Vindictus freezing computer...

[TA]

Alrighty.... So... For the past several days now, seemingly at random, Vindictus has frozen my entire computer. When this happens the entire screen (both monitors) turn all sorts of weird colors and pieces of everything previously on the screen are now all over the place scattered randomly like a big jumbled colorful mess.

A week or two ago my liquid cooling system was making really loud noises. I hadn't changed the coolant for like... 2 years. So, I added more and the noises stopped. When it started making noises however, I think after that.... is when this may have started. I'm not sure.

I've always been paranoid it doesn't really work to begin with since I don't think for liquid cooling that it keeps my CPU anywhere near cool enough, even before any of this.

Right, so... My specs...

CPU: Core i7 920 Overclocked to 3.5 GHz
GPU: GTX 280
RAM: 6 GB
CASE: Thermaltake Armor+ LCS *
OTHER: Not important. But the rest is good too.

*= the liquid cooling system was pre-built into the case. All I had to do was get the appropriate block for my CPU chipset, LGA 1366. Then I just had to put on the conductant stuff to the copper block, attach the tubes and put some coolant in it.

Now, I'll say this...... While I've always been worried it wasn't really working, it's never had a single problem and it's never overheated or anything even once since I've built it. Which, by the way, was 6/14/2009. So, I've had it quite some time with no problems. It's a stable clock, and I only raised it high enough that the voltage still didn't need raised.

Right... So... With this happening, I'm obviously worried about my computer. :worry:

Moreso about hard drive issues cropping up after having to cold shutdown so much. I know it's not good for them, and I'm really not a fan of bad sectors.

Right, so... I was all paranoid and thinking first of all... I don't have the money to replace the liquid cooling system. But, I've thought it was a big pain in the ass and was never sure it even worked in the first place ever since I bought it. I mean, it's like $600... it should be cooler than it is. Right now the temps are 122°F 122°F 127°F 113°F (each of the cores, with Core Temp), they'll sometimes get up to like 147°F (63°C) or so. Or maybe higher, I dunno. That doesn't even sound right now, maybe like 180°F or something, surely? I dunno, maybe not. I don't remember seeing anything like that lately. I think when they're being used a lot they'll get up to mid 140's.

Anyways, I was thinking about maybe just getting a good air one since they're less trouble and it's pretty obvious they're working. And well... that's like just $20.

But, thinking about it.... it's been so many years with zero problems and...... those don't seem like bad temperatures at all, especially not for such an overclocked CPU.

What makes me really question my thoughts though is that my friend tells me that his computer did that on Vindictus too. But, it hasn't happened since the most recent update, just a lot of other errors started happening. Like, errors when trying to join boats or friends/guild problems or connection properly closed when changing chars. I wasn't getting the boat thing, but the other stuff I was getting. He reinstalled Vindictus a couple days ago and said it fixed everything for him. So, I tried. It fixed all the little errors when relogging for me, but now I get the error when joining boats sometimes which I never got before, and...... the computer freezing still happens.

If it's a Vindictus related problem I don't want to waste a bunch of money looking into my computer and replacing a ridiculously expensive cooling system with a much less good one over some crazy hunch. Him saying his did the exact same thing I described makes me so paranoid it's unbelievable.

I question it's my computer too since I can play much more intense games like Assassin's Creed, Crysis, and similar games like Dragon Age, Fallout 3, Oblivion, Guild Wars, Lineage II, Starcraft II, etc. etc., with no problem whatsoever. Ever.

So uh..... watdo.

[ValkyrieHamster]

Sounds like it could be a video card issue. A while back I had an issue while playing games where the game would randomly display all sorts of tripped out pixelated colors. And the freezing problem also sounds like it's a video card issue. But the fact that you can play other games fine with out any problems sort of chucks that out the window.
:what:

[5il3nc3r]

Not necessarily. It depends on how GPU intensive each game is, as it varies.

And I would also lean towards a video card issue.

[sakraycore]

sounds like a dying video card

(also those temps are really bad for water cooling)

[TA]

I really don't think it's the video card... I'd be a lot quicker to jump to the CPU overheating.

Idle: 118°F, 115°F, 120°F, 108°F (48°C, 46°C, 49°C, 42°C)
Full load: 160°F, 153°F, 151°F, 145°F (71°C, 67°C, 66°C, 62°C)

But... the i7's are widely known to be hot running CPU's and those temps are well within acceptable ranges. It doesn't overheat until 100°C, it doesn't even disable the turbo mode until 68°C, and 71°C is the highest I've been able to get the thing running Vindictus (I have Core Temp keeping logs now).

