Hardware/PSU question.

[~misfit~]

Hi Group.

A friend of mine has just bought a new computer. He specified what he wanted
and they built it for him. Basically all he asked for was an 80gig HDD,
512Mb RAM, P4 and a gamers graphics card as the machine was to be used
mainly for gaming.

So he gets his machine with XP Home pre-installed and straight away it's
crashing. It won't play games for more than a minute and even just
web-browsing crashes it after a while. He spoke to their tech who wanted to
know exactly how it was crashing and when. He said it gives blue-screens
with varying messages at different times and sometimes just spontaneously
re-boots.

They weren't helpful, firstly saying it's something he's doing and then
saying send it back and they;ll get it back to him in a week. He said that
wasn't good enough and was told to bring it up the next day and he can wait
if he wants to while they look at it.

He takes it up there (A two-hour drive) and waits 3 hours in the car-park.
They tell him it was a corrupted windows problem and that they've fixed it.
He asks for the windows CD as, although the paperwork that came with the PC
said CD included, there wasn't one. They say there was and won't listen to
his protestations.

He gets it home, tries to install and play Battlefield 1942 and crashes.
Repeatedly. He's been talking to me about it but I'm loathe to get involved
as I feel it's a warranty thing and they should fix it. He say's there's a
langauge problem for a start, the tech doesn't have English as his first
language, and he doesn't know how to deal with the guy who just keeps
insisting it's my mate's fault.

He rings them back and they agree to give him *another* windows CD if he
goes to pick it up and tell him to install over windows. I gave him a
bootable floppy with memtest86 on it, thinking it could be flakey memory. He
re-installed but still had problems so booted into memtest and left it
running over-night. It went fine, no errors reported.

So he bought it around to me. I formatted and did a fresh install. No
problems. I left it dowloading a 26Mb driver-update and came back to it 90
minutes later to find it had re-booted.

I installed prime95 and started the torture-test. It crashed after 30
seconds. I installed 3DMark 2001 SE and tried to run it. It crashed after 10
seconds.

The graphics card they put in is a GeForce4 MX440 and he's not that happy
about that, it's not exactly a serious gaming card. He intends to replace
it. The CPU is a P4 2.4Ghz.

I decided it was time to take a peek inside it and was very surprised to see
on big letters on the PSU "300 Watt".

I think this is the problem, the PSU isn't big enough. What do you guys
think?

Thanks,

 

[John]

I think this is the problem, the PSU isn't big enough. What do you guys
think?

Thanks,

I always suspect the PS but to tell you the truth , the only time I
think Ive ever run into a problem that I think was defintely the PS
was ages ago when PSes werent all that discussed that much and I
foolishly bought a really really really cheapo case which I thought I
was getting a bargain of a lifetime on - at a time when cases were
that cheap at all where Im at. That PC locked up like crazy and the
rest of the parts were decent namebrands parts.

However - I see so many people using generic PSes w/o problems though
Im sure many problems they dont think are PS problems are caused by
many cheapo generic case/PS combos.

Its really hard to say. A lot of builder so tend to skimp on the PS
because most people dont know the difference so its an obvious place
to reduce the cost.

The problem is - so many other things from motherboards, inadequate
cooling, driver problems, incompatible hardware, software problems -
can all cause problems that its really hard to say.

Thats why its good to buy parts you know something about and to have
an extra PC handy or parts laying around. I have almost enough parts
for another PC in fact two more - I sold some parts the last few weeks
but am keeping enough and buying more parts to finish one off to keep
a cheap system around for parts swapping. Its far more worth it to me
since im getting parts for 80% off all the time or free - at rebate
sales , to just keep them rather than sell them for 80% off or so -
the small amount I get for the parts dont even make up for the
aggravation Ive been having lately with my PC having to buy things at
gross prices so I can swap them out when I have a problem.

If you really want to get into it obviously - strip the system down ,
reformat the hard disk and reinstall windows cleanly and test it with
a bare win xp and hardware system with the case open while checking
the temps with motherboard monitor or some other software. Also look
at the how the MB is mounted. They always tell you check that just in
case theres some metal contact to the board. The best thing is to take
it out and remount it. Then if it still crashes swap mem modules and
put a fan on the system and see if it runs OK. Try safe mode too. Then
if its stable start adding more cards. If not then the PS is a likely
candidate but you wont know until you replace it. My problem has been
I bought THREE PSes - two Antecs and one POWMAX and I had a COMPUSA
one - and it turned out not to be it. And then I bought TWO more
graphics cards - and that turned out not to be it . So just plain
going out and buying stuff can get expensive especially when you can
wait around for a big sale.

In the end it could be some weird quirk related to that specific MB -
you should read up on the user feedback on that board , or even that
graphics card though the 440 mx has been around for ages now but you
never know - a lot of new repackagers are still coming on the scene
and marketing them. Maybe they put inadequate cooling on the card or
crappy memory or something or have really bad drivers - though Id
think they would be using pretty generic copies of the Nvidia drivers.

 

[kony]

Hi Group.

A friend of mine has just bought a new computer. He specified what he wanted
and they built it for him. Basically all he asked for was an 80gig HDD,
512Mb RAM, P4 and a gamers graphics card as the machine was to be used
mainly for gaming.

