Athlon XP system freezes

[Kevin Galligan]

This is a funny story. I'm pretty close to having bought 2 computer
systems slowly, trying to get my 1 to work. About a year ago, I put
together a system from parts (new parts). Here's the original
config...

Athlon XP 1900+ (I think, might be low 2000's)
2 crucial 256mb ddr 2700's
2 WD 80g SE w/8mb buffers (raid, the redundant backup type)
Enermax case w/300w ps
Ati radeon 8x00 SE w/64mb
MSI motherboard kt4 ultra aru

The exact specs elude me now, but those are pretty close. Anyway, I
wanted something that was pretty fast and stable, and wouldn't be lost
due to a hard drive crash. Were I to build it now, I would've spent a
little extra and got something more like a workstation, with an MP
proc and ecc ram, but I wasn't as compulsive about possible data loss
at that point.

The machine seemed to work fine, but on occasion it would just lock
up. No warning, just stop. The screen would still show the last
thing, but the mouse didn't move, and no key input (Ctl+Alt+Del did
nothing). A restart would get it back up. I couldn't get it to
repeat by doing anything specific, and sometimes it wouldn't happen
for days or weeks, and sometimes a couple times a night.

I really had no idea about how to diagnose the problem. Over time I
replaced some parts in the hope that it would smooth things out.

I replaced the 2 ram sticks with 1 512mb ddr 2100 stick. Seemed to
help for a day or 2, then the same thing.

After that, I gave up for a while and dealt with it. Recently, tired
of it, I went crazy and picked up several new things. The
following...

MSI motherboard KT6V-LSR - For some reason I was secretly convinced
that the motherboard was the problem. This was the only complete
waste purchase. Everything else I'm at least recycling into my old
machine for a poor man's server.

Antec True Power 380 PS
Antec 120mm fan (front input)
Collermaster 80mm thermally controlled fan (back out, right behind
cpu)
CoolerMaster DP5-7JD1B-0L heatsink and fan
Mitsumi 80g sata drive (putting the raid in the "server" previously
mentioned)

The fans, heatsink, and powersupply also serve to reduce the noise
volume. That, at least, has worked out pretty well.

I got it up and running, and its very quiet, and it was looking good.
Surprise, it just locked up (typing this from my laptop). The only 2
things left in the case that I could replace would be the graphics
card and cpu.

Now before I go crazy and pull those too, I'd like to ask for some
advice. At this point, I think its the heat. Before replacing the
heatsink and fans, I had the stock retail heatsink and the fans that
came with the case. I didn't know too much about how to set that up
before. The case came with a fan on the side door and one on the top.
Bad (I think) air flow. The cpu temp used to get pretty high. Into
the 60's at least after use. I didn't focus on this before as a
problem because of what I've read, the XP shouldn't have a problem
with this.

I put the new heatsink on, with the stock pad on the bottom. It
looked better at first, but also hit 60C. I don't know if it got
higher. I wasn't checking for a while before it crashed, but it had
been stable at 60C for a while.

Anybody think this could be part of the problem? The next step in the
plan is to use some thermal compound instead of the stock pad to see
if that keeps the temp down. The problem is that I can't regularly
repeat the crash, so I won't know if something I've done had really
fixed anything.

The other possibilty is the video card. The only strange thing I've
seen with it was while playing tron 2.0. Occasionally it would just
drop out, but the desktop would come up with an error message, and
then would bring the game back up (usually after the light cycle
crashed).

Ok, that's enough info for now. I already feel pretty stupid for
replacing almost everything in the case. I'd like to avoid replacing
everything if possible.

Thanks in advance

PS. Not overclocking or anything like that.

 

[Dave C.]

This is a funny story. I'm pretty close to having bought 2 computer
systems slowly, trying to get my 1 to work. About a year ago, I put
together a system from parts (new parts). Here's the original
config...

Athlon XP 1900+ (I think, might be low 2000's)
2 crucial 256mb ddr 2700's
2 WD 80g SE w/8mb buffers (raid, the redundant backup type)
Enermax case w/300w ps
Ati radeon 8x00 SE w/64mb
MSI motherboard kt4 ultra aru

The exact specs elude me now, but those are pretty close. Anyway, I
wanted something that was pretty fast and stable, and wouldn't be lost
due to a hard drive crash. Were I to build it now, I would've spent a
little extra and got something more like a workstation, with an MP
proc and ecc ram, but I wasn't as compulsive about possible data loss
at that point.