So... Now I don't think it's a CPU overheating problem at all.

I have no clue what it is... since it happened to someone else, I don't think it's hardware related, especially if a software change resolved the issue for the other person. So, my guess at the moment is it's something to do with Vindictus... how to fix it, I don't know.

[sakraycore]

if you want to be sure it's not a hardware problem, run the following stress tests.

intel burn test - CPU
OCCT - GPU
OCCT - PSU
Prime95 - Ram

These programs are going to be MORE stressful than any software out there because they tax a component 100%. So if your computer passes those, then it's basically considered to be rock solid.

[TA]

Well, my CPU isn't overheating for sure. I had Core Temp running the last time it froze and nothing was above 70°C, most cores were a lot lower in fact.

[TA]

Hm... well, bad news. It seems the problem isn't Vindictus related since it just happened with Mass Effect 2.

While you guys suspect the GPU, I don't think it's as likely as some other things may be. Although, this did start happening not long after I updated to the latest drivers for my video card.

My RAM has never been set up correctly. I have 6GB and it's only ever registered 4GB. For some stupid reason back when I built the PC I got GSkill RAM which apparently has to be manually configured properly in BIOS, which I don't know how to do. I tried asking (http://gskill.us/forum/showthread.php?p=18989#post18989) the GSkill tech support, but they weren't particularly helpful. So, it's been registered as 4 instead of 6 since I built my PC.

Maybe that could be the cause? I don't know.

[TA]

Hmm, hmm! Well, here's an update...

I reinstalled the latest drivers for the video card (266.58), this time with the custom option "Clean Install" and then I ran EVGA's OCScanner stresstest with the artifact scanner enabled for 20 minutes, the highest temperature it reached was 86°C, there were no errors.

Then I tried Vindictus again and it froze with the screen artifacting horribly and computer freezing again after only a couple minutes; however, I was smart enough to have EVGA Precision (a GPU monitoring program) up and at the exact moment the freeze happened the card temperature was only 71°C. I imagine this rules out the video card overheating.

I checked my BIOS to make sure my 12V power was within the 11.4~12.6 range because if not that could mean a PSU issue, it was 12.232 V. Acceptable.

So... I think that eliminates my GPU & PSU (I think? I'm asking an EVGA tech guy about that)... So, if that's the case, I suspect it's the RAM. So, I may just get a 12GB triple channel kit for <$150 or so from Crucial, at 1333 just to be safe. Not gonna bother messing with those G.Skill tards.

[princesss]

rams wont crash yur game nor will it black out yur screen

having more rams wont garuntee a fix. more ram just means your comp would run faster even with a lot of task and will stay at a low usage percentage

the only problems here is...

either major over heat , bad power supply , or burned out GFX card.

check your task manager and see if yur comp is spikiing if not...

it means yu prob have like a 300W power supply for a ridculously great gfx card and thats prob why it burned out.

id suggest buying a new GFX card + a decent powe supply at newegg.

total cost would be around 200-300 and there are lots of rebates offered as well.

also try taking yur sideboard out and cleaning it . take a compressed air tank and blow the entire compartment that might help.

if not then im sorry idk anything else


source : im in csi major + computer game programming major :)

[TA]

Ehm... no, I have an 800W PSU. And like I said, the video card isn't overheating, neither is the CPU. I suppose the PSU could have aged since 6/2009 and be supplying less power now...

My plan right now is to replace my RAM since I have a 64-bit operating system and instead of my 6GB registering only 4GB registers and it's bull**** that it's never worked. I know bad RAM can cause all sorts of computer issues.

And anyways, if that fixes it, good. If that doesn't, then the EVGA guy said the only step left is testing the video card in another computer (I can't do that) or running memtest and Heaven to test the RAM and try to recreate the issue (don't feel like it since I need to replace it anyways). They said if that failed that they'd replace it.

So... Well, if the two possible problems are video card and RAM, I'm just gonna try RAM first since I know it's defective. Then if it doesn't work, then I practically get a new free video card replacement anyways.

And I suppose if that doesn't work, the only thing left is the PSU.

[phresh]

There's no BIOS configuration that will cause your system to detect less RAM than what is actually there. Perhaps one of the sticks is not completely seated in the slot? The only thing you typically need to configure for RAM is the timing settings and voltage.

I agree with the first few replies. It sounds like the video card is crapping out. EVGA has excellent support, at least.

Is the video card liquid cooled too? Is it over-clocked?

