terrible CPU or CPU fan noise on some startups - BIOS alteration?

[poachedeggs]

I have got a custom built machine: Asus M2N68-AM SE2 motherboard with
an AMD Athlon I X2 250 3 ghz CPU, plus 320 hd drive, 4 gb RAM
(Buffalo, PC6400, a compatible speed with the m/b), PNY Nvidia G210
card, running Windows 7 64 bit.

I had some instability problems when I'd had some apparently faulty
Elixir RAM - blue screens, and warped thing shappening on the
display. For a little while, waiting for the Elixir to be replaced by
a second stick of Buffalo RAM - asked for by me because the other one
seems fine - I only had 3gb, adding a 1gb generic stick that came with
the machine. Today is the first time the CPU has made this terrible
grinding din. It stopped doing this after I shut down and started
again.

Could this be simply because my home is unheated? February in England
and no central heating, which I can't rectify without trebling my
electricity bill. My laptop and netbook and other appliances cope and
have for fifteen years here. I would prefer to ignore this factor if
anything else is also possible, simply because this factor is
unresolvable.

Or, can you advise me about any Bios or Windows settings that might
need changing? I've got Windows' power setting set to High
Performance, and to not go into sleep or hibernation mode. Is this
tied in with ACPI and all that, i.e should anything be altered in the
BIOS pertaining to that?

My BIOS has sections for both Q-fan and Cool 'n' Quiet, but both these
things seem to do the same job, which I'm a bit muddled about, and the
little manual hasn't been enlightening. I had Q-fan enabled for a
while, and then I disabled it as it didnt seem to do anything. Now I
have Cool 'n' Quiet enabled.

Have I forgotten anything? This is the first time I've gone 64 bit -
does this require any BIOS or other changes?

Modest as the cost may seem to some I really can't afford to have this
machine die on me.

I will admit that I have one 'cracked' bit of video-editing software
running, and I'm happy to admit this because I fully intend to buy it
in a month's time as it is not as expensive as I'd thought, £35, and
needed to run it fully to know it suits me. But though scans with
Avast and Defender show no viruses, it did occur to me that might not
be foolproof. But I would think Keygen is famous enough that anything
bad smuggled into a version of it would soon be found.

I'm dreading having ot talk to the company I bought the machine from
because it would be so long-winded and they'd probably try to get out
of responsibility some way or another if there is a fault with the CPU
or motherboard. Memtest has okayed the RAM, anyway. The CPU
temperature checks out as normal in the BIOS too. The PNY card has a
little fan. The case has a fan which I was told wasn't necessary to
connect - it was very noisy so I've not bothered. With a case side
off I put my hand near and all seems cool and very, er, 'fanned up'.
I've had the machine a month-ish. It turned out that one connector
was on wrong as set up by the company, a connector that makes the HD
activity light work - I'm not too inspired by the thought that I as a
nervous novice have put this right after bottling out of fully
assembling it myself from the components.

Or maybe Windows 7 64 bit isn't stable?

All advice, as jargon-free as possible, would be appreciated. Many
thanks in advance.

 

[Paul]

I have got a custom built machine: Asus M2N68-AM SE2 motherboard with
an AMD Athlon I X2 250 3 ghz CPU, plus 320 hd drive, 4 gb RAM
(Buffalo, PC6400, a compatible speed with the m/b), PNY Nvidia G210
card, running Windows 7 64 bit.

I had some instability problems when I'd had some apparently faulty
Elixir RAM - blue screens, and warped thing shappening on the
display. For a little while, waiting for the Elixir to be replaced by
a second stick of Buffalo RAM - asked for by me because the other one
seems fine - I only had 3gb, adding a 1gb generic stick that came with
the machine. Today is the first time the CPU has made this terrible
grinding din. It stopped doing this after I shut down and started
again.

Could this be simply because my home is unheated? February in England
and no central heating, which I can't rectify without trebling my
electricity bill. My laptop and netbook and other appliances cope and
have for fifteen years here. I would prefer to ignore this factor if
anything else is also possible, simply because this factor is
unresolvable.

Or, can you advise me about any Bios or Windows settings that might
need changing? I've got Windows' power setting set to High
Performance, and to not go into sleep or hibernation mode. Is this
tied in with ACPI and all that, i.e should anything be altered in the
BIOS pertaining to that?

My BIOS has sections for both Q-fan and Cool 'n' Quiet, but both these
things seem to do the same job, which I'm a bit muddled about, and the
little manual hasn't been enlightening. I had Q-fan enabled for a
while, and then I disabled it as it didnt seem to do anything. Now I
have Cool 'n' Quiet enabled.

