Computer Instability Problem.

Big Kev · 25 Dec 2008 at 21:39

My computer has been playing up for a little while now, with everything from Firefox, Outlook, Explorer and games often not responding, needing me to wait for the system to respond or to reboot and when I do, I get the disk read error, press ctrl-alt-del to restart problem, which is only resolved if I turn the computer off, then on again a minute later.

I've tried running overclocked and at stock, with the same results.

I've run memtest86 for over six hours on each of my sticks, with no errors.

I've run chkdsk a couple of times, with no errors.

I've reinstalled Vista 64.

My specs are:

P5Q Pro
2 x 2G Corsair Dominator PC2-8500
320G Sata WD
Gainward HD4850
Corsair 620W psu
E6750, normally at 3.6G with Freezer Pro 7

I'm rather stuck now and would appreciate some advice, as this is driving me up the wall now.

Cheers.

ChrisLX200 · 25 Dec 2008 at 21:47

Try a new disk cable, random lockups, freezes, disk errors might be a sign of intermittant failure. Could be just about anything else mind, but that's where I would start... Re-seat the cards and RAM whilst you have it open.

Big Kev · 25 Dec 2008 at 22:39

I've just changed the cable and I'll see how it goes.

Cheers mate and have a good xmas.

The Halk · 25 Dec 2008 at 22:49

If you have Everest or Speedfan or the like running, try not running them - make sure any services they need aren't running as well. They've given me a bit of beef on a couple of installs.

If you have a spare hard drive try connecting only that one and installing an OS on it and run with it for a couple of days. It sounds like a software/drivers issue.

Also try having a look at the SMART attributes of your drive.