Irritating PC Freeze!

[squallypie]

Hi,

I'm running a new PC custom built by a local computer store. The specs are as following:

Intel 2600K i7
Asus P7Z68 V LE MoBo
Sapphire 6870 1GB
Cooler Master 750W PSU
8GB Patriot
2GB Seagate and 1GB Samsung

The problem is: Computer freezes RANDOMLY.
What happens: Music stops playing, keyboard and mouse stop responding, all processes freeze but the screen is still there. No BSOD or Restart.
How i'm fixing it: Force shutdown by pressing on the power button and restarting it again.
Does it happen all the time?: Yes
When: It happens from anywhere between 5 minutes after start up to a few hours. Very luckily one day, it lasted for 28 hours after start up once. i thought the problem was over but it freezed again.
Random Observations: A temperature labelled as "CPU" on speedfan shows 80*C when idle and it reduces to 40*C when the cpu is under load. Very strange as temperature is usually supposed to RISE when under load. But the core temperatures are in the typical values. I dont know what the "CPU" label actually refers to.. a friend suggested that the motherboard might be overheating but the System temperature is at 30s. Also, the computer freezes even when "CPU" temperature is low. So any connection between the CPU temp and freezes are ruled out.. But still it is strange.

A little about the components:

The graphics card and PSU were transferred from an old PC to this new PC. They worked very well in the old PC so i dont think they are the problem.

I ran memtest for an hour and the tests were all okay. So RAM cant be blamed as well.

Seagate has a hard disk diagnostic tool which i ran on both my hard disks and both passed all the tests.

I dont think anything can go wrong with a processor but i might be wrong.

I think its something to do with the motherboard as that is the main component in providing all the outputs. Only the video goes out from graphics card, but even the card is on the mobo..

Any ideas? its VERY irritating that this new PC isnt as stable as my 3 year old PC.

I sent the computer back to the shop which made it for me but they sent it back saying they ran all benchmarks and everything was fine. I'm planning to send it back again.

Thanks alot!

 

[Wamphryi]

In my experience a freeze like that is normally the HDD failing at random to communicate with the south bridge on the motherboard. This is likely why the PC freezes and the screen still stays up. My first suspect would be the motherboard.

 

[kajabla]

That strange Speedfan reading points me at a malfunctioning mobo. Can you replicate that?
Run the HDD diagnostics until it freezes and see if you can see anything.
So you have a complete 3-year-old PC? What are its specs? Try as many parts as you can with that one along with all its other parts. PSU, GPU, HDDs. Especially the HDDs: boot with them on the other machine and run it for a couple of days. If it freezes, there you go.

 

[DXRick]

I would take it back to the store and let them try to figure it out first.

 

[bassejepsen]

I had this problem before, and it was a harddrive.

Try disconnect the drive you dont have your OS on and see if the problem still exist.

If it still freezes try reinstalling your os on an other harddrive