So he gets his machine with XP Home pre-installed and straight away it's
crashing. It won't play games for more than a minute and even just
web-browsing crashes it after a while. He spoke to their tech who wanted to
know exactly how it was crashing and when. He said it gives blue-screens
with varying messages at different times and sometimes just spontaneously
re-boots.

They weren't helpful, firstly saying it's something he's doing and then
saying send it back and they;ll get it back to him in a week. He said that
wasn't good enough and was told to bring it up the next day and he can wait
if he wants to while they look at it.

He takes it up there (A two-hour drive) and waits 3 hours in the car-park.
They tell him it was a corrupted windows problem and that they've fixed it.
He asks for the windows CD as, although the paperwork that came with the PC
said CD included, there wasn't one. They say there was and won't listen to
his protestations.

He gets it home, tries to install and play Battlefield 1942 and crashes.
Repeatedly. He's been talking to me about it but I'm loathe to get involved
as I feel it's a warranty thing and they should fix it. He say's there's a
langauge problem for a start, the tech doesn't have English as his first
language, and he doesn't know how to deal with the guy who just keeps
insisting it's my mate's fault.

He rings them back and they agree to give him *another* windows CD if he
goes to pick it up and tell him to install over windows. I gave him a
bootable floppy with memtest86 on it, thinking it could be flakey memory. He
re-installed but still had problems so booted into memtest and left it
running over-night. It went fine, no errors reported.

So he bought it around to me. I formatted and did a fresh install. No
problems. I left it dowloading a 26Mb driver-update and came back to it 90
minutes later to find it had re-booted.

I installed prime95 and started the torture-test. It crashed after 30
seconds. I installed 3DMark 2001 SE and tried to run it. It crashed after 10
seconds.

The graphics card they put in is a GeForce4 MX440 and he's not that happy
about that, it's not exactly a serious gaming card. He intends to replace
it. The CPU is a P4 2.4Ghz.

I decided it was time to take a peek inside it and was very surprised to see
on big letters on the PSU "300 Watt".

I think this is the problem, the PSU isn't big enough. What do you guys
think?

Thanks,

A generic 300W could be the problem. Many name-brand 300W could power
that system though. You might use a voltage meter to take readings
when the problem is reproduced, at least on 3/5/12V.

You could swap in another power supply for testing, but it might not
be good to "play around" with the system too much in case he ends up
wanting a refund.

If the shop wants a lot of $ or tries to replace it with another
generic PSU that's hardly a good resolution, it would be better if
they gave a partial credit towards a name-brand of his choice or
whatever their policy allows. If all else fails a $40 Sparkle 350W
should be a fine replacement.


Dave

 

[~misfit~]

A generic 300W could be the problem. Many name-brand 300W could power
that system though. You might use a voltage meter to take readings
when the problem is reproduced, at least on 3/5/12V.

You could swap in another power supply for testing, but it might not
be good to "play around" with the system too much in case he ends up
wanting a refund.

If the shop wants a lot of $ or tries to replace it with another
generic PSU that's hardly a good resolution, it would be better if
they gave a partial credit towards a name-brand of his choice or
whatever their policy allows. If all else fails a $40 Sparkle 350W
should be a fine replacement.

Hey Dave, thanks for replying.

It is a generic PSU, I've never heard of it before.

I haven't messed with it too much as it's under warranty. The only reason
I've done what I have is the tech is Asian and hardly speaks English, is
based two hours away and my mate doesn't know much about PCs (his last one
that he is replacing was a P100/16MB/1gig) and keeps getting blamed for the
problems.

In the BIOS and in windows using MBM5 the vcore fluctuates between 1.48v and
1.42v. The 3.3v rail *never* goes over 3.28 and dips to 3.25v. All the other
voltages are low to one degree or another.

I just want to be sure it is the PSU before I get him to insist on a
replacement, it'd be a bitch to have it replaced and still have the
problems.

Cheers.

 

[~misfit~]

I always suspect the PS but to tell you the truth , the only time I
think Ive ever run into a problem that I think was defintely the PS
was ages ago when PSes werent all that discussed that much and I
foolishly bought a really really really cheapo case which I thought I
was getting a bargain of a lifetime on - at a time when cases were
that cheap at all where Im at. That PC locked up like crazy and the
rest of the parts were decent namebrands parts.

However - I see so many people using generic PSes w/o problems though
Im sure many problems they dont think are PS problems are caused by
many cheapo generic case/PS combos.

Its really hard to say. A lot of builder so tend to skimp on the PS
because most people dont know the difference so its an obvious place
to reduce the cost.

Yeah. The place that he got to build it specializes in business machines and
supply his fathers company. I don't think they took the power draw of the
graphics card into the equation when they built it.

The problem is - so many other things from motherboards, inadequate
cooling, driver problems, incompatible hardware, software problems -
can all cause problems that its really hard to say.

I'm fairly sure everything else is fine. It's an MSI mobo with an MSI
graphics card, Liteon DVD-CDRW combo. The rest of the parts (other than the
PSU) look good quality.

