www.abithelp.com

ladies and gentleman your attention please

so I'm at a loss, I really am. My pc keeps randomly crashing and has done for a while, at first it was just crashes to desktop and as you know some games do that for whatever silly reason, so I ignored it.

Now lately I keep getting actual error messages that xyz can't access a memory segment etc etc you know the usual Random memory errors you get with bad code an what not. So I thought I'd run memtest just in case, this came back clear after running it for 16 hours.
So I did some digging and decided to re-install the pc with windows 7 home prem 64 bit (as I do have 4gb ram in the pc all of the exact same model btw) Anyway this gave me yet more crashes when playing, but! I got a blue screen or two as well finally with an error some thing to do with the video card

Anyway looking onto google it seems to usually happen with nvidia's but a few hits for ATI, so I try their fixes and they are ALL related to driver issues. That's all fine and well but I've tried loads of older revisions to see if anything worked, but alas nothing. So I suspect it's something else

So I come here asking my friends at ABIT, any ideas?
I must also note I dont have much by ways of spares at the moment, so I can't test parts seperately. PSU voltages are all stable RAM was tested with memtest the C drive and the games drive have both been tested.

I've cleaned and re-seated everything just to be sure it wasn't an over-heating problem, but my CPU and GPU do not go over 52 generally, cpu tend to sit around 40-50 ish on load and GPU at 52 when playing a game spiking at 60 if I play something really intensive with full super duper magic light shows on.
Oh and I took the audigy out as somewhere it was mentioned this might be causing the issue (uninstalled drivers too) as I do get a sound screech when the pc crashes, although that does seem to have gone away now. Using the AW9D's sound thingy at the moment.

TIA

Have you tried giving the RAM a little more voltage? I see you say you have it set at "stock" timings, does that mean Corsair's recommended timings and voltage?

Back when I had my AV8, it was very picky about the brand of RAM. Patriot and Corsair just gave me constant headaches. I finally went with OCZ Platinum and never had another problem. And, yes, Memtest didn't find any problems, either.

Power supply would be my second guess, especially with modular cables. I never really have trusted them. But it seems like you have done all the troubleshooting I would do, already. I usually will put the PC on it's side, and then unplug all the connectors, plug them all back in, take the RAM out, use a can of air and blow the dust out. Re do the thermal paste (which you have done) clean all the fans including the power supply. Not sure what else to suggest.

Oh, have you looked at the capacitors around the area of the CPU? I'm not sure if that series of boards had that problem or not. If you see any with bulging tops or brown goo oozing out, that's what the problem is.

Chris,

Yea the RAM is currently as is with the timings that were on the package/website (its been a while I'd have to double check tonight) and voltage too. Don't quote me on this yet as I haven't checked but I think it was 5-5-5-18 or 4-4-4-12 for the XMS2 I have. The voltage I have no idea of the top of my head except it being 2.something I think
Upping the voltage a notch is not a bad idea actually, should have thought of that myself, I remember on my old abit mobo I had to do just that to get it running stable again.

I have to agree with the modular thing, but at the time it was the best bang for buck. Honestly I have been toying with buying a new one but of course the whole "do I really need it" comes into play and I see some new brands have replaced some old trusted ones and some old crappy ones have themselves renamed and are listed on some websites as good ones now

As you said, dust/paste has been cleaned and re-applied, the one thing I did not do was check the caps, although as I was cleaning I did not notice any brown goo, but I'll have a look at deformities later.
I wish I had a spare GPU lying around to test, hmm actually, I could try using the other pci-e port to see if it might be the port causing the issue? Yea grabbing at straws here

Best I can suggest is don't rush it. Take it one step at a time. Check the caps. You did the thermal paste. Cleaned all the fans. I would loosen up the RAM timings a little (with 4 sticks you may actually have to under clock them) 2.1 volts and 5-5-5-15, 2T Make sure the BIOS is seeing all the RAM slots and has set the TrFc to the same value to all the RAM sticks.

I wrote a Guide a while back: guides/topic259.html Hope this helps.

just a quick heads up - upped the voltage to 2.10 (it was on 2.0) sticker on the memory said 2.1 but I believe this is highest rating it has been tested on?
Ran CPU-Z and that said 1.8 for voltage. I left the timings on 4-4-4-12 for now it has not crashed once last night so fingers crossed, I'll test more this weekend when I don't have to work

2.1 is the manufacturer required voltage...its warranteed (for most ram) +.2 above that.

This is not the old ram where you can underclock it and maintain stability, since DDR2 you need to have 1.9 or higher to maintian the data integrety. JEDEC standard was supposed to be 1.8 and thats before enthusiast and performance ram entered the picture.

fair enough bear thanks

well nothing has crashed once in 5 or 6 days now and it used to happen after an hour or two of "intensive" gaming, so the voltage did the trick chris!
Thanks for the help again

No worries, dude. Glad you got it fixed up. It's what we're here for.

Greybear wrote:2.1 is the manufacturer required voltage...its warranteed (for most ram) +.2 above that.

This is not the old ram where you can underclock it and maintain stability, since DDR2 you need to have 1.9 or higher to maintian the data integrety. JEDEC standard was supposed to be 1.8 and thats before enthusiast and performance ram entered the picture.

Though i've been DIY for years and been messing with branded comps as well since the day of VIA forum. But i alway let the ram run at auto, the most recent similar incident happen to my customer which bought a DIY comp and prefer to have Kingston hyper-x ram, once i setup for him, it keep on crashing, the ram voltage have never came across my mind, next we change the ram and it run fine. Comes to think of it, it could just be the voltage as what you guys claim here