New Build Freezing up

Bennehmaru · 19 Sep 2008 at 09:08

Morning all, I need a little help and I'm just wondering if anyone has any idea's to what it could be.

Basically I've bought a load of news parts.

An Intel Q9650 @ 3.0ghz
Asus Rampage Extreme Motherboard
OCZ 4Gb 1066 Ram
ATI 4870 X2
Thermaltake Armor+ LCS (the watercooling one)

PSU is a 620 watt Corsair jobby from my old pc, and I've got a couple of HDD's in there for storage, and 1 optical drive.

Now the problem is every so often my computer just freezes and it has to be hard reset to get it to work again. No errors come up and when I look at the event viewer no errors appear that would crash the PC. Also I think this is related, but since installing all the new components Windows takes and absolute age, whether is be 64bit XP or Vista 64bit.

Anyone have any idea of what it could be.

Freelanc3r · 19 Sep 2008 at 10:15

It could be the harddrives. As all the other kit should be fine as its new. Also try a higher watt PSU. To see if thats holding it back.

RJC · 19 Sep 2008 at 10:20

Run prime or Orthos to check for stability and see if any errors occur.
Test your memory with mem-test to ensure these are ok.
When you installed the RAM did you setup the correct voltages and timmings, these should be stamped on the memory modules.
How many sticks of RAM are you using, if you are using 4 the MCH voltage might need to be upped .1 or .2v.

EsaT · 19 Sep 2008 at 12:30

Eva01 said:
but since installing all the new components Windows takes and absolute age

That sounds like drivers or something similar.
(did you reinstall OS when changing parts?)

Paradiso · 19 Sep 2008 at 12:44

Power supply should be able to handle it, I have a similar system but with 4 HDD's in it and the same PSU. Do you have anyway to monitor your CPU temp, the heatsink may need reseating causing the machine to overheat and lockup. Also check all your cards and ram are seated ok.

Also run MHDD32 from UltimateBootCD.com burn to disc and boot from dos. This will check you hard drives, check you ram 1 stick at a time in memtest while you at it.

Also reset your BIOS and make sure you memory settings are set correctly according to the rams manufacturer with the correct voltage.

wsgroves · 19 Sep 2008 at 12:50

I would bet a PSU problem. With that gpu comes a lot of amps required on the rails. I would guarantee thats your problem.

PhoenixUK · 19 Sep 2008 at 13:49

4870x2 and 620 corsair ? ummmm... + few hdds, + OC on all of it.

try with CPU on stock and remove a hdd or two if you can for 1 day and see if it crashes.

I would say either a PSU not being able to keep up with full load or the harddrives, but it can be anything tbh.

PaulyD · 19 Sep 2008 at 14:45

I would say its either the PSU not supply enough power (esp with the overclocks etc) or a driver issue - as Phoenix said try with a few items removed and see if it gets the same results.

Bennehmaru · 19 Sep 2008 at 14:49

Good news! Looks like it was a problem with the RAM, I've taken it out and reseated it and now my computer has been stable for 8 hours. Longest it ever went before was about an hour.

The system isn't overclocked yet but will do in the future.

Bit of a wierd one as I tried to reseat the RAM first of all but to no avail.

EsaT · 19 Sep 2008 at 15:18

Eva01 said:
Good news! Looks like it was a problem with the RAM, I've taken it out and reseated it and now my computer has been stable for 8 hours.
Bit of a wierd one as I tried to reseat the RAM first of all but to no avail.

Maybe you this time changed slots of DIMMs... Or planets were just in unfavourable positions.

PhoenixUK said:
+ OC on all of it.

Ehemm... 3GHz is stock speed of Q9650. :rolleyes:

And total peak draw is around 400W so no sweat for 700+ W PSU.