XP Problem or Hardware?

[WhiteEclipse]

I will try to keep this short but it is a little strange, and would appreciate any help.

I dual boot XP sp3 and Vista on two harddrives - XP is the primary drive. This hardware setup has been working fine for months, and I have had sp3 since RC2.

Last week avast updated, and I started getting random reboots in xp. No BSOD, no error messages, no error logs, just reboots. Vista was fine (no avast installed). On one occassion only, I got an error message that no MBR was found. Rebooted again and it was fine, went into xp, ran chkdsk and it fixed errors. After that I got one hard lock (not a reboot) while playing diablo (not intensive for a modern rig)

As it turns out, Avast had problems with xp sp3, and released an update. Great, I uninstall avast, install sp3 final, re-install updated avast and all is good for a couple of days. Leave the system overnight with two instances of folding, no problem. Gaming new (stalker) and old (diablo), no problem.

Left it on again last night, and I woke up this morning to a hung system. What was stange is that it was hung at the vista/xp boot menu where you need to choose operating system. Which means that it rebooted, then hung after going through bios system check and making it to boot menu.

Is this a hardware problem, or XP problem (even though it hung at boot menu) or HDD problem? Normally these strange reboots are psu or memory. PSU is four months old corsair 620, and memtest has been running for hours now without problems? Could this be heat problem, temps have varied a lot here the last few days - I have never had a heat problem before but only installed the 6400 last Christmas.

What is driving me crazy is that I still can't get it to crash in Vista or the ultimate boot cd/memtest, etc.

AMD x2 6400, Corsair xms2 2 gig, 8800gts, 3 raptors (2 for os, 1 for data), corsair 620, creative audigy 2, lite-on dvd, asrock dualsata2, hawking wireless nic.

[Anarchi]

If it intermittently hangs at the OS selection screen, then it surely cannot be a software problem. Possibilities I can think of:

The HDD may have an intermittent problem, or the HDD cable is loose and making bad contact. Run the Advanced test in DFT Support - Downloads and Utilities

The Mainboard may have a fault, such as bad capacitors causing instability.

The PSU may be faulty, despite being newish.

The system is overclocked too much, are you overclocking?

The memory may be too stressed. Memtest cannot detect ALL memory problems. Try relaxing the memory latency. Dont use "Turbo/Formula1 Mode" in the BIOS if they exist. Try just one memory module and see how that goes, then try the other on its own.

Go into the BIOS and make sure the PCI Bus is running at 33MHz and the PCI Express bus is running at 90 or 100. If I increase my PCI Bus to 37Mhz, the sound card becomes very unstable and causes BSOD's and freezing.

The CPU may need a Microcode update, update the BIOS to the latest version.

[WhiteEclipse]

Thanks anarchi. I have a strange feeling it is the HD or psu - not sure why.

system is not overclocked.

I will run the utilities you suggested on the hd. I can also borrow a known good psu, but this is a pain because I currently have a very nice wiring job.

I'll try relaxing memory timings also. They are running what they are rated for, but memory can go over time.

I'll let you know what happens.

[rachael24]

Yeah please keep us updated...Im curious myself as to what the problem is.

[WhiteEclipse]

Slight update, I moved the memory to two different slots because I think one module was touching a capcitor. Also, I loosened up the timings a little bit. so far, so good (slightly below spec). Hopefully this will last.

[WhiteEclipse]

It was in fact the power supply. The following thread has more info:

Random reboot without Reboot - could this be a PSU issue?

[ATINUT]

I had a similar problem last year when I came back to Intel, but in my case it was caused by a dying harddrive, that luckily was still in warranty.

[266]

I don't think dual boot for a beginner of computer.

Change to single boot.

Never dual boot.

[maxidius]

My P4C800 mobo has simlar symptom recently. I used it for more than 2 years, but not often. When my father used it, told me sometimes the PC did not even boot up. I guessed he did something wrong.

I had similar doubt like you, hardware, or hard disk, or XP. So I changed PSU, changed hard disk and re-installed XP freshly. The symptom continues until now.

Finally, by accident, I touched the passive heatsink on the chipset just under CPU, slightly on the right. It