I THINK this is a graphics issue, but I can't be sure. Help please!

[Judgeneo]

Basically, my now takes 2-3 times to boot up, and when it does it only works properly for a small amount of time.

After x minutes of work, the display to my monitors just cuts out yet the music keeps playing. Whilst the song is still playing, I am able to pause and unpause the song using my keyboard shortcuts, but when the song ends it doesn't start the next song in the WMP list.


So my desktop is next to unuseable.

Here are the core specs:

AMD 965 @ Stock
AMD 5870 @ Stock (powering 2 BenQ monitors)
Asus Crosshair formula IV
Corsair 60Gb SSD Boot Drive
2x Samsung 1Tb drives
4GB Ram
OCZ 600W power
Wireless network card (plugged into botherboard, but disabled at windows level due to no current use)

SSD health check gave me 55% which is apparently excellent and should last 9 more years?

What else can I check to diagnose the fault?
How much would it cost for a similarly performing new replacement graphics card?


If you need any more info, let me know, I'd quite like to be able to use my PC again soon...

Many thanks.

 

[Judgeneo]

might not be your GFX card, try using your onboard GFX for a while to see if the problem persist's

That was my original thought, but I don't think the motherboard has an onboard GFX output, and I don't have a replacement card to replace and check with. Atleast, I couldn't see one when I checked last. I'm not due home until midnight today, so I'll check again tomorrow night.

Basically just check the RAM and PSU, and perhaps try a different HDD. The health check doesn't mean anything really.

How do I go about checking the RAM and PSU?

I'm doing to make a ubuntu USB boot now to use tomorrow. If this works A-OK would it be safe to assume the SSD is at fault?

 

[Judgeneo]

Just tried making a USB boot drive, but either I can't get it to work and the screen goes black because of that, or the display cuts out before it works.

I can't even boot onto the windows log-on page any more. The last time I managed to do so I saw a "display driver has stopped responding" message before the displays cut out.

I don't have any video output on my motherboard, its all done through the graphics card.

Any advice?

 

[Judgeneo]

The last time I booted up it lasted 25 minutes before crashing.

The screens cut out before coming back again with the 'display driver has stopped working and recovered' message appearing in the bottom right, before both screens crashing out completely again. Again, the music was controllable via keyboard shortcuts until the end of the song, and then the computer would seemingly do nothing at all.


Any and all advice would be appreciated, I really need it running to do work.

 

[Judgeneo]

Start with the simplest possibility - a loose HDD cable. If connection is lost to your o/s drive you could experience such a system hang.

Checked all the HDD connections, no problems there.

You can use Memtest to check your ram not sure if that is the best software but should do the job.

Just used the windows memory diagnostic tool, no problems detected

Have you tried updating your GPU drivers or going for some older ones?

Did you change system settings, driver updates or hardware changes before the problem started? or did it just start up out of the blue?

Personally i would check the ram first but from my experience this can be time consuming ;P

The problem just turned up out of the blue.

I've managed to install ubuntu on a different hard drive. I just booted into that now and it crashed in much the same way as windows did. As Linux uses different drivers, and the OS is running of a different hard disk, I guess we can rule them out as causes of the crash?



What else can I check?

 

[Judgeneo]

Check the Windows event log for errors - hard disk errors are easy to spot there.

Does it run SuperPi or Prime95 reliably? They don't really use disk access so should run fine up until the end even if the disk is faulty.

Use Memtest for RAM testing - the Windows one won't pick everything up.

Have you got access to a spare PSU to try?


Hate to say this, but I had a similar issue once which turned out to be the graphics card in the end but best to eliminate everything else first.

Unfortunately it doesn't really last long enough in order to run those programs
I managed to download memtest this morning, but it crashed before I could run the program.

No spare parts either.

 

[Judgeneo]

Windows (or ubuntu) would no longer boot at all, so I couldn't check the logs like people suggested, so I got impatient and ordered a new GPU.

I installed it (MSI 7850), and the computer booted, and then crashed at the screen asking me to select which OS to boot into. Since then I haven't been able to get any display at all.

Unplug all unnecessary stuff
Run your system with only one stick of ram at a time
That will rule out ram
If you can not boot another OS software is not the problem
From PSU i do not see relevance because it will not play music after black screen, but just to be safe if you have another set of power plugs for the GPU use them
So that leaves GPU or MB
Place the GPU in a different PCIExpres slot
Next step get a GPU from somebody and test that

I tried with one stick of RAM at a time before ordering the new GPU, same problem.
Now I've got a new GPU I've tested with that in multiple PCI-E slots, and with the old one in multiple slots...

I take it this now means my motherboard is the one at fault (potentially northbridge)?

 

[Judgeneo]

Ok about to order a new motherboard. I just thought, do I have to buy new thermal paste? Or can I just remove the CPU + heatsink as one unit and move it over?

 

[Judgeneo]

Update.

The new motherboard also didn't fix the problem. Tried it with both the old card, and the new, no difference at all...

So I returned the graphics card and motherboard, and recently received my full refund (thanks OCUK!).
As a last attempt at fixing it, I've just ordered a new power supply. If this doesn't solve the problem I'll buy a new pc completely

 

[Judgeneo]

Lack of update is because of lack of time to try the new PSU.
Installed it last night, same issue...

The plan now is to build a completely new machine. Using that I'll be able to test to see if any my current components are functioning in the hope of getting some money back.

Creating a spec me thread now, thanks for the help guys!

 

[Judgeneo]

Probably a daft question now, but did you try a different hdd, cable and reinstall the OS with the latest drivers?

I've tried different cables, and the same problem occurred when running both windows on my SSD, and a newly installed ubuntu on a different HDD.

Ahh well. Thanks again everyone