Computer advice needed

[Deviant Esq]

Over the weekend my computer decided to stop working. I'd arrived home and tried to switch it on, and nothing happened. So I took it in and found that the power supply had given up, so I had it replaced.

Got it home, hooked it all up again, and found that it froze after about a minute of running windows. Feck. So, using the windows CD, I repaired the installation. Caused a few problems, things wouldn't run properly, and it refused to install service pack 2 again. Took it back in, they had a look at it and said that the motherboard wasn't hooked up properly, so they tidied it up and put it back together.

I then took it home, formatted the hard drive, installed XP Pro, installed service pack 2, installed the graphics card drivers (all fine so far), then installed the motherboard drivers (incl. ethernet driver) - this is what seems to have caused the problem. Now, every time I start the computer, it starts windows fine, logs in fine, bit slower than usual perhaps, but every single time, within about 30 seconds, it freezes. The mouse pointer still moves but it won't respond to any keyboard or clicking inputs. Took it back to the shop who say it may be the motherboard but they aren't sure, as testing the individual parts will cost me lots of money - money I don't have.

Um, help?

[jim.cox]

Will it run in safemode without networking?

Will it run in safemode with networking?

Will it run in normal mode with the network disabled?

Do you have the correct (& latest) drivers?

Unfortunately when a power supply fails it can damage a motherboard...

[Deviant Esq]

Unfortunately when a power supply fails it can damage a motherboard...

I have the drivers that came with the hardware.

It ran fine with the Windows install (XP Pro) repaired, with the network running, access to the router, internet and all, but refused to reinstall SP2. It'd start to install and just sit there with the install window up, making no progress. Other things could still be done, but the install would go nowhere. So, I formatted the HDD and reinstalled Win XP Pro (legit version). Worked fine. Installed SP2. Worked fine. Installed graphics card drivers. No worries. Installed motherboard drivers. Hoo fuck, now it always freezes before I get a chance to change anything.

[CookMySock]

borrow an Ubuntu CD and boot it and see what it does. If you have the same problem then you have a hardware fault, if not then an O/S fault.

Pull everything out of the computer that you don't need and reboot.

Pull the Memory out and re-insert it.


DB

[jim.cox]

I formatted the HDD and reinstalled Win XP Pro (legit version). Worked fine. Installed SP2. Worked fine. Installed graphics card drivers. No worries. Installed motherboard drivers. Hoo fuck, now it always freezes before I get a chance to change anything.

So just which motherboard drivers did you install?

Can you get into safe mode? (hold down f8 on starting)

[Deviant Esq]

So just which motherboard drivers did you install?

Can you get into safe mode? (hold down f8 on starting)

I haven't got the computer at the moment unfortunately; the shop still has it. They're going to test the motherboard for me to see if it's got a problem. If it doesn't I'll have to go collect it as it'll cost too much to test everything. They've already tested the RAM and HDDs (a 160GB and a 500GB), which came back fine, but other than that, I don't know.

Knowing what it does at the moment though, I suspect that if I asked it to start in safe mode it would enter safe mode fine, but whether it would freeze or not? Couldn't say without trying it.

[johan]

Does the new power supply have enough power/watts to drive all your devices?

[xwhatsit]

Does the new power supply have enough power/watts to drive all your devices?

This man's onto it. If they replaced it with a shitty/low-powered/faulty power supply, it could not be giving enough juice or clean enough juice. Once it heats up a bit you can get all kinds of weird memory corruption carry-on that will cause freezes. I've seen it heaps of times.

[Deviant Esq]

Does the new power supply have enough power/watts to drive all your devices?

Yes, definitely. I've got a PCI-E 6800 GTS graphics card, a power hungry thing, so the replacement power supply is a 620W monster of a thing - it definitely has enough power to get the job done.

[PuppetMaster]

You said you can still move the mouse ?
The mouse probably wouldnt be moving if it was the board.
Dont install the board drivers, just the nic if Windows hasnt found a driver already.

[Deviant Esq]

You said you can still move the mouse ?
The mouse probably wouldnt be moving if it was the board.
Dont install the board drivers, just the nic if Windows hasnt found a driver already.

Yeah, I can still move the mouse when it freezes, it just won't respond to any keyboard inputs (no response from ctrl+alt+del) or any mouse clicks. I don't really want to have to avoid installing the drivers, because if they're causing it to freeze there's something not right hardware wise, it's been fine the last three years on the same drivers. What's this 'nic' you're talking about?

[CookMySock]

nic = Network Interface Card. Its the Ethernet port - if you aren't using it, you can safely not install the drivers for it.

DB

[Waxxa]

Sounds to me that the problem is the Hard Drive, even though you have tried reformating the HD it looks like the actual components, namely the acctuator arm, has had it. Can you strip out a friends HD, connect it to yours and see how your PC operates then. Worth a try and if thats your problem HDs are pretty cheap right now.

[Spuds1234]

If you want DE, I can pop around and disable your onboard NIC and pop in a pci NIC.

If your computer doesnt crash, problem solved, and you can consider us even on that cheese burger I owe you.

If it doesnt work, I'll take my NIC back and hook you up with a cheese burger one day when I have money.

[Deviant Esq]

nic = Network Interface Card. Its the Ethernet port - if you aren't using it, you can safely not install the drivers for it.

Ah right. The trouble is that I am using it - it's my internet access. Funny thing is that it was working alright when I'd repaired the Win XP Pro installation (without SP2), I had internet access (and could see the router), but I hadn't reinstalled the drivers at that stage.

Sounds to me that the problem is the Hard Drive

The HDD has already been tested and has come up fine, if the tech's word is anything to go by, naturally.

If you want DE, I can pop around and disable your onboard NIC and pop in a pci NIC.

Thanks for the offer Spuds. We'll see what the shop comes back with in terms of the test results on the motherboard - it's being tested now. If they can't find anything wrong with it I'm not paying them any extra to start testing individual bits... I just can't afford it. Hopefully that problem will be rectified soon too