XP Freeze-ups

[Tim Cole]

I've had a problem with sudden, random freezes since late spring, soon after
upgrading to XP-Home.
No blue screen, no warning, acts like full memory -- can't go to the next OS
instruction in the CPU.
I've noticed several others probably experiencing the same thing starting
about the same time who have also posted here and elsewhere.
This is extremely exasperating: it can happen right after bootup; it can
happen once a day; it can happen a dozen times in one day; it always happens
at the most inopportune moment. It seems to happen most with either IE6 or
OE6 open and when I advance the cursor. (NOTE: I do NOT have an infrared
controlled mouse). I have nothing that I consider exotic in the way of
applications, nor do I have one single game -- beyond solitaire --
installed.
The only changes I remember occurring about the time this started:
XP had some patches;
ComCast took over my cable hookup (I also have been having email
download problems since ComCast where I have to go to the ComCast server and
weed out corrupted emails -- or at least emails that ComCast engineers have
programmed as corrupted -- something that I've only had to do once before
under eight years of other servers).
You may not have an answer nor a solution, but if you have had similar
problems with freezing -- and especially if you have XP, IE6, and OE6, AND
ComCast cable -- maybe we should band together and hit either Microsoft or
ComCast with it.
Still looking...

 

[GSV Three Minds in a Can]

I've had a problem with sudden, random freezes since late spring, soon after
upgrading to XP-Home.
No blue screen, no warning, acts like full memory -- can't go to the next OS
instruction in the CPU.
I've noticed several others probably experiencing the same thing starting
about the same time who have also posted here and elsewhere.
This is extremely exasperating: it can happen right after bootup; it can
happen once a day; it can happen a dozen times in one day; it always happens
at the most inopportune moment. It seems to happen most with either IE6 or
OE6 open and when I advance the cursor. (NOTE: I do NOT have an infrared
controlled mouse). I have nothing that I consider exotic in the way of
applications, nor do I have one single game -- beyond solitaire --
installed.
The only changes I remember occurring about the time this started:
XP had some patches;
ComCast took over my cable hookup (I also have been having email
download problems since ComCast where I have to go to the ComCast server and
weed out corrupted emails -- or at least emails that ComCast engineers have
programmed as corrupted -- something that I've only had to do once before
under eight years of other servers).
You may not have an answer nor a solution, but if you have had similar
problems with freezing -- and especially if you have XP, IE6, and OE6, AND
ComCast cable -- maybe we should band together and hit either Microsoft or
ComCast with it.

Sounds much more like a hardware problem than a software problem.

Have you tried a memory test (www.memtest86.com works for me)? If that
passes, it could be problems with your PSU, or with temperature (blown
the dust out of your case recently? Are all the fans going round
nicely?). Something like Prime95 torture test (www.mersenne.org) will
normally crater a PC with marginal temperature/voltage performance
rather quickly.

Or if your motherboard is of a certain age, it could be the capacitors
in the VCore generator going south (many mobo's were made with what
turned out, in retrospect, to be cheap and dodgy capacitors) ... you can
look for bulging lids (the caps are typically just in front of the IO
shield at the back of the case), although it isn't always visually
obvious.

 

[Tim Cole]

While I agree that temperature might be the culprit, I do pretty good
dusting and cleaning (dirty fans are terribly inefficient), and I would
expect to see garbage or a change in the display -- there is none of that.
Also, I have had several freeze-ups right after booting when the pc is still
relatively cool. I have seen freezes like this in the old days when the
virtual mem. gets filled and the cpu can't advance to the next instruction.
I forgot to mention that cntl-alt-del has no effect when this happens --
only a reboot will fix it. I would suspect the old mobo, or a bad mem, or
faulty caps, if it weren't for some others having the same, identical
symptoms. However, I've never liked this mobo anyway -- time for a new
one...

 

[GSV Three Minds in a Can]

While I agree that temperature might be the culprit, I do pretty good
dusting and cleaning (dirty fans are terribly inefficient), and I would
expect to see garbage or a change in the display -- there is none of that.

Well you didn't give much hardware details, but if an old-style AMD CPU
overheats, it'll just stop .. everything frozen. No screen corruption,
and the video output continues (but the cursor won't move). More modern
motherboards tend to either slowdown the clock speed, or cut power to
everything. Of course the other chips (Northbridge, Southbridge, etc.)
can still overheat, and lock up. That's just the usual failure mode for
overheated CMOS.

Also, I have had several freeze-ups right after booting when the pc is still
relatively cool.

Yep, that sounds less like heat.

I have seen freezes like this in the old days when the
virtual mem. gets filled and the cpu can't advance to the next instruction.

Not a problem with XP. If it's locked up, normally there is a serious
driver problem (usually with an unsigned driver .. my unsigned 'virtual
TA' drivers for my router can manage it sometimes, if I terminate them
the wrong way), or a hardware failure (like the CPU has stopped, for
instance).

I forgot to mention that cntl-alt-del has no effect when this happens --
only a reboot will fix it. I would suspect the old mobo, or a bad mem, or
faulty caps, if it weren't for some others having the same, identical
symptoms. However, I've never liked this mobo anyway -- time for a new
one...

<snip>

Don't rule it out just because lots of people have it. The amount of
cheap and nasty memory out there is quite large .. and =nearly all=
those motherboards built with that particular brand of capacitor are
dying (just like nearly all the Fujitsu HDDs with a particular chip on
died) at about the same time.

Don't know what memory/cpu/motherboard you have, but I can recommend
Asus A7N8X deluxe, AMD Barton, and Crucial RAM (for most bang for the
buck).

 

[Tim Cole]

AMD Athlon 900 socket 7 on a FIC AZ-11 mobo with latest chipset patches.