[5il3nc3r]

It's not BIOS related. x86-OSes (32-bit Windows) cannot detect more than 4 Gb TOTAL of memory (that's 4Gb including your RAM, video card memory, etc.)

If you have more than 4Gb of RAM, and want your computer to detect it (why wouldn't you?), then you HAVE to switch to an x64-OS (64-bit Windows).

If you already have a 64-bit OS, then make sure that your motherboard is also x64 compatible (maybe your motherboard doesn't have enough available channels to properly utilize all of your RAM.

[phresh]

It's not BIOS related. x86-OSes (32-bit Windows) cannot detect more than 4 Gb TOTAL of memory (that's 4Gb including your RAM, video card memory, etc.)
...

Yeah, I realized that is probably the case hours after I posted. We just need Tasha to verify her OS to confirm.
If that is the case, the POST screen should report the correct amount of RAM, but Windows will not.

[Succ]

Two flags, but at least someone picked up on one of them.

First off the ram.
There's a lot of reasons why this happens, and involves a lot of work. Even then, you might not even get if fixed and probably have to buy new ram.
You first have to make sure each ram works. To do this, you have to shutdown, and only have one ram installed in the slot 1 and boot up. If computer recognizes each of them, that's a good sign. The next step would be to install two in slots 1 and 3. And interchange them around and see if they work together. Then the third one. If that doesn't help, it can be that your CPU is seated improperly, and you have to re-seat it to make sure the connections are solid.
There's more stuff to it, but it sounds like you have an EVGA mobo+gfx. You're best bet is to head over to the EVGA forums and read up on it. You're not the only one with this issue.


You have OCed your CPU. The question I have is, Have you verified that your OC is stable?
Go back to stock settings and see if it still happens.
Since you are hard locking and not BSOD, you're running against some voltage issues.
Hard locking usually points to ram issues.
Since your system is about 2 years, what is the brand of the PSU? These things usually don't last too long for me.. so I always have a spare around to see if that's faulty.

Is the graphics card OCed? It doesn't sound like it ... but something to ask...
Since you ran it for 20 minutes on precision, it should be good to go.

[TA]

I've already told you guys that I have a 64-bit operating system. It's Windows Vista Ultimate x64. I have 5TB of HDDs, which I'm pretty sure you can't even do on 32-bit? And anyways, I know what I'm running on.

I replaced the RAM, this one, yet again, only detects 2 of the 3 sticks. This time I got a 12GB kit, so it's only detecting 8GB of it.

My motherboard can't actually boot with a card in just the first slot, but with two different brands and two different sets of RAM, it's pretty obvious I have a bad DIMM slot. In fact, only the black slots work. When I tried putting the RAM in the blue slots, it just put the computer into a permanent restart cycle, like a bad clock. Except, it never did come up. Once I'd switched them back to the black slots it even said there was a bad clock and reset all my timings, which is weird.

And anyways, I'm pretty sure letting it do that for about 2 mins or so fried my HDD. It started clicking really loud not long after and I was 4 days without a computer while waiting for an Advanced RMA. I ended up getting a new one from Best Buy and cloning to it instead since it was going to take yet another 4 days because of some shipping delay. I actually just now got all the hdd crap sorted out...

But yeah, it really looks like it's a motherboard problem. Even eVGA (my GPU's support) and Crucial (my RAM's support) have told me it's the motherboard. Unfortunately, MSI is just dicking me around.

OC stable, tried unclocked too, problem persisted. Like I said, it's not the CPU. I've benchmarked that too and it doesn't overheat.

GPU I've benchmark tested and it doesn't overheat, and it's not overclocked, no.

Oh by the way, I guess I never posted this...

Mobo: MSI X58 Platinum SLI (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130220)
GPU: eVGA GTX 280 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130492)
PSU: Kingwin MACH1 800W (http://www.xoxide.com/kingwin-mach1-800w-psu.html)

And uh, since I replaced my RAM now... this is it...
RAM: Crucial 12GB kit (4GBx3), DDR3-1333 (http://www.crucial.com/store/partspecs.aspx?imodule=CT3KIT51264BA1339)

I was doing DDR3-1600 before, this (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231225).

This problem is getting pretty expensive at this point... $150 to get new RAM, $100 for another hdd since I couldn't stand another 4 days without my computer. So... $350 and nothing has been fixed. RAM still isn't all detected and I haven't tested yet, but I'm pretty sure it probably still freezes too.

[phresh]

That sucks, but at least you've gotten to the bottom of it. Weird that a HDD died on you in troubleshooting. Seagate?

