Computer Freeze

[huckleberrypie]

Can you take a really good peek at the motherboard to see if there's anything wrong with it, say a busted capacitor or something?

[RAMChYLD]

Well, unfortunately, I'm going to agree with Blake this time. Check the motherboard for dead capacitors. These capacitors stabilize the power going into the motherboard, and the annoying thing is when they die, power will still go through, but you'll start seeing issues like freezes and sometimes, boot failure.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_capacitors">http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_capacitors</a><!-- m -->

That article will list everything you need to be on the lookout for.

[Blackberry Bun]

21 August: While playing a game.
7 September: While playing a game
5 October: While playing a game
13 October: While playing a game

Haven't done anything, but a few searches online shows that one of the symptoms of motherboard capacitor failure matches with this problem. I'll see if I can open the PC and take a good look.

Though the thing is, now that holiday is already over, I don't have much free time.

[RAMChYLD]

Well, if you do have to replace the motherboard, I suggest looking for a board with solid capacitors. Those usually are less prone to capacitor failure.

[Blackberry Bun]

So I opened the PC today, and I saw nothing wrong (Visually, at least).

By the way, I opened the PC expecting the capacitors to be this kind...


But all of them turned out to be this kind:

Are these what you called as solid capacitors?

Anyway, the guy from the computer shop suggest to switch the Memory with the one in my PC and see if the freeze will happen to me instead. What do you think?

[huckleberrypie]

Faulty RAM sticks could be a possible culprit, although sourcing an older one i.e. a DDR2 bar can be a bit of a chore.

[RAMChYLD]

Are these what you called as solid capacitors?

Anyway, the guy from the computer shop suggest to switch the Memory with the one in my PC and see if the freeze will happen to me instead. What do you think?

Yes, those are solid capacitors. They are usually much more reliable than those normal capacitors. I think most motherboard makers should have changed to those by now.

Hmmm... You already ran MemTest86 and it was okay, right? But still, worth trying. Also worth checking the video card again. Maybe the video card is indeed defective.

[Blackberry Bun]

21 August: While playing a game.
7 September: While playing a game
5 October: While playing a game
13 October: While playing a game
24 October: While playing a game

Yeah, I have switched the RAM and the freeze stayed in his PC. And it seems to get increasingly often again. I guess time to order a whole new world. Uh, I mean... motherboard.

A different friend suggested that it might be malware, but I kinda disagree since we have checked the possibility of software-side problems, right?

[RAMChYLD]

Will, right now my suspicion is that it's all down to the video card. Can you exchange the card in your PC with him and see if your PC starts freezing and his stops?

Well, I agree that i don't think it's malware.

What I do suspect now, however, is incompatibility caused by a function that the video card uses that some motherboards does not properly support (remember that I've mentioned about something called MSI-X that has caused my computer to act erratically and freeze because newer NVidia video card drivers tried to enable it on my motherboard, which after I did research found that the motherboard has a flawed implementation of the function). Although, if both motherboard and video cards are identical, this is unlikely to be the case.

[Blackberry Bun]

Since my PC and his PC has the exact same spec, except the HDD where his is twice the size, I'm pretty positive this is hardware failure somewhere. After quite an amount of online searching, I came to a conclusion that the motherboard is the one at fault in this case, and it's getting worse as we speak.

I have ordered a new motherboard from the shop. Hopefully I will be right this time. Motherboard is very expensive.