The machine seemed to work fine, but on occasion it would just lock
up. No warning, just stop. The screen would still show the last
thing, but the mouse didn't move, and no key input (Ctl+Alt+Del did
nothing). A restart would get it back up.

OK, that symptom would be caused by a bad driver (motherboard chipset
driver) OR possibly a bad power supply. I'd lean toward driver as your
power supply is a really good one. However, with two motherboards doing the
same thing? -Dave

 

[billy_bat]

OK, that symptom would be caused by a bad driver (motherboard chipset
driver) OR possibly a bad power supply. I'd lean toward driver as your
power supply is a really good one. However, with two motherboards doing the
same thing? -Dave

I was thinking either software or heat. (cpu)
Good Luck!
BB

 

[somebody]

This is a funny story. I'm pretty close to having bought 2 computer
systems slowly, trying to get my 1 to work. About a year ago, I put
together a system from parts (new parts). Here's the original
config...

Athlon XP 1900+ (I think, might be low 2000's)
2 crucial 256mb ddr 2700's
2 WD 80g SE w/8mb buffers (raid, the redundant backup type)
Enermax case w/300w ps
Ati radeon 8x00 SE w/64mb
MSI motherboard kt4 ultra aru

The exact specs elude me now, but those are pretty close. Anyway, I
wanted something that was pretty fast and stable, and wouldn't be lost
due to a hard drive crash. Were I to build it now, I would've spent a
little extra and got something more like a workstation, with an MP
proc and ecc ram, but I wasn't as compulsive about possible data loss
at that point.

The machine seemed to work fine, but on occasion it would just lock
up. No warning, just stop. The screen would still show the last
thing, but the mouse didn't move, and no key input (Ctl+Alt+Del did
nothing). A restart would get it back up. I couldn't get it to
repeat by doing anything specific, and sometimes it wouldn't happen
for days or weeks, and sometimes a couple times a night.

I really had no idea about how to diagnose the problem. Over time I
replaced some parts in the hope that it would smooth things out.

I replaced the 2 ram sticks with 1 512mb ddr 2100 stick. Seemed to
help for a day or 2, then the same thing.

After that, I gave up for a while and dealt with it. Recently, tired
of it, I went crazy and picked up several new things. The
following...

MSI motherboard KT6V-LSR - For some reason I was secretly convinced
that the motherboard was the problem. This was the only complete
waste purchase. Everything else I'm at least recycling into my old
machine for a poor man's server.

Antec True Power 380 PS
Antec 120mm fan (front input)
Collermaster 80mm thermally controlled fan (back out, right behind
cpu)
CoolerMaster DP5-7JD1B-0L heatsink and fan
Mitsumi 80g sata drive (putting the raid in the "server" previously
mentioned)

The fans, heatsink, and powersupply also serve to reduce the noise
volume. That, at least, has worked out pretty well.

I got it up and running, and its very quiet, and it was looking good.
Surprise, it just locked up (typing this from my laptop). The only 2
things left in the case that I could replace would be the graphics
card and cpu.

Now before I go crazy and pull those too, I'd like to ask for some
advice. At this point, I think its the heat. Before replacing the
heatsink and fans, I had the stock retail heatsink and the fans that
came with the case. I didn't know too much about how to set that up
before. The case came with a fan on the side door and one on the top.
Bad (I think) air flow. The cpu temp used to get pretty high. Into
the 60's at least after use. I didn't focus on this before as a
problem because of what I've read, the XP shouldn't have a problem
with this.

I put the new heatsink on, with the stock pad on the bottom. It
looked better at first, but also hit 60C. I don't know if it got
higher. I wasn't checking for a while before it crashed, but it had
been stable at 60C for a while.

Anybody think this could be part of the problem? The next step in the
plan is to use some thermal compound instead of the stock pad to see
if that keeps the temp down. The problem is that I can't regularly
repeat the crash, so I won't know if something I've done had really
fixed anything.

The other possibilty is the video card. The only strange thing I've
seen with it was while playing tron 2.0. Occasionally it would just
drop out, but the desktop would come up with an error message, and
then would bring the game back up (usually after the light cycle
crashed).