Just FYI 32-bit doesn't limit storage capacity.

[TA]

Western Digital.

[Taycat]

Well that really sucks now.

I just hope you can afford a new motherboard...

[Succ]

On the plus side.. I hear gigabyte makes decent motherboards.
I have an evga board+gfx, and it works well enough bot lately they have sucky bios support so I would avoid them for now.

Honestly, it seems like everything has gotten sorted out. Not cpu, gfx, ram, hdds... all that is a crappy mobo that has faulty dimm slots.
Sorry to hear that you've already put in 350 without getting anything actually fixed.

[TA]

Well, it's just started to artifact and freeze during just normal operation now, not even in games. I guess I'm gonna have to break down and get on with getting a new motherboard. God, I hate putting in motherboards and connecting everything... I always miss something or do something wrong.

:gloom2:

edit: Okie, well... I ordered a Rampage III Formula, since apparently no stores near here carry it, or any decent motherboard for that matter. It's still processing though... I hope it gets here soon and fixes it because it's starting to artifact+freeze almost every time it's started now.

[TA]

Goddd.... It took me 9 hours to label every cable on my mobo, take out the old mobo, clean off thermal paste, put cpu in new mobo, put new mobo in case, apply new thermal paste, reattach my liquid cooling and hook everything back up.

And now, just something had to go wrong...


Detecting drives
No drives found

Reboot and select proper Boot device or insert boot media in selected Boot device and press a key.

And what's weird is that in BIOS it detects all the hdds and I set one of my hdds to the boot drive... grrr... Why is this happening... Everything is hooked up correctly, I checked all the connections to all the hdds... wth.

Oh and an amusing aside... This mobo only detects 8GB of RAM in BIOS too.

[TA]

Things went much much worse than I had ever imagined.

The new motherboard did not fix the RAM issue, so I can assume it does not fix my problem so I'm going to send it back. Unfortunately, I learned that when installing a new motherboard one must reinstall windows.

Worse still, my Windows Vista Ultimate x64 cd was scratched and hung at Expanding files 0% for hours before it finally got a BSOD before not completing.

At which point, I decided I would just put the old motherboard back in and have my computer back while I sorted out what was really wrong (I'm going to flay my GPU for this at this point). And so, I put the old one back in with record time - I had already spent 9 hours carefully cateloging and detailing exactly where everything goes, so other than the ***** of a liquid cooling system for my CPU, I did it very quickly.

Worse yet, my attempt to install Vista on the new motherboard had messed up any hope of not having to finish installing Windows on it. Oh yes, that meant that I still needed a Windows CD. F my life. Seriously. Wow.

So, long story short... I get a new one and finally just moments ago finished installing Vista again.

All I've managed to do so far is absolutely nothing. I'm actually worse off than I started, and -$600. Oh the joy.

To top it all off, I've been so stressed and frustrated the past few days that I've felt sick and close to throwing up. Ah...

Well, I guess I'll be getting my PC mostly back to how it was before I tried changing the motherboard for the next few hours. I suppose after I'm done doing that I'll have to work out sending back the new motherboard for a refund then getting a new GPU and new PSU - only two things left, and **** them **** them **** them, they can go to hell!

I was almost ready to crawl up into a ball and cry not long ago... this has all been... such an ordeal. Nothing, absolutely nothing, went my way.

[Taycat]

Aw!

-hugs-

At least it's sorta fixed, right? ;3;

[TA]

Actually, it's more broken now than it was before.

Also "wonderful" news... now it sounds like one of my hard drives is making weird noises. God...

[Taycat]

Actually, it's more broken now than it was before.

Also "wonderful" news... now it sounds like one of my hard drives is making weird noises. God...

I think your computer is out to kill you.

Be careful.

[TA]

So, I was trying to back up my important C files to my H drive (and then F as well), but it was going horrendously slow and then my computer artifacted and froze.

I can see this being a problem.

If just copying a couple gb's of files causes it to artifact and freeze then how on earth am I going to manage to clone my C drive? Ah god...

:stress:

[Micho]

So, I was trying to back up my important C files to my H drive (and then F as well), but it was going horrendously slow and then my computer artifacted and froze.

I can see this being a problem.

If just copying a couple gb's of files causes it to artifact and freeze then how on earth am I going to manage to clone my C drive? Ah god...

:stress:

Hope it works out Tasha!

[Osayidan]

For your drives, get an external enclosure that can hook up to another PC via usb.
Or use a bootable OS CD like ubuntu or windows XP PE (bart PE is good). Even while a drive is starting to die or if a computer is dead, you can get your stuff from it that way unless the drive is totally trashed.