Thats why its good to buy parts you know something about and to have
an extra PC handy or parts laying around. I have almost enough parts
for another PC in fact two more - I sold some parts the last few weeks
but am keeping enough and buying more parts to finish one off to keep
a cheap system around for parts swapping. Its far more worth it to me
since im getting parts for 80% off all the time or free - at rebate
sales , to just keep them rather than sell them for 80% off or so -
the small amount I get for the parts dont even make up for the
aggravation Ive been having lately with my PC having to buy things at
gross prices so I can swap them out when I have a problem.

If you really want to get into it obviously - strip the system down ,
reformat the hard disk and reinstall windows cleanly and test it with
a bare win xp and hardware system with the case open while checking
the temps with motherboard monitor or some other software. Also look
at the how the MB is mounted. They always tell you check that just in
case theres some metal contact to the board. The best thing is to take
it out and remount it. Then if it still crashes swap mem modules and
put a fan on the system and see if it runs OK. Try safe mode too. Then
if its stable start adding more cards. If not then the PS is a likely
candidate but you wont know until you replace it. My problem has been
I bought THREE PSes - two Antecs and one POWMAX and I had a COMPUSA
one - and it turned out not to be it. And then I bought TWO more
graphics cards - and that turned out not to be it . So just plain
going out and buying stuff can get expensive especially when you can
wait around for a big sale.

I *have* reformatted and tried a bare XP install. The temps are fine both in
the BIOS and using MBM5. Everything looks to be put together correctly. I'm
not about to go striping it and re-assembling it (yet) as it's under
warranty and I'm fairly sure they wouldn't like that. As I replied to Dave,
the voltages (reported in BIOS and MBM5) are a bit on the low side and
fluctuate.

In the end it could be some weird quirk related to that specific MB -
you should read up on the user feedback on that board , or even that
graphics card though the 440 mx has been around for ages now but you
never know - a lot of new repackagers are still coming on the scene
and marketing them. Maybe they put inadequate cooling on the card or
crappy memory or something or have really bad drivers - though Id
think they would be using pretty generic copies of the Nvidia drivers.

When I re-installed I used nVidia detonator drivers, not the latest either,
just a stable version I've used before. As I said, it'll run memtest86 all
night no problems so I'm fairly sure the memory is fine, it was my first
suspect.

Cheers,

 

[~misfit~]

He could just insist that they do "whatever" it takes to fix it,
though if their idea of a fix is a larger generic power supply, oddly
enough he could even end with the exact same power supply with merely
a label bearing larger numbers. Some of those generics aren't too bad
but others are clearly problematic. In the worst case he'd end up
with a power supply that "seemed" to work ok but in a few months,
maybe after his warrantly expired, the effects of long-term
high-ripple would finish off the motherboard then he needs two parts
replaced, or more.

He should insist on a name-brand replacement, the aforementioned
potential to kill the motherboard over time exists even if it isn't
the power supply currently causing the problem. This isn't to suggest
that motherboards only die from bad power supplies of course, but when
the power supply is junky enough it's likely, and the power supply
will only get worse as it ages when it's pushed to the limit like a
generic 300W would be.

Thanks Dave, taken on-board. It seems that I'm going out with him tomorrow
to speak to the tech as my friend doesn't know much and ends up getting
baffled by bullshit.

Cheers,

 

[John]

I just want to be sure it is the PSU before I get him to insist on a
replacement, it'd be a bitch to have it replaced and still have the
problems.

Cheers.

Goooooood luck.

Hope it turns out to be one of those easily curable things.

Im getting ready to send a neighbors ABIT KX7-333 - keyboard port
went out , he needs an upgrade to 1,1 anyway since it can handle
anything over AMD Athlon 2000 processors without a fix.


Im sending mine back too - never did figure out what was causing the
random lockups and reboots and ive tried everything.

 

[~misfit~]

Goooooood luck.

Hope it turns out to be one of those easily curable things.

Im getting ready to send a neighbors ABIT KX7-333 - keyboard port
went out , he needs an upgrade to 1,1 anyway since it can handle
anything over AMD Athlon 2000 processors without a fix.


Im sending mine back too - never did figure out what was causing the
random lockups and reboots and ive tried everything.

Well, I can't find the problem. They supplier sent him a replacement
(larger) PSU and another stick of RAM, I swapped 'em out and it still locks
up. It's a POS basically, he's gonna try returning it this afternoon and I'm
gonna build him a Barton/nForce2 system.

I'm at a loss as to what the problem is. I think it's mobo. Prime95 crashes
with the new RAM and PSU after seconds and it only tests CPU/RAM so it's
something between them. I doubt it's the CPU.

 

[~misfit~]

Huh?? Was the replacement power supply a brand name power supply? Generic
power supplies are pretty famous for being shitty. You said it was larger,
but is it a well known brand? http://www.ourstrangeworld.com

Nah, it was another generic. That's all they use. (Bear in mind this outfit
doesn't deal with the public usually, they are corporate only, not many
corporate buyers specify an Enermax PSU) We weren't going to get a
name-brand PSU out of them.

He was going to try to get them to take it back yesterday, I haven't heard
from him today to know how it went.