Have I forgotten anything? This is the first time I've gone 64 bit -
does this require any BIOS or other changes?

Modest as the cost may seem to some I really can't afford to have this
machine die on me.

I will admit that I have one 'cracked' bit of video-editing software
running, and I'm happy to admit this because I fully intend to buy it
in a month's time as it is not as expensive as I'd thought, £35, and
needed to run it fully to know it suits me. But though scans with
Avast and Defender show no viruses, it did occur to me that might not
be foolproof. But I would think Keygen is famous enough that anything
bad smuggled into a version of it would soon be found.

I'm dreading having ot talk to the company I bought the machine from
because it would be so long-winded and they'd probably try to get out
of responsibility some way or another if there is a fault with the CPU
or motherboard. Memtest has okayed the RAM, anyway. The CPU
temperature checks out as normal in the BIOS too. The PNY card has a
little fan. The case has a fan which I was told wasn't necessary to
connect - it was very noisy so I've not bothered. With a case side
off I put my hand near and all seems cool and very, er, 'fanned up'.
I've had the machine a month-ish. It turned out that one connector
was on wrong as set up by the company, a connector that makes the HD
activity light work - I'm not too inspired by the thought that I as a
nervous novice have put this right after bottling out of fully
assembling it myself from the components.

Or maybe Windows 7 64 bit isn't stable?

All advice, as jargon-free as possible, would be appreciated. Many
thanks in advance.

A "terrible noise" coming from a CPU fan, means there is a mechanical
problem. Some fans have sleeve bearings, and have poor mechanical tolerances.
They "wobble" at startup, and that gives the "growling" noise. If you're
still under warranty, or still on speaking terms with your system builder,
discuss the possibility of using a higher quality aftermarket cooler.

CPUs come in "retail" or "OEM" versions. The retail one comes in a box,
and includes a heatsink/fan for cooling. The OEM processor, comes with
no cooler. If you buy an OEM CPU, then you can shop for an aftermarket
cooler, of the quality you're happy with.

Your AMD CPU socket has a couple plastic tabs on it, for a clip to fasten.
Coolers which remove easily, from the top side of the motherboard, may use
that clip mechanism. The clip makes it relatively easy, for a person to
replace the cooler.

Some of the coolers which are much heavier, use their own retention frame and
backing plate, and require removing the motherboard to install them. For
a person who paid to have a system assembled, this is more work than they
would bargain for, and it might be better in that case, to get someone
else to do the installation.

The heatsink on my current system, fastens with screws, and the nuts are on
the back side of the motherboard. I have to take my system all apart, to
do maintenance. On the positive side, there is no danger my cooler will
ever fall off. And the fan on the unit I got, seems to be pretty good.

There are hundreds of different models of coolers for sale, some of
which give good performance and are hard to install, some which
are easy to install but don't cool well. Since your processor is a
65W unit, you might get away with the usage of one of the latter type.
If you had a higher power processor (they range up to 140W), then
in a case like that, the emphasis is on cooling performance, and convenience
doesn't matter. Always read customer reviews, before buying any cooler,
and if possible, download the installation instructions before you
buy. Some coolers (like the Tuniq Tower), are notoriously hard to
install - some you have to access an area where you cannot see what
your fingers are doing, and use sense of touch only. In some cases,
if you have big hands, it isn't going to happen.

In this example, you can see there is plenty of room to get your
hands near where the clip fits. But this particular heatsink
probably needs a bit better finish and design of the plate on the
bottom, as some customers complain it doesn't cool that well. The
heatpipes used by this design, are filled with a couple drops of
fluid, and the boiling and condensation of the fluid, is what makes the
pipes virtually perfect conductors of heat. Heat pipes allow
concentrated heat to be moved from the top of the CPU, into
the multitude of fins. Heatpipes are a great invention, which
have made a big difference to how well the coolers work.

http://images17.newegg.com/is/image/newegg/35-233-018-S04?$S640W$

If you're sure it is the CPU cooler that is the problem, talk
to your system builder, and see what options they suggest to
fix it. Oiling the fan, would be a temporary solution, and
oil is only a good workaround, if there is a hole you can use
to add the oil. I have some fans here, where the instruction
to "oil the fan", simply couldn't be followed. There is no room
to precisely get oil inside.

Paul

 

[SteveH]

I have got a custom built machine: Asus M2N68-AM SE2 motherboard with
an AMD Athlon I X2 250 3 ghz CPU, plus 320 hd drive, 4 gb RAM
(Buffalo, PC6400, a compatible speed with the m/b), PNY Nvidia G210
card, running Windows 7 64 bit.

