random crashes

[H3LLfx]

PLEASE HELP ME!!!!!!

I have been trouble shooting for over a week now, and I still
cannot determine what the problem is...... the machine is brand
new!!! ie: about 2 weeks old.

MY MACHINE:
AMD 1.3ghz
K7S5A motherboard (with onboard sound & AMR)
256+128mb RAM
30gb Western Digital HDD
Sound Blaster LIVE 5.1 sound card
GeForce 2 MX 400 graphics card
Windows XP

THE PROBLEM:
Random crashes (the machine freezes)!!!! Mostly while playing
games but it happens during normal "windows explorer" operations
as well. I remove the SoundBlaster card, and this seems to
improve slightly, but it still crashes!!!! These crashes occur
whether I dissable the onboard sound or not. A game can only be
played for a maximum of about 5 minutes, then the freezing occurs.

THE REMEDIES:
I have tried several methods to fix the problem.... but with no
success. I HAVE DOWNLOADED THE LATEST DRIVERS FOR ALL
COMPONENTS!! These drivers are all for XP, but still the problem
is there....... these drivers include the AGP, LAN, and AUDIO
drivers available from the ECS website. As well as the latest
sound blaster drivers & Geforce Drivers!!!!
I have also tried swapping the cards into different slots - no
effect.

I have also tried clean installations using Win98SE, WinME as well
as Win XP..... the problem is still there in all three OS's i
used.

I must mention that during my testing, the best solution I found
was to remove the SoundBlaster card from the machine. This helped
a lot, but the CRASHING STILL OCCURS!!!! (although not as frequent
as before) - disabling the onboard sound in the BIOS, also has
very little effect!!

PLEASE HELP ME - I AM AT MY WITS END!!!! If this problem is not
resolved, I will be forced to consider changing all my components.
But i really hope that you can help me

Kind regards
H3LLfx

[bassman]

Hello H3llfx and welcome,
Sounds like the classic AMD heat issue. Do you have an AMD approved HSF? How about some case fans? Have you run any monitoring progs to check CPU temps? Any conflicts in Device Manager? Or multipul listings of a device or driver in DM under SafeMode?

Here is a link to look at just in case you didn't see it in your researching components. Toms HeatVideo (http://www4.tomshardware.com/cpu/01q3/010917/heatvideo-05.html#download_the_first_toms_hardware_test_lab_ video)
Post back your progress http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/cool.gif

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Please let us know if what we suggest helps. This helps us help you better.

[BigBlue66]

Hey,

Was this machine purchased or did you build it yourself? If you purchased it from a reputable retail store, take it back. It should be under warranty.

If you built it yourself (IBUILTIT), have you double checked all connections and jumper settings? Did you remove the protective plastic covering from the tape on the bottomside of the heatsink? Is the heatsink fan working correctly?

Another possibility is bad RAM. Try running with just one module at a time to see if things improve.

One other thing you could try is go into BIOS setup and choose Fail Safe Defaults or something like that. In other words, don't try to run optimal values in BIOS for now. See if that helps.

With the soundblaster installed, do you have any IRQ conflicts or forced hardware?

The soundblaster issue sounds suspicious to me, but it could also be a heat problem. Are you using the onboard AMR? If not, disable it.

Post back with your progress and good luck.

Big Blue 66


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