Help needed!

[rabidbunny]

Hi, my friend just recently got his custom build set up and has trouble with windows freezing.

His story: Over the summer his psu fried his mobo (that's all he knows for sure) and eventually found a new mobo to replace the fried one.

He now has:
-a7v600-x
-amd 2800 (not completely sure it's an XP, but I think it's socket A)
-2x512 mb ram
-Antec 400 watt psu
-eVGA 6600 LE
-WD 80 gb caviar
-crap old white box
-some heatsink with copper heatpipes and a blg blue fan on top

His dilemma:
he has now been able to boot to windows 2000 (i guess he hasn't tried xp) and just as he gets to the desktop, ten seconds later it freezes.

My question:
would flashing the bios help the freezing?
I know the pc isn't overheating as everything is still cool.....
What could be the problem???

I don't know if his cpu or other components could be damaged.

Any insight as to what is happening and/or how to fix it would be GREATLY appreciated by me and most of all my friend.

 

[WR2]

Have you run MemTest86 to test the memory?
Any event where the MB fried would put the RAM at risk. Same for the video card. Any change of swaping those components out for testing?

 

[mad-dog]

If your sure the hardware is all good then do a reinstall on the OS after setting defaults in the BIOS, make sure to reformat the disk before trying to reload the OS.

 

[computer_gy]

did he reinstall the os after replacing the mb if not that is your problem

 

[rabidbunny]

I do not know if he reformatted the disk or not. He probably didn't .

As far as ram goes, I was thinking of taking some ddr memory over to his house and seeing if the ram is bad or not. He has definately not run memtest, but I may try it for him.

If I have time soon, I will take some parts to his house and test them in his system and then test his parts in my system. (that would be my old dell 4550 with ddr memory and an agp slot. )

I cannot thank you enough for your help.
I will post back soon...

 

[computer_gy]

yeah if he didn't reformat and install that is definatley your problem it's like you waking up not knowing who you are and what you are doing and resuming your life.

 

[I]

yeah if he didn't reformat and install that is definatley your problem it's like you waking up not knowing who you are and what you are doing and resuming your life.

Not necessarily, if windows boots all the way to the desktop you're typically home free, when swapping boards IF there is a problem it will tend to be a bluescreen when loading drive controller drivers, an infinite loop at login, or a failure to *see* the OS drive logical location.

It's not like not knowing who you are, etc, because of plug and play - the same mechanism that installs all that hardware when windows installed the first time, can do so again, equally well if you get the system booted to the point that it can do so.

OP didn't really describe exactly what freeze meant, if there is any reaction to keyboard, case reset button, <CTRL><ALT><DEL>, etc.

I'd expect it's something loading at boot, a 3rd party program like maybe an overclocking, chipset register or other hardware monitor type program. He should boot to safe mode and use something like HijackThis to see what's loading, and of course whether it freezes in safe mode. Another option is leaving it sit at the bios hardware health, monitor menu page and watch temps, voltages, and whether it freezes there if left sitting.

 

[rabidbunny]

Ok. His uncle did format the drive and installed windows 2000. Once he logs on, the WHOLE computer freezes mouse and all. I think we may try putting on a new BIOS. He did test different ram and graphics in the computer and it still froze from what he said. I think tonight I will go check it out and see what we can do...

I think he should just get a new motherboard/cpu combo off of newegg. But he doesn't have a job.

Does anyone know of any other possibilities to fix his computer besides buying brand new parts?

Thanks.

 

[I]

Ok. His uncle did format the drive and installed windows 2000. Once he logs on, the WHOLE computer freezes mouse and all.

This is the exact opposite of what I specifically mentioned, to know exactly what is happening, not "and all". Freeze can mean anything, it can be just the OS freezing or hardware itself locking up.

You seem to be trying to fast forward over the details, which could be why there is a problem, but at the very least we can't see this system so have to rely on everything you write.

I think we may try putting on a new BIOS. He did test different ram and graphics in the computer and it still froze from what he said. I think tonight I will go check it out and see what we can do...

Asus usually has reasonable bios notes, if there is nothing metioned about this problem then a new bios probably won't help, BUT if it has a very old, near original bios then odds go up it might have random bugs as all early bios revisions do.

I think he should just get a new motherboard/cpu combo off of newegg. But he doesn't have a job.

No reason to buy a new board if the level of performance it offers is acceptible. New board could have exact same issue, or worse. New board also has different power requirements, that A7V600 uses more 5V rail current for CPU power instead of 12V, so the PSU might need swapped too (depending on what it is).

Does anyone know of any other possibilities to fix his computer besides buying brand new parts?

Any other besides the things mentioned that we have no idea if you'd tried? YOu kinda have to try these things, and/or report back on whether you did else we have nothing to go on. Most things aren't really "optional" suggestions, since they are targeted towards your specific issues and information.

If the board proves stable (like sitting at bios health screen, passes memtest86+ for a few hours), there is no reason to change the motherboard or any other hardware, odds shift to it being windows, and safe mode is the next attempt. All things loading at boot-time should be temporarily disabled, or uninstalled, added back later one at a time if problem is resolved. This includes drivers from Add/Remove programs.

I happen to have an A7V600 box running Win2k (among others), it does fine for what it is (not a primary use system, so I don't know how far it would o'c or what kind of scores it'd get in benchmarks, etc, though IIRC the chipset is a single-digit % slower than nForce2 all else being equal and the PCI bus has lower realized throughput (primarily an issue if trying to max performance out with RAID and GbE, like using as a fileserver platform).). It's not a bad board in general though, would make a fine system for someone that doesn't need modern performance levels.

If all else fails, take a spare hard drive and do a temporary win2k testbed install, just enough to confirm Win2k clean installs and boots ok, then you can also install prime95 or similar to do a stress test.

 

[rabidbunny]

As far as freezing goes, the OS freezes along with the mouse and keyboard. The harddrive and fans keep going but that's it.

I do believe that the bios is origional and I was wondering if there is a power issue for the settings on the motherboard for the cpu.

ONE LAST THING: when I boot the pc up, I don't see a boot option so I can boot in safe mode.....

 

[I]

As far as freezing goes, the OS freezes along with the mouse and keyboard. The harddrive and fans keep going but that's it.

I do believe that the bios is origional and I was wondering if there is a power issue for the settings on the motherboard for the cpu.

ONE LAST THING: when I boot the pc up, I don't see a boot option so I can boot in safe mode.....

I asked about using the reset switch too, and am done helping because you are not trying to systematically make it easier for us to help you.

There could be power management bugs in the bios, but you are again not focusing on what I wrote, doing those things is the first step because it's not likely a bios problem. When they made the board Win2k was already mature OS so they'd certainly have had it as a testbed, board with original bios should be expected to have booted a clean Win2k.

There is no bios menu option for safe mode, start hitting F8 quickly right as the bios starts to boot to windows. See this for a screenshot of the menu choices, choose "safe mode".

 

[rabidbunny]

I asked about using the reset switch too, and am done helping because you are not trying to systematically make it easier for us to help you.

What???? You do know that this computer is not currently sitting at my feet right?? It is at my friends house and he does not have the reset button set up or something. I have only been over there for an hour the other day and that was to set up a Win95 pc. I won't be getting any new info soon because he is busy and does not seem to be in a hurry. He may end up letting me take his pc for a weekend to work on it in my house. Then I will probably have many questions..
So, I won't be able to run memtest and check for all the other stuff for a bit. He doesn't know enought about computers to work on his pc.
I am trying to think of things too, but I haven't had much time to look at the pc again..