System freezes after 6 hours ???

[PC-Magic]

My name Wessel : Please help and don't laugh !!!
I fix pc's in my spare time but ran into a prob with this particular system..(Celeron 333mhz slot 1 cpu on a M748mr at MB, with 64mb Ram, 4gig HDD, Win 98 SE ,etc)
The system freezes up after about 6 hours or so (sometimes sooner) I've used "sisoft sandra" diagnostic's prog and the only thing I could gather from it was that the bios was a bit outdated (but the system is only 6 months old according to customer) After a hell of a battle I found manufacturer "PC-Chips" and downloaded latest drivers for onboard sound -& vga & IDE. Also the Bios upgrade but am battling to upgrade it(unsure).
Anyway also realised that when using screensaver-bombs out after only 20minutes but not with powersaving mode...Please don't tell me then not to use the screensaver because it 's not suppose to work like this....I have also reformated the Hdd and installed everuthing from scratch but still no luck ! Please help if anyone can since I've never experienced something like this.....
Kind regards
Wessel

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Trust your pc...
Somewhere, somehow it will give you grief !!!!

[dale]

System freezing could be due to many things. You have obviously reinstalled everything, so your basic OS is probably o.k. Some other things:

1. A background programming running that has a memory leak. Over time the system runs out of memory and resources and just dies. Press Ctl-Alt-Del and look to see if you have any odd or lesser known programs running and try running without them for a while.

2. Its possible your CPU or memory is getting hot. If the CPU fan is not working (or is turning slower than it should) or you have poor airflow through the box, the ambient temperature inside can get so hot that the CPU and system starts to flake and just stops. So clean everything and make sure you have good airflow. Make sure that CPU fan (the fan right on top of the CPU) is working. Check your power supply fan as well.

3. Try running "msconfig" from the Run command and go through and disable various things that get started at boot time and see if anything clears up.

regards,
dale

[ReddDogg]

I have seen a problem very similar to this twice. Once, it was the processor overheating. Was a celeron 433 processor, and it too froze after about a couple hours or so. The fan had ceased to work. New fan fixed it, but it still gives slight problems now and again. Second instance I ran into was with an ati all in wonder video card. They have their own processor installed, and it was overheating as well. It froze after about an hour or less, usually less. Needed new card, it was faulty. It is possible you have a memory leak too, but I am thinking somehting is overheating in there.

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Joe Redd
MCP

[DANQU]

Another thought on this is to check the Device Manager for any signs of problems with the driver or a resource conflict.

[ixl]

Dale read my mind on this one. As for the screen saver, sure it should work. But bear in mind that a lot of software is poorly written, and the more of it that is running at once, the more likely problems will crop up...
I don't think this one is a resource conflict, Dan, or it wouldn't crop up after such a long period of time...

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Charles M. Kozierok ( ixlubb@PCGuide.com )
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...

[PC-Magic]

Originally posted by dale:
System freezing could be due to many things. You have obviously reinstalled everything, so your basic OS is probably o.k. Some other things:

1. A background programming running that has a memory leak. Over time the system runs out of memory and resources and just dies. Press Ctl-Alt-Del and look to see if you have any odd or lesser known programs running and try running without them for a while.

2. Its possible your CPU or memory is getting hot. If the CPU fan is not working (or is turning slower than it should) or you have poor airflow through the box, the ambient temperature inside can get so hot that the CPU and system starts to flake and just stops. So clean everything and make sure you have good airflow. Make sure that CPU fan (the fan right on top of the CPU) is working. Check your power supply fan as well.

3. Try running "msconfig" from the Run command and go through and disable various things that get started at boot time and see if anything clears up.

regards,
dale

Dear Dale...
Ctrl+alt+Del does not even work in this instant....(Hard reboot only)

As for programs in the backround : nothing in the startup...
As for fans and airflow = all cool and running even the cpu not that hot...
As for power supply fan = blowing strong but will check that ...(Can powersupply fan bring the whole system to standstill?)
As for memory installed several different(working) ram dimms to c but that was not the prob.Also the casing is open and it being winter here by us I don't think the airflow is inadeqaute..

Wil run "msconfig" in the morning and c what results from that...

Thanks for the advice (all of u !!!) will come back to u about the issue..
Regards Wessel



------------------
Trust your pc...
Somewhere, somehow it will give you grief !!!!