Can't help much for the board, all I can suggest is listening for the beep codes during POST, if there are any. Then find out what they mean for your specific board model. Troubleshooting hardware is the most annoying the in the universe if you don't have it in front of you.

[placeboing]

Based on the 1st page posts and your current one, I would take a wild guess that your GPU is dying. Not overheating, but dying. It can lead into other system errors when this happens. Its how my old GPU died. But I haven't read the middle pages and I only skimmed what I did read, so this is just a guess. Personally I would have just gotten a $30 video card (which can be returned when done) way earlier on in the troubleshooting process, and as you said, the troubleshooting itself might have caused other problems by this point (such as many hard shutdowns causing possible HD errors), but who knows. Computers can be annoying sometimes.

[xJac]

GL with your computer, can't really help much since I am no expert.

[Yoorah]

Wow, I just read this thread and it looks like you went through a lot over a long period of time. D: You should have posted it in the general tech help section. u_u;

My typical analysis would be to first blame the video card, especially if it's a NVIDIA chip, as they commonly die after a few years, even if you do not overclock them. It's the part with probably the highest failure rate in the PC. Like placeboing said, it would be best to buy a cheap one at BestBuy or a similar store, and return it after testing.

My other concern is your RAM, however. You've said that essentially a third of your RAM was never accessible. Since you've replaced both the motherboard and the RAM modules, the only part remaining that has to do with RAM is the memory controller--this is built into your CPU. If you think about the i7-920's memory controller architecture, it's a triple channel RAM interface. It's very likely that the memory controller is broken and is only operating 2 of the 3 channels, hence you can only access 2/3 of the total RAM you install. It's likely that your CPU was defective from the start. :\ The only other factor that could possibly affect RAM is your PSU giving low quality current, but I think that that's an unlikely scenario. I guess you can try resetting the BIOS to defaults and see if that'll help, but I kind of doubt it.

The multiple, unrelated problems made this a nightmare to troubleshoot. u_u

And just for the record, liquid-cooling systems require constant maintenance, unless they are specifically designed and marketed as no-maintenance solutions (I don't think yours is). You're supposed to flush the coolant every once in a while, and whatnot. I don't have any experience with those, you should check the manual.

[TA]

Well, when I got my i7 920 the RAM was controlled by the northbridge (motherboard). Only the later models control it within the CPU. At least, that's what I've heard.

I suppose what I'm going to try now is, my HDD replacement comes tomorrow, so I'll go to Best Buy and pick up an eVGA GTX 560 Ti, put that in and try to clone my hdd. If it doesn't artifact/freeze at all during that process and I successfully get my HDD replaced then I can further try some things to see if it's still artifacting and freezing. If so, it won't be quite as pressing as a failing hdd. But, I'll try the PSU next. If that too doesn't fix it then the only real option at that point is to just scrap the build and restart. I mean, I could keep the hdds, GPU & PSU, but the only thing left to replace would be the CPU and it'd be silly paying full price for an old CPU when I could get a new one, and if I did that then I'll have to get a new motherboard as well, and at that point I may as well just change the other stuff as well.

This is an expensive problem which has really grated my nerves and stressed me to the limit.

[Yoorah]

A very expensive hassle. :(

But just so you know, all Core i processors always had an integrated memory controller, yours included. The "northbridge" is built into the CPU.

I hope the new graphics card will resolve things as far as stability is concerned.

[TA]

lol, well this is just wonderful... I finally got the new video card installed, cloned my C HDD to the replacement WD sent me, but the new one sounds a bit like it's going too. That, and my liquid cooling system doesn't sound like it's doing so hot... at all...

edit: I'm not sure if the new video card fixed the artifacting/freezing problem. So far, it hasn't happened yet though. So, I'm hopeful that maybe it did.

The LCS & new C HDD sounds worry me though. *sigh*... The battle continues.

[TA]

Well, I tested on Mass Effect 2 and Vindictus. I don't want to call it too soon, but it looks like replacing the GPU really did fix the artifacting/freezing problem. Gawd, and it was my first suspect, but those damn video card people convinced me it wasn't just to cover their own asses... akdfkjk

My LCS is still making wonky noises, and I guess I should probably RMA this RMA'd HDD too, but I guess after I get everything all reinstalled, I'll be back to normal and able to start Vindictus again.

[xJac]

Gratz.

What kind of sound is it making btw? My laptop starts making noise like one year ago (the fan i think), and it still works really great since then, no issues.