Help computer nightmare.

baz44331

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Nov 27, 2010
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Hi my name is Baz, this is my first post lol.

OK this has been a total nightmare of a month.I ordered a custom build from a company call custompc.ie.

These are the specs:
OS. windows, 7 ultimate 64bit.
Processer, I7 950
RAM 8GB, 2GB stick DDR3 PC 3-10660
Motherboard, ASUS P6T Deluxe.
PSU, 900W EVO
Graphic card, ATI 5970 2GB
Sound card, ASUS Xonar DS

OK originally I had a GTX 480 Nvidia card in there and windows7 home premuim. So I would start my game and get a crash within 10 minutes, the screen would go black with the game playing in the background, sometimes I would have to do a hard restart to get it going, or sometimes it would let me bring up the task manager and close the application, the game is arma 2 OA, and I've also tried Napoleon Total War too, they are all on Steam, so I have tried C.O.H and thats the same, at first i though it was the card because a window would pop up saying driver has stopped responding but has now recovered. But because i have tried 4 other cards in there ATI and Nvidia it cant be the card.

so my friend had a look and he did a complete reinstall of windows and formated the Hardrive, then manually went in and updated the drivers for the motherboard and the Graphic card, sound card, everything, still same crashes. lol then he looked at the ram and went into the BIOS and changed the settings as per the manufactuer, still nothing we also checked the temps of the graphics card and processor and they are all fine too, lol we are lost as to what it could be. ive spent about 3000 on it lol and still it crashes man i cant even sleep right lol. The funny thing is I had taken out part of the tower case to fit in the 5970 so now I cant RMA the build! So I now have 2 questions....

1. Can anyone help me with this issue?
2. If I was to change a component to stop this issue, what would it be?

 

baz44331

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Nov 27, 2010
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Hi dadiggle thanks for the reply . But ive formated the hardrive and completly reinstalled windows and manually installed all the newest drivers there are .it cant get any cleaner then that mate lol.
 
Set the RAM voltage to the one specified by the manufacturer. Then if nothing good happens, try with one stick of RAM. Add another one and so on and change the stick if it goes bad, maybe one of your sticks is bad. After eliminating the RAM we'll see about the video card, etc.
 

blackhawk1928

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I honestly think your RAM is the issue. First off the fact that you are using 2 sticks of ram for your system you are losing a lot of power. Your socket/chipset are meant to be run using triple channeled memory, ie 3 sticks or 6 sticks, not 2. If you use dual channel you lose bandwidth which loses power. If I were you, i'd get rid of those 8GB and buy 6GB of ram...composed of three sticks of 2GB or get 12GB of ram...either way, it should be tripled.

And lastley, try opening a game and use a temperature monitor to keep an eye on your CPU/GPU temperature, that also can be an issue for your crashes, it the system overheats.

Nevertheless, the fact that the ram is dual channeled shouldn't be causing you stability issues so I would take out a stick and try, if no luck then try taking out another stick...etc.

And it might seem like all the correct drivers are installed, but I would make absolutly sure that the latest drivers are there for your MB, Sound, GPU, and chipset.
 

baz44331

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Nov 27, 2010
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ok guys its the ram like you said thanks for the help. thank god lol.. dont have to replace anything. so i put up the settings of the ram in the BIOS and it works really well i played for two hours lol before a crash. i just need the right settings cant find them anywhere. i have 8GB install blackhawk and they are work fine, thanks for the info.

my ram is this

GEIL
2GB PC3 - 10660 CL =9-9-9-24
GV32GB1333C95 1.5V

PN5865-5NACO5860 4714221 10948

if anyone know the settings for this ram in the BIOS please post here. guys thanks for the help,
 

etk

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I'd pull the sound card unless you have a really high end speaker system or audio software that needs the card. They tend to cause a lot of issues. You should not have a problem with dual channel RAM, I'm not sure what you are talking about with the bios, you said you fixed it but you can't find where to change the settings? I'm not sure what you can change and what you can't. If you can get to voltage, try to turn it up to 1.6V
 

baz44331

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Nov 27, 2010
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ok well in the BIOS settings i put up the Voltage and the other settings thats listed with the voltage up. as per the mother board standard settings, instead of the Auto setting, and it worked fine, i need to find the settings for the ram, ive seen on other forums where people had to manually put the settings in themselves .when i was haveing crashes i sent the dump logs to Microsoft and they said everything works fine so it couldnt be the sound card sure its made by the same company as the motherboard, it has to be the ram,.
 

baz44331

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Nov 27, 2010
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the settings i cant find is the one of the ram thats what i was talking about, I apoligise for not be more clear,
 
put a single 2Gb stick, play until you are sure its a good stick, replace it with another one, repeat until you can understand that they are all good. Win7 randomly assigns memory as i understand it, so it will use the full range of memory locations. So occassionally it will find a bad section, using just 2Gb at a time will force it to use all of the memory.

 

axlrose

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depending upon who the manufacturer is, and if you have any more problems, call the memory manufacturer. my last build was the first time i had to manually set everything for the ram. hadn't done that in bios in the first build, just put it in and it worked. I have ocz and they were able to walk me through step by step on the phone on how to set voltages and timings and some other things i still don't remember. had similar problems with my build and took similar steps. kept having problem getting my os installed and did clean installs, thought it was all sorts of other stuff just like you. glad it's up and running (if i read right). hate to spend $3,000 and have a pile of useless parts. :)
 

baz44331

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Nov 27, 2010
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lol yea mate it works perfect now lol im going to take a pic of the settings in the bios and get someone to have a look at it and see if anything dodge on it lol,