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Seemingly random crashes, then boot option won't stick in UEFI

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June 15, 2012 6:40:21 AM

This is how it usually goes: Everything seems to be going normally, then, without warning, the computer crashes straight to a restart, and after the mobo splash screen, I get the message "NTLDR is missing."

When I manually power off, restart and go into the UEFI, I see that my SSD, which has the MBR on it, is gone from my 2 boot option priorities and is now third in the list of Hard Drive BBS Priorities. I change it back to my SSD, save changes, and it boots fine.

Rinse and repeat. This seems to happen completely randomly. I could not even be using the computer, be loading a web page, telling it to shut down. Anything. I can't pinpoint it.

Here's what I've tried so far:

- Updated Mobo firmware
- Updated SSD firmware
- Updated drivers for as much as I could think of
- Unplugged the SATA cables and plugged them back in
- Reformatted and reinstalled Windows

Here's my system specs:

- Windows 7 64-bit Home Premium
- ASRock P67 Extreme4 Gen3 mobo
- Crucial M4 64GB SSD
- Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB
- XFX ATI Radeon HD 6950 2 GB

More about : seemingly random crashes boot option stick uefi

a c 261 G Storage
June 15, 2012 9:54:54 PM

What is your PSU? It can be failing and causing the reboots.
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June 15, 2012 11:17:20 PM

Quote:
What is your PSU? It can be failing and causing the reboots.

It's a Corsair TX750M. How can I tell if that's what is causing the crashes?

Here's some more info regarding the crashes:

I can tell it's about to crash when the computer semi-freezes. I can't really click anything other than some random things. I can't ctrl+alt+del to pull up Task Manager, but sometimes a dialogue box pops up asking to "end task," which I obviously can't click.

When it finally crashes, the whole screen goes black except for an inch strip at the top full of artifacted random colored pixels.
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June 16, 2012 2:33:42 AM

Quote:
Start by running memtest on your ram


Ok, I ran memtest86 and everything completed (got the go ahead to press esc to exit).

How would I go about testing my GPU and PSU for failures?
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a c 261 G Storage
June 16, 2012 2:35:29 AM

elstie said:
Quote:
Start by running memtest on your ram


Ok, I ran memtest86 and everything completed (got the go ahead to press esc to exit).

How would I go about testing my GPU and PSU for failures?

The only way I know of is swapping between computers, guess I am lucky having multiple PC's in one home.
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June 16, 2012 2:39:45 AM

rolli59 said:
The only way I know of is swapping between computers, guess I am lucky having multiple PC's in one home.


Lol. Well, would it tell me anything if I either RMA'd or flat-out bought a new PSU first, tested it, then possibly send it back, and then, if necessary, do the same with the GPU?

Obviously buying another whole new rig just for testing purposes is a bit out of my budget right now.
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June 16, 2012 7:11:12 PM

I totally forgot about this other tidbit. If I go right into the UEFI Setup after a crash, without letting it display the "NTLDR is missing" message, my SSD is not detected in the SATA3 ports at all. If I power down from the UEFI and power up again, I still get the "NTLDR is missing" but the drive is detected and I can select it as the boot drive again.

It makes me wonder if the SSD or the SATA ports are the problem.
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a c 261 G Storage
June 16, 2012 10:08:13 PM

My suspicion would be the SATA ports failing but you can try it with putting the HDD on the SATA 3 ports as well and if both disappear then it is definitely the board.
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June 17, 2012 12:10:44 AM

Ok, I went with your advice and plugged the SSD in to a SATA2 port instead. Same old freezing/crash/restart.

I think I might try to create a partition on my 1TB HDD and install Windows there to try to rule out the SSD itself before I go spending cash money on new PSUs, GPUs, and mobos.

Thanks for your help so far! :) 
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November 22, 2012 4:12:59 PM

Did you manage to fix this issue? I have a similar spec and the exact same problem.
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November 28, 2012 11:14:18 PM

It turned out to be an issue with the SSD. When I called support at Crucial, they just had me RMA it. I have a new one in there with zero issues now.
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November 28, 2012 11:14:40 PM

It turned out to be an issue with the SSD. When I called support at Crucial, they just had me RMA it. I have a new one in there with zero issues now.
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