when the hard drive is going bad. You may want to try an OS on a bootable CDROM like knoppix in order to rule out the hard drive. Good luck!

 

[Mousemonkey]

I would start by pulling the micron pc2100 stick and then checking in BIOS to see if the system is seeing the pc2700 and running it at 166mhz, then check cpu-z again (ver 1.38 is the latest but that shouldn't make any difference with the age of your system) I have had similar issues with my Sck A rig and two sticks one pc2700 512mb and one pc2100 256mb that really did not play well together.

 

[lordaardvark2]

I don't agree with you, aardvark doesn't have very much ram to begin with, losing 256M may cause a significant increase in virtual memory usage.

I don't believe that your RAM is causing the instability, but everyone else here does so maybe i'm missing something.


My advice: go ahead and take out your 2100 RAM, if it doesn't help and your hard drive starts thrashing then put it back in. I think it's the PSU, but sometimes my computer starts to hang when the hard drive is going bad. You may want to try an OS on a bootable CDROM like knoppix in order to rule out the hard drive. Good luck!

arright, i suppose i'll whip out that other stick of ram then, and give that a whirl. prime95 is still running fine, and i've even TRIED to crash my computer, by running a whole bunch of stupid things together (defrag, adaware, virus scan all while prime 95ing, speedfan, taskman, firefox) but no stutters, oddly enough. its been going for about an hour i suppose.

i was wondering about the hdd, but i told myself that it wasn't that, because its a new hdd, still under waranty... i mean it better not be the hdd... idk about any disk-booting OSes, but i'll try to put in my aincient 2gig and see if that is any different... only problem with 2gigs is that i can't really test much with that size, lol.

thanks again to all of you! (still crossing fingers for psu)

and mousemonkey, i'll be sure to check the bios when i take it out. only thing is i've been messing with my timings and such... i'll put it AT 166, hows that? heh. then maybe i'll clock my cpu back up. idk. i just want it to f'ing work right! it'll probably be a while till i take it out, though, because of my current testing. how long do you think i should run prime95? i mean i've heard that some crazies run it for weeks, but i'd rather be able to do some tweaking later in the day....

 

[lordaardvark2]

okay, after 5h 42m of prime95, there were no errors. i flipped teh compy off and took off the slower stick. i checked the bios, and the ram was set to "by spd" which made a resulting frequency of 333 (?!). so i boot in, i...oh wait, i clocked my proc up too, from 133 to 166. anyway, i boot in, come here, and i have a hang. sux. bad. i checked cpu-z, and it sez that my ram is 166. sigh. idk. this is so weird. i'm gonna try switching around the ram, playing musical DIMMs. dammit. i'll try to open a game or something, to know if this is still a bad setup.

 

[lordaardvark2]

/bump

i switched around the sticks some, and turned down the speed in the bios, from "by spd" which set them to 333 to "50%" which set them to 166 like they *should* be. so i boot up, no hangs yet, but cpu-z now reports the frequency to be 83.7 mhz. BALLS! still workin on it.

in this test, i had both of the matched dimms in. however, the ram was in single-channel mode. how significant is this? i suppose one of my matched ones is dying/dead, which sucks, b/c that means i have to slow down the good one by sticking in the slower 256... i CANNOT have less than 512 megs... that is bad enough.....

 

[yawn115]

Youve probably got DDR ram so 166 equates to 333 "effctive" speed and this is why cpu-z is showing it as 83 when you manually set it to 166, so you can and should return it to the spd setting (333).
Also socket A doesnt even support dual channel (its a motherboatd feature not a ram feature).

 

[lordaardvark2]

Youve probably got DDR ram so 166 equates to 333 "effctive" speed and this is why cpu-z is showing it as 83 when you manually set it to 166, so you can and should return it to the spd setting (333).
Also socket A doesnt even support dual channel (its a motherboatd feature not a ram feature).

really, y'don't say? wow. thats the first i've heard that. thanks alot. hmmh. thats very interesting. but still would you say that dual-channel being non-effective in some combinations is any kind of hint? idk what the hell its significance is. i've been trying all possible ram combinations, b/c i'm THAT desperate, and i've gone through 5 failed attempts, this being my 6th. we'll see how it goes!

thank you very much for the info. i really did not know that.

 

[lordaardvark2]

alright, i'm about out of ram stick combinations, and so far they've all still been glitchy. so how would i go about doing the PF thing? its worth a try....

 

[lordaardvark2]

Ok, I will find pcworld's link to do that, but since you have less than a gig of ram, it might not make too much of a difference, and also considering yu are running below 400mhz might be another reason why it could be so slow if you do the pf thing


shoez........

