Random Crashing and BSOD's

V_R · 31 Jul 2007 at 18:51

Hi all,

Over the last few days my pc has been randomly crashing and blue screening.... I am guessing its a hardware problem, but need help and advise to confirm or deny this.

I've had different BSOD's including USBport.sys, ntfs.sys and a few others that i cant remember off the top of my head., some of which dont give a specific problem, Some are 'page fault in non paged area' and 'driver irql not less or equal' and others dont say anything other than the usual ms stuff.

When it crashes the screen will go black and all i get is 'no signal' from the monitor. When i hit the reset button most of the time it will non post and no beeps so i have to reset the BIOS, and it will then post again.

Nothing on the pc has changed other than installing Rivatuner, which i now uninstalled in the unlikely event it was the problem. Needless to say, its had no effect....

The screen going black make me wonder if it may have something to do with the 8800? But i am not sure....

Any ideas? Thanks guys, this is driving me nuts.....

jak731 · 31 Jul 2007 at 19:04

Are you running the system overclocked? 'page fault in non paged area' sounds like it could be a problem with your RAM or hard drives.

V_R · 31 Jul 2007 at 19:12

Sorry should have said, no the system is totally stock.

Have tried different RAM combinations, doesn't seem to make a difference.

Will run Memtest as soon as i get chance to, need to install a floppy drive, and typically i dont have much time atm....

V_R · 1 Aug 2007 at 21:02

Anyone?

I got another ntfs.sys bsod today, with a funny bar running across the top, Looked like a bunch of random colours all mixed up.

Smart status via speedfan and disk checkup tools say both drives are fine. Can i trust that to be true? Will try and run the disks checker tools tomorrow, am out again to night.

V_R · 2 Aug 2007 at 16:10

Sorry to bump, but any advise guys?

Th3D0n · 2 Aug 2007 at 16:15

id format it see if that helps but it sound like some thing is overheating so check the cpu and gfx see if they are getin to hot

KangooVanMan · 2 Aug 2007 at 16:34

I would say a page fault in a non paged area has to be the ram.

johnno93 · 2 Aug 2007 at 16:39

BSODs are normally a sign of a hardware problem, my guess would be RAM or HDD, possibly CPU. Also you say you suspect it might be the 8800, is it running exceptionally hot and are the PCI power connectors firmly fitted. The fact that it wont boot until you reset the bios makes it sound like its a hardware issue. Have you got another system to check the components in?

V_R · 2 Aug 2007 at 16:41

Th3D0n said:
id format it see if that helps but it sound like some thing is overheating so check the cpu and gfx see if they are getin to hot

Well speedfan tells me all is nice and cool. Antec 900 is the case so airflow is good. all temps aer below 40'C

I would say a page fault in a non paged area has to be the ram.

I wondered that, i have four sticks of RAM and keep swapping them round it don't seem to make a difference, Tried to get memtest running off a USB stick last night, but it didn't want to have it.

So will fit a floppy drive tonight and try again.

richieboy · 2 Aug 2007 at 17:25

V_R said:
Well speedfan tells me all is nice and cool. Antec 900 is the case so airflow is good. all temps aer below 40'C

I wondered that, i have four sticks of RAM and keep swapping them round it don't seem to make a difference, Tried to get memtest running off a USB stick last night, but it didn't want to have it.

So will fit a floppy drive tonight and try again.

Run memtest86 and if it passes run SP2004. If both pass, post back here.

V_R · 2 Aug 2007 at 18:14

johnno93 said:
BSODs are normally a sign of a hardware problem, my guess would be RAM or HDD, possibly CPU. Also you say you suspect it might be the 8800, is it running exceptionally hot and are the PCI power connectors firmly fitted. The fact that it wont boot until you reset the bios makes it sound like its a hardware issue. Have you got another system to check the components in?

the 8800 runs at 50 idle and goes up to 75ish on load, is that ok seems like a big jump to me....

All connections are good, it wouldn't be a power issue would it? the 620w corsair i have should be fine.

Typically i have just bayed all my old bits so don't have any bits to swap out! :mad:

V_R · 2 Aug 2007 at 18:15

richieboy said:
Run memtest86 and if it passes run SP2004. If both pass, post back here.

will do, cheers.

V_R · 2 Aug 2007 at 19:57

Ok, so i've just ran memtest and its thrown up errors after 3 minutes. See below. I also notice that only 3007mb of the ram was showing in bios and memtest. So it looks like its one of the sticks are bad....

Why it says 'chan count' does that mean its the stick in channel one i assume?

Am now running it with two sticks only (the two newer ones) and its run for 21 minutes and counting without any errors! yay!

Can you guys confirm this please.

richieboy · 2 Aug 2007 at 20:30

Just run it one stick at a time, whichever one errors needs replacement. Job done.

V_R · 2 Aug 2007 at 21:43

Well it ran for over an hour on the two newer sticks and was fine, have been using the pc and is behaving itself.

So it looks like it was the original set of RAM, the GeIL 2gb 6400 stuff from OCUK. The second set i got is running fine so far. An going to speak to OCUK tomorrow, will they replace it or will i have to send it to GeIL? It was bought back in April.

Cheers for the help guys.

V_R · 18 Aug 2007 at 14:21

Just an update for anyone if their interested. I RMA'ed the kit, OCUK tested it and confirmed its faulty, sent out new set and now all is well.

Nice one OCUK. :cool: