System lockup

NiGHTSNiGHTS San Diego Icrontian
edited April 2004 in Hardware
When overclocked, my system has suddenly locked up during CoD, as well as when trying to find the IDE bus after running Nero. This lockup is just like a complete system freeze at whatever the last image displayed was. My temps are fine, 19C for case and probably 40-44C for CPU under the load. It would appear that my overclock has suddenly become unstable, but I don't know why. Would anyone have any ideas as to a fix for this odd problem? Would a clean XP install remedy the situation? Also, in the bios my multiplyer has suddenly become unlocked it seems, allowing me to change it to whatever I feel like, although I have not tried... too good to be true I think.

System Specs:

Nf7-s v2
barton 2500 @ 3200
slk-947u w/ smartfan II
xms pc3200
maxtor 40gb hd
9800 pro @ stock

Comments

  • NiGHTSNiGHTS San Diego Icrontian
    edited April 2004
    Does anyone have any ideas?
  • hypermoodhypermood Smyrna, GA New
    edited April 2004
    What do your voltages look like?
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    edited April 2004
    Hmmm... IDE Bus??? As in just the CD-RW drive, or as in the HDs also???

    What version of Nero is this, BTW??? There have been updates to Nero, lots of them recently. And, is this Nero Express, full Nero Burning ROM, or Nero Ultimate Edition 6.0???? Older Neros, on a very busy box, can lock IDE if there are burning errors. The COD thing could be RAM, video drivers or hardware, or dust insulating things and causing overheating. TOO MANY programs running, especially with adware, trojans, and worms these days, can cause boxes to get real busy under the hood.

    Also, run a CD Lense Cleaner CD in the CD-RW, see if problems vaporize-- dirty CD-ROM drive or CDs can cause IDE bus hangs when CD-RW drive cannot read well.

    Also, CPU temp is high given case temps, I think-- my Barton runs less than 18 C over case temps when stable, and temps rise rapidly when the CPU is run higher than about 2.1 GHz, which is in the Barton 2800+ rate range for detection. It will not run stable at 3200 GHz, and part of that is RAM and different board, but your temp rise versus case leads me to think that your CPU is not getting enough heat dumped off of it fast enough.

    So, you might want to carefully clean dust out of case, including the front fan vents, the CPU HS under the fan, etc. And if Computer case has been moved recently before this happened, make sure all IDE cable connections are tight, power connections to all HDs and the CD-RW are seated tightly, RAM is seated tightly into sockets, and video card is seated tightly inside case. Power needs to be off, and you need to follow anti-stat precautions while doing this last thing.

    Let's check hardware things before reloading XP, as if the things I mentioned are not good, a reload might not succed while those hardware issues are present, and if they are fixed a reload might not be needed. HOWEVER, update Nero if you can ALSO. AND, after checking these things and fixing anything obviously wrong even slightly, get XP to check HD for errors. THEN defragment the drive, all partitions on it.

    John D.
  • NiGHTSNiGHTS San Diego Icrontian
    edited April 2004
    My voltages were at 1.8v, but are now running stable at 1.75v. I have since tried playing KoToR and CoD, both are stable when set at 1.75, yet another occurance that has never happened before.

    Bios is set to run my 2500+ as a 3200+, rather than me changing them manually. Nero is older, now that you mention it...I probably should update. Its the full burning ROM.

    As far as case temps go, it'll slowly rise with my processor, and when running at 42C under load the case will warm up to about 22-23C. I have 2 in, as well as 2 out for fans, pulling 35CFM's each in a Chieftec wannabe Alienware case.

    Dust doesn't seem to be a problem, cause there is none. All connectors are tight, as well as RAM and Video. I'll run some stuff to see if there are any HD errors on the disk, its going on 4 years old now I believe.

    As far as the entire situation is going, however, it seems that everything is fine now...which bothers me a little bit. What would have caused this lockup in the first place? Since last night, I've been able to re-overclock the stock speeds back to a 3200+ BIOS setting with lower Vcore on the processor itself. Would this just be due to the fact that its been "burnt-in" after a month on higher settings?

    Ageek, I thank you for your time, very appreciative of the work you do around here.
  • hypermoodhypermood Smyrna, GA New
    edited April 2004
    Run memtest86 and if that passes run the Prime95 torture test. If you pass these, then you most likely have a device driver problem or failing device attached to the IDE bus.
  • gtghmgtghm New
    edited April 2004
    First thing I would try is to bring everything down to stock speeds.
    Then try and duplicate the lock up. If you can duplicate it it could be as simple as a driver getting courupted. Sometimes when you over clock your system it will cause data errors in certian files and cause stuff to not work properly, however bring down the OC and all becomes good again... However it could be some peice of hardware going south on you too... If you are able to get it stable after you back down the OC I would say that its a matter of some peice of hardware being over stressed and crapping out on you.

    Again first thing I would do is back the rig to stock speeds and check for stability then go from there...

    "g"
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