Ok, since I have the Jan issue, the link isn't online yet, but I will give you the code:

start.run
regedit
Then in the system files on the left pane, go to:
Hkey_Local_machine
Systen
Currentcontrolset
control
session manager
memorymanagement
then double click on disablepagingexecutive
change the 0 value to a 1, and page file will only be used once your ram is up
If you don't like it, simply change the value from 1 back to 0


If this doesn't work, maybe time to upgrade?........... Confused

hey, man, thank you very much. i'll definitely give that a whirl. as previously stated, i'm gettin kinda desperate...

its totally time for an upgrade... but then again, isn't it always? the thing is, this IS an upgrade... i'm coming out of the dark ages of an AMD k-6 (i believe) operating at a BEASTLY 300mhz, with a WHOPPING 120 megs of ram. oh, and i had dial up. yeah. so i spent my childhood on that sucker, unfortunately. i mean, it wasn't bad. we had our ups and downs. but then i started to feel my growing pains as the 4 gig hdd began to seem too small.

needless to say, i've been wanting to build all my life. so i start outlining a build on soc 939 last year, when it was the BIG thing. i learned a ton, knew what i was doing (for the most part) and all i needed were the parts. well, then i got a particularly expensive girlfriend and some other stuff went down, and i never quite had enough money.

so, long story short, my friends ALL end up building before me, after i tell them how easy it is to build, and teach them some stuff. good thing is, they outgrew some of their systems and ended up giving me this bucket. so, although i'm having to do major patch work to keep it afloat, i love it every minute.

so, the end. i do need to upgrade, b/c i still haven't technically popped my computer building cherry. i'm not quite sure why i'm telling you my life story, but i've already typed all this out, so SOMEONE is going to read it, i'm not just gonna delete it. heh.

 

[joefriday]

First of all, have you checked device manager to see if any of your drivers are FUBAR? Have you ran any anti spyware programs or virus scans lately? It sounds more like a software issue than a hardware problem.


Other things to check are the mobo for any bulging capacitors and the accessory components. I had a Gigabyte board of that era and it blew two caps. Funny thing was the damn board would still boot and load windows, but it was glitchy to say the least. If those are good, try removing your PCI cards and unplugging all you peripheral accessories (printer, scanner, game controller, etc) next and see if conditions improve.

 

[lordaardvark2]

no no no, my system is still crap by many standards, but thats what i was COMING from. i've got a 2 ghz sempron, i really can't complain, with a 9550, does steam games on all high (real happy with that).

yeah, it could still be software, but i'm on a relatively fresh install (of windows), and that didn't help. i use nod32 and adaware quite often b/c my mom gets on here, and not to be mean, but i don't really trust her computer-savviness. anyway, i'll try pulling out peripherals. i'm not exactly sure what i'm looking for on the mobo, but i'll give it a look over.

thanks guys.

 

[Konut]

I'd guess its the power supply. Idk if you've received the new power supply yet, but you can get this one. Its definitely in your budget. If its not the PSU or ram, something in your system is busted, so you might be struggling for a lot longer. Maybe try booting up with just the 1 stick of 256 since you already tried the other stick alone. Anyways, heres the PSU.

http://shop1.outpost.com/product/4587977?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

 

[killmess]

/bump

i switched around the sticks some, and turned down the speed in the bios, from "by spd" which set them to 333 to "50%" which set them to 166 like they *should* be. so i boot up, no hangs yet, but cpu-z now reports the frequency to be 83.7 mhz. BALLS! still workin on it.

in this test, i had both of the matched dimms in. however, the ram was in single-channel mode. how significant is this? i suppose one of my matched ones is dying/dead, which sucks, b/c that means i have to slow down the good one by sticking in the slower 256... i CANNOT have less than 512 megs... that is bad enough.....

Try go up from 133Mhz to 166Mhz fsb. I have a stick of 256MB "Panram" 2100 working fine at 2700. :roll:
Brand name ram should handle a little more speed, maybe putting higher timings, like 3 3 3 7. :roll:

Also 170W psu, 8O I think it really isn't enough. :x :!:

 

[killmess]

:arrow: Have you done the standard set of tests of memtest+? You should do the "all tests" set. I had 1600 errors in tests #5 and #6. :idea:

 

[killmess]

no, I don't think it is spyware/virus, his system is just kinda crap (no hard feelings? ), 300 mhz ram, and socket a sempron, that explains it all

All I can say at this point is uninstall all programs that are fairly new and you don't use much, that is what is lagging your system, because they are designed to run smoothly on a basic dell that is up to date, not a 5 year old computer

What do you mean? :?: :x I'm writing this from an amd cpu(thoroughbread b) 1.8Ghz @ 166Mhz, (almost the same than his), but with a 4200-8x and 768 ram and I can run Oblivion quite well. :roll:

 

[hella-d]

RAM Is Cheap, You Can Get A Gig For Less Than $100.00 Get Some More (And Matching) DIMMs

 

[zjohnr]

but i memtested them...!

I suppose it's more than a little sacrilegious to disrespect the memtest, but I'm not so sure how effect a test it actually is. It's not that I doubt the efficacy of the basic test algorithms themselves. I don't.

What I wonder about is how well memtest86 is able to stress the memory subsystem. I believe it relies completely on memory accesses generated from the CPU. During actual system usage though, wouldn't the memory be dealing with requests from the CPU, PCI bus (DMA), and whatever interface the video card uses, all more or less simultaneously?

IMO, a memory test that hit the memory from all possible directions would be the way to go. I'm not sure if memtest86 does this ... or if, in fact, any memory test routine does.

Just speculating out loud. But, of course, if I'm wrong about any of the above, I'm sure I'll hear about it shortly. That would be a good thing too.

-john