[DANQU]

Charles
If he is sharing an IRQ with a device and either devices or not being used for awhile, or in till they or used the problem may not be prevalent at first.
Checking the Device Manager is a quick source to evaluate and to eliminate
Driver and resource conflicts.
Dan

[PC-Magic]

Originally posted by DANQU:
Charles
If he is sharing an IRQ with a device and either devices or not being used for awhile, or in till they or used the problem may not be prevalent at first.
Checking the Device Manager is a quick source to evaluate and to eliminate
Driver and resource conflicts.
Dan


Dan I refer to an issue (came accross it while searching for some more answers to a topic u have discussed with someone earlier in this forum and thought about the possibility ...?

I Quote...
"Stuff happens. The latest report was about problems with Dell laptops freezing up. They had to be powered down in order to restart. This has not been unusual, but in this case, the manufacturer acknowledged the problem with up to 400,000 units built last year. The actual culprit was the memory chip set manufactured by Micron. The specific problem is that the computers are unable to resume work after being put into a low-power or sleep mode. It is refreshing at least to have manufacturers not blaming someone else for a problem.

I have run into this lockup problem quite frequently. Some users unable to figure out a solution have just abandoned their computer until the batteries ran down completely. It was then possible to restart the computer. A better method is to temporarily pull out the battery. I have found that the problem was often due to the BIOS (internal memory) setup conflicting with commands available from the Power Management icon in the Windows Control Panel. You can program the display and drives to stop running after an adjustable time period to conserve battery power. I have seen this problem with many brands, including my Hitachi. The first thing that I do is to disable all the power-down features, and the problems have always gone away. Of course, you want to extend battery life before recharging, so you should carefully select the features that you want to forego. To minimize danger of data loss, it is always good practice to frequently save your work to disk

Is this a possibilty ?
I think after checking everything u all mentionted that my search is narrowed down to a faulty MB or cpu...(any ideas on which diagnostic software can test either one of these items?)

Will be greatly appreciated....
Kind regards
Wessel


------------------
Trust your pc...
Somewhere, somehow it will give you grief !!!!

[DANQU]

Clean inside of computer dust makes a good blanket to hold in the heat.

A voltage regulator might be going bad but the time of 6 hours is a problem because a faulty voltage regulator would show signs of erratic behavior before the time specified

A very good program to check motherboards and CPUs is WinCheckit by Touchstone
http://www.touchstonesoftware.com

Hope this help
Dan

[PC-Magic]

Dear Dan and friends...

I have stripped this pc apart yesterday and cleaned everything
spotless...(Fans etc.)Even used a bit of "contact cleaner in all the
slots and reconected everything the way I was taught(just to make sure everything is the way I like them to be....)
I installed win98 se once again and installed all the latest drivers that I have downloaded instead of the ones supplied on the cd....(graphics,sound & ide)

1) the pc gave a little error saying it does not want to work in 32bit graphics (screen black and blanc on reboot -needs restart)so it graded itself down to 16 bit(in safe mode).
2) Everything fine in 16 bit mode so do some more diagnostic tests (found nothing wrong this time)and used powersaving mode instead of screensavers.
3) rebooted this morning to be told on boot-up that cmos/bios battery "state very low" and choose between 2 options
a) Press F1 to resume setup
b) Press F2 to reset all values to defaults

so I pressed F1 and resetted everything (even lost it's cpu settings).
All is still running smoothly at the moment.

Now all I want to know could the cmos battery be the problem all along (freezing the sytem) or did this happen because I removed the battery from MB to test it's voltage (3,5 volt) ?

4) I don't think it's nessesary to flash the bios with the latest bios since the MB is only 9 months old(BIOS).

This is my last report on this issue and if it still gives hassels I am just going to replace the MB.
Thanks all for the contribution, much appreciated...

Regards
Wessel

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Trust your pc...
Somewhere, somehow it will give you grief !!!!

[ReddDogg]

yes, that battery could have been causing the problem all along, though it would never have been my first guess. I guess that goes to show even the best of us have alot to learn http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/redface.gif) I know systems do alot of funny things when that battery is low or faulty. I am kind of amazed it would stay on 6 hours with a batter that was low though.

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Joe Redd
MCP