Ok, that's enough info for now. I already feel pretty stupid for
replacing almost everything in the case. I'd like to avoid replacing
everything if possible.

Thanks in advance

PS. Not overclocking or anything like that.

'Freezing up' is typically the OS. Software does this. There is a
chance the software problem might have been induced by hardware
failure. And you are running a bit hot, but then, early Athlons and
AthlonXPs were hot.

I'd go for the OS&drivers first thing, and leave hardware for a good
while. (but do keep an eye on the temp)

One thing you could do, to rule out the temperature, is to underclock
the cpu. If it still freeze up, your mind is free to concentrate on
the problem instead.

Ancra

 

[Kevin Galligan]

OK, that symptom would be caused by a bad driver (motherboard chipset
driver) OR possibly a bad power supply. I'd lean toward driver as your
power supply is a really good one. However, with two motherboards doing the
same thing? -Dave

I got the driver from ati's site. If the driver is bad, then their
latest driver is bad, as well as the driver(s) they've had previously.

Also, the original system ran on Win2K and the new system is running
WinXP Prof. Both had the most recent service packs applied. I tried
the driver thing for a while, making sure I had the new version of
everything.

As for the power supply, this particular machine has been running on 2
different supplies (the Enermax one that came with the case, then the
Antec), from a UPS, and at 2 different locations (moved in April).

 

[Kevin Galligan]

OK, that symptom would be caused by a bad driver (motherboard chipset
driver) OR possibly a bad power supply. I'd lean toward driver as your
power supply is a really good one. However, with two motherboards doing the
same thing? -Dave

Sorry. Just posted about the video driver, not the motherboard
chipset driver. I really don't think its that, but quite obviously I
know much less than I think I do. However, basic logic tells me that
2 different motherboards with 2 different chipset versions (they are
different, correct?), released a year or more apart would probably not
have the same problem. As I remember, I also updated the bios on the
original board.

I installed MBM5 last night (http://mbm.livewiredev.com/) to check
temps. Oddly enough, the temp reading from MBM5 was about 4 degrees
different than the windows monitor that MSI supplies. They were both
open at the same time, and still different. I think the MBM reading
is closer to what my bios reading shows (although there's an obvious
lag between the two, as you have to restart). Any reason why those
would be different?

Anyway, I had my window open last night, so the room was really cold.
If pushed I could get the machine up to about 50C (by pushed I mean
running a disk search and regedit search at the same time, as I don't
have much else installed on the system). I closed the window and
planned on testing temps then, but it was about 1am, so I figured I'd
skip it.

Anyway, lets assume the machine can get up to about 60C, and possibly
higher before the new parts. 65C or more at times of stress. From
what I've read, AMD says this is ok, but other people have said that
the machine can become quite unstable at these temps. If this is
true, I'm sure I can get the temp down one way or the other. The only
real concern I would have at that point is if there might be some
permanent damage as a result.

Otherwise its the video card. Honestly, there's nothing else left in
the system.

 

[Gil Theissen]

To rule out temp, you could always take a panel off and run a desktop fan up
against the board. That'll reduce temps 5-7 deg. C. For what it's worth, I
would have started with the video card first.

Gil Theissen

 

[Kevin Galligan]

To rule out temp, you could always take a panel off and run a desktop fan up
against the board. That'll reduce temps 5-7 deg. C. For what it's worth, I
would have started with the video card first.

Gil Theissen

The only problem with that is the lockups can happen at random times.
I've had it go a few hours a night for weeks with no trouble, then a
couple times a night.

I actually ripped it apart tonight. I put on some better thermal
paste, cleared out the inside a little for better air flow, and
plugged the 120mm fan into the regular power lead (the Antec has a
special "Fan Only" lead which must be lower power). The cpu temp has
topped out at 51C, even after a dvd burn and other general stuff.
However, my machine is no longer quiet. That big fan in front is
audible now (altough there is a LOT of air going into the case).

We'll see. Part of me really doesn't want to worry about it. I was
pricing the video card and proc today. Radeon 9600XT and 2500 Barton.
I hate wasting money, but that would be sweet.

Hopefully it turns out to be the heat and it just works now.

I love the Motherboard Monitor program. Its strange. MBM says 51,
but the thing from MSI still says 55. Anyway, the MBM has the log
feature, so if it does crash I'd be able to see what temp it was at.
If it bombs out in the low 50's, its not a heat problem.