I had some instability problems when I'd had some apparently faulty
Elixir RAM - blue screens, and warped thing shappening on the
display. For a little while, waiting for the Elixir to be replaced by
a second stick of Buffalo RAM - asked for by me because the other one
seems fine - I only had 3gb, adding a 1gb generic stick that came with
the machine. Today is the first time the CPU has made this terrible
grinding din. It stopped doing this after I shut down and started
again.

Did you listen to this noise with the side off, to try and identify exactly
where the noise is coming from? It does sound to me like dodgy fan bearings,
but you need to identify it better. If it is the CPU fan, it may be worth
getting the CPU cooler/fan changed for something better, like those from
Arcitc Cooling.

My BIOS has sections for both Q-fan and Cool 'n' Quiet, but both these
things seem to do the same job, which I'm a bit muddled about, and the
little manual hasn't been enlightening. I had Q-fan enabled for a
while, and then I disabled it as it didnt seem to do anything. Now I
have Cool 'n' Quiet enabled.

No, C&C thottles the CPU which then allows the CPU fan to run slower, if
Q-Fan is enabled (at least that's my understanding of it!)

 

[TVeblen]

I have got a custom built machine: Asus M2N68-AM SE2 motherboard with
an AMD Athlon I X2 250 3 ghz CPU, plus 320 hd drive, 4 gb RAM
(Buffalo, PC6400, a compatible speed with the m/b), PNY Nvidia G210
card, running Windows 7 64 bit.

I had some instability problems when I'd had some apparently faulty
Elixir RAM - blue screens, and warped thing shappening on the
display. For a little while, waiting for the Elixir to be replaced by
a second stick of Buffalo RAM - asked for by me because the other one
seems fine - I only had 3gb, adding a 1gb generic stick that came with
the machine. Today is the first time the CPU has made this terrible
grinding din. It stopped doing this after I shut down and started
again.

Could this be simply because my home is unheated? February in England
and no central heating, which I can't rectify without trebling my
electricity bill. My laptop and netbook and other appliances cope and
have for fifteen years here. I would prefer to ignore this factor if
anything else is also possible, simply because this factor is
unresolvable.

Or, can you advise me about any Bios or Windows settings that might
need changing? I've got Windows' power setting set to High
Performance, and to not go into sleep or hibernation mode. Is this
tied in with ACPI and all that, i.e should anything be altered in the
BIOS pertaining to that?

My BIOS has sections for both Q-fan and Cool 'n' Quiet, but both these
things seem to do the same job, which I'm a bit muddled about, and the
little manual hasn't been enlightening. I had Q-fan enabled for a
while, and then I disabled it as it didnt seem to do anything. Now I
have Cool 'n' Quiet enabled.

Have I forgotten anything? This is the first time I've gone 64 bit -
does this require any BIOS or other changes?

Modest as the cost may seem to some I really can't afford to have this
machine die on me.

I will admit that I have one 'cracked' bit of video-editing software
running, and I'm happy to admit this because I fully intend to buy it
in a month's time as it is not as expensive as I'd thought, £35, and
needed to run it fully to know it suits me. But though scans with
Avast and Defender show no viruses, it did occur to me that might not
be foolproof. But I would think Keygen is famous enough that anything
bad smuggled into a version of it would soon be found.

I'm dreading having ot talk to the company I bought the machine from
because it would be so long-winded and they'd probably try to get out
of responsibility some way or another if there is a fault with the CPU
or motherboard. Memtest has okayed the RAM, anyway. The CPU
temperature checks out as normal in the BIOS too. The PNY card has a
little fan. The case has a fan which I was told wasn't necessary to
connect - it was very noisy so I've not bothered. With a case side
off I put my hand near and all seems cool and very, er, 'fanned up'.
I've had the machine a month-ish. It turned out that one connector
was on wrong as set up by the company, a connector that makes the HD
activity light work - I'm not too inspired by the thought that I as a
nervous novice have put this right after bottling out of fully
assembling it myself from the components.

Or maybe Windows 7 64 bit isn't stable?

All advice, as jargon-free as possible, would be appreciated. Many
thanks in advance.

It would help everyone here greatly if you could describe the problems
you are having with the operating system as clearly and concisely as you
can. Post what causes the evbent(s), the exact wording of any screen
messages you are getting, the information given in the bluescreen, Event
Viewer logs, etc. Like Jack Webb used to say: "Just the facts ma'am".
Windows 7 is very demanding of components, particularly video and power
supply. Lots of people have had issues that turned out to be hardware
related. You will need to do some diagnostic tests to determine the
cause of your particular problem(s)to rule out the usual suspects one at
a time.

 

[larry moe 'n curly]

I have got a custom built machine: Asus M2N68-AM SE2 motherboard with
an AMD Athlon I X2 250 3 ghz CPU, plus 320 hd drive, 4 gb RAM
(Buffalo, PC6400, a compatible speed with the m/b), PNY Nvidia G210
card, running Windows 7 64 bit.

I had some instability problems when I'd had some apparently faulty
Elixir RAM - blue screens, and warped thing shappening on the
display. For a little while, waiting for the Elixir to be replaced by
a second stick of Buffalo RAM - asked for by me because the other one
seems fine - I only had 3gb, adding a 1gb generic stick that came with
the machine. Today is the first time the CPU has made this terrible
grinding din. It stopped doing this after I shut down and started
again.

Could this be simply because my home is unheated? February in England
and no central heating, which I can't rectify without trebling my
electricity bill. My laptop and netbook and other appliances cope and
have for fifteen years here. I would prefer to ignore this factor if
anything else is also possible, simply because this factor is
unresolvable.

Cold isn't a problem unless condensation forms on the equipment, so
you want to keep it well above the dew point, especially for a couple
of hours just before you turn on the computer system. An old VCR can
be useful here because it contains a dew sensor and a front warning
light that glows when dew is detected.

I've never had an old AMD fan fail, but I've had several brand new
ones squeal (rear sleeve bearing not oiled at all; front had ball
bearing) or vibrate badly. All of these were made by Delta, which is
supposed to be good quality, and AMD seems to use Delta fans even when
the heatsink supplier normally provides a different brand. Sometimes
a fan makes noise because a washer inside is cocked funny, and pulling
or pressing the fan rotor can move the washer out of the way. Fan
noise has nothing to do with the WIndows version, memory, or BIOS
settings (except to turn the fan on and off or adjust its speed).
I've had good luck with Elixir (Nanya), but others have reported
problems with it, and just because some memory passes MemTest doesn't
mean it's OK; you need to run 2-3 different good memory diagnostics
for several hours each, with the memory at its default timings and
voltage. Don't trust DDR2 memory rated for over 1.80 volts or DDR3
higher than 1.50 volts because that indicates it failed at normal
voltage.

 

[RayLopez99]

I have got a custom built machine: Asus M2N68-AM SE2 motherboard with
an AMD Athlon I X2 250 3 ghz CPU, plus 320 hd drive, 4 gb RAM
(Buffalo, PC6400, a compatible speed with the m/b), PNY Nvidia G210
card, running Windows 7 64 bit.

I had some instability problems when I'd had some apparently faulty
Elixir RAM - blue screens, and warped thing shappening on the
display.  For a little while, waiting for the Elixir to be replaced by
a second stick of Buffalo RAM - asked for by me because the other one
seems fine - I only had 3gb, adding a 1gb generic stick that came with
the machine.  Today is the first time the CPU has made this terrible
grinding din.  It stopped doing this after I shut down and started
again.

Could this be simply because my home is unheated?  February in England
and no central heating, which I can't rectify without trebling my
electricity bill.  My laptop and netbook and other appliances cope and
have for fifteen years here.  I would prefer to ignore this factor if
anything else is also possible, simply because this factor is
unresolvable.

All advice, as jargon-free as possible, would be appreciated.  Many
thanks in advance.

Yes, the noise if from your fan and it's due to the cold. My PC is
also the same. But the noise has nothing to do with any other
problems, just as bad memory. Noise is just a nuisance, but it does
not affect performance, though sometimes if the noise gets too loud
(before the machine heats up) I tap the sides a few times, and that
breaks up the resonance and stops the noise.

RL

 

[SteveH]

Yes, the noise if from your fan and it's due to the cold.

Rubbish, if it were just the cold the fan would be going round slower, not
faster and therefore noisier. It could even be that its supposed to do that
(which I've seen before) - the fan starts off fast, and then Windows cuts in
and gets control, the fan slows down and quietens down.

My PC is

also the same. But the noise has nothing to do with any other
problems, just as bad memory. Noise is just a nuisance, but it does
not affect performance, though sometimes if the noise gets too loud
(before the machine heats up)

Depends what is causing the noise. If its just the noise of airflow, then
yes, its just a nuisance. However, if its noise caused by vibration, then
something could eventually break. Which is why its important to know where
the noise is coming from and whats causing it.

I tap the sides a few times, and that

breaks up the resonance and stops the noise.

And therefore is noise being caused by vibration, which may need
attending to.