Alrighty everyone, so this might end up being a fairly lengthy article, but I want to make sure I give you all of the information so you can correctly assess.
Earlier in the year, I decided that I needed a desktop for college. I had seen people do it before and I was fairly adept at computers, so I put the computer together with the following components from newegg.
========
Chassis - COOLER MASTER Elite 430 RC-430-KWN1 Black Steel / Plastic Computer Case
Hard Drive - Western Digital Caviar Blue WD10EALX 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
CPU - Intel Core i5-2400 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz (3.4GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52400
Mobo - MSI P67A-GD65 (B3) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
PSU - RAIDMAX HYBRID 2 RX-630SS 630W ATX12V V2.2/ EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready Modular Modular LED Power Supply
RAM - Patriot Gamer 2 Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model PGD38G1333ELK
GPU - EVGA 02G-P3-1386-KR GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
CD Drive - ASUS DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS Black SATA 24X DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM
---------------After reading CPU temps--------------
Upgraded CPU Fan - XIGMATEK LOKI SD963 92mm HYPRO Bearing CPU Cooler bracket included I7 i5 775 1155 AMD and dual fan push pull compatible
=======
Originally, I put the desktop together in about five hours and hooked it up. Worked great, except on startup it gave (and still gives) me an error of saying "No Hard Disk Detected", however the opposite could not be truer as it found my hard drive when I loaded the OS; Windows 7. I then tested it that night with Starcraft II and it worked great; no minor bugs, nothing. The following day, I pull all of my games/programs on it including skype. Here is where things started to get weird. On Borderlands, everything went great and without a hitch, however when I started Civilization V, after playing for about an hour, it froze. And this freeze froze everything; the keyboard, the monitor, the mouse, etc. A buzzing sound came from the speakers and a hard restart was necessary. This freeze also happened again during the Multiplayer for Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, Starcraft II (after about an hour), League of Legends and even Skype, while using my webcam. Also, in the Windows reliability program and windows events, no freeze is registered.
So I thought "oh, this is obviously overheating or a voltage problem" (the cpu temps were getting between 85-90 C's). So I fixed the RAM's voltage so it fit exactly what it needed (it required 1.65 volts, but the auto detect only gave it 1.5, so it was around .15 off). While waiting for the fan and thermal paste to come, I reinstalled Windows 7, reinstalled the drivers for all of my components and checked event viewer (which I ended up needlessly fixing an event 3011 and 3012 for corrupt performance readers).
My fan and paste came in yesterday and applied both, making my cpu super-cooled leveling off at a max of 50 C's at full load and 25-30 C's idling. The hottest component is now the GPU which usually hits 65-70 C's under full load.
At this point, I figured "great, I have been freeze-free for 2 days, let's retest", so I played two games of league of legends last night (around 1.5 hours) on skype and it froze. Again. Once I restarted my desktop to let everyone know what happened (and loaded skype and rejoined the conversation) I only got in two words before it froze again.
In summary, basically under stress, especially under games/programs requiring the internet, the computer has a full freeze, requiring a hard reset. I tried to fix the voltages (RAM) as well as cool the computer, which seemed to work only for a short while. Further once the computer freezes, whenever I turn it back on, it is more prone to freezing unless I leave it off overnight.
I'm not even necessarily looking for an answer, just an idea of where to start. Thanks again, I would really appreciate some help on this one.
Edit: If you can find a more appropriate forum, feel free to move it. I just didn't know where this one would go.
Earlier in the year, I decided that I needed a desktop for college. I had seen people do it before and I was fairly adept at computers, so I put the computer together with the following components from newegg.
========
Chassis - COOLER MASTER Elite 430 RC-430-KWN1 Black Steel / Plastic Computer Case
Hard Drive - Western Digital Caviar Blue WD10EALX 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
CPU - Intel Core i5-2400 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz (3.4GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52400
Mobo - MSI P67A-GD65 (B3) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
PSU - RAIDMAX HYBRID 2 RX-630SS 630W ATX12V V2.2/ EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready Modular Modular LED Power Supply
RAM - Patriot Gamer 2 Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model PGD38G1333ELK
GPU - EVGA 02G-P3-1386-KR GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
CD Drive - ASUS DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS Black SATA 24X DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM
---------------After reading CPU temps--------------
Upgraded CPU Fan - XIGMATEK LOKI SD963 92mm HYPRO Bearing CPU Cooler bracket included I7 i5 775 1155 AMD and dual fan push pull compatible
=======
Originally, I put the desktop together in about five hours and hooked it up. Worked great, except on startup it gave (and still gives) me an error of saying "No Hard Disk Detected", however the opposite could not be truer as it found my hard drive when I loaded the OS; Windows 7. I then tested it that night with Starcraft II and it worked great; no minor bugs, nothing. The following day, I pull all of my games/programs on it including skype. Here is where things started to get weird. On Borderlands, everything went great and without a hitch, however when I started Civilization V, after playing for about an hour, it froze. And this freeze froze everything; the keyboard, the monitor, the mouse, etc. A buzzing sound came from the speakers and a hard restart was necessary. This freeze also happened again during the Multiplayer for Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, Starcraft II (after about an hour), League of Legends and even Skype, while using my webcam. Also, in the Windows reliability program and windows events, no freeze is registered.
So I thought "oh, this is obviously overheating or a voltage problem" (the cpu temps were getting between 85-90 C's). So I fixed the RAM's voltage so it fit exactly what it needed (it required 1.65 volts, but the auto detect only gave it 1.5, so it was around .15 off). While waiting for the fan and thermal paste to come, I reinstalled Windows 7, reinstalled the drivers for all of my components and checked event viewer (which I ended up needlessly fixing an event 3011 and 3012 for corrupt performance readers).
My fan and paste came in yesterday and applied both, making my cpu super-cooled leveling off at a max of 50 C's at full load and 25-30 C's idling. The hottest component is now the GPU which usually hits 65-70 C's under full load.
At this point, I figured "great, I have been freeze-free for 2 days, let's retest", so I played two games of league of legends last night (around 1.5 hours) on skype and it froze. Again. Once I restarted my desktop to let everyone know what happened (and loaded skype and rejoined the conversation) I only got in two words before it froze again.
In summary, basically under stress, especially under games/programs requiring the internet, the computer has a full freeze, requiring a hard reset. I tried to fix the voltages (RAM) as well as cool the computer, which seemed to work only for a short while. Further once the computer freezes, whenever I turn it back on, it is more prone to freezing unless I leave it off overnight.
I'm not even necessarily looking for an answer, just an idea of where to start. Thanks again, I would really appreciate some help on this one.
Edit: If you can find a more appropriate forum, feel free to move it. I just didn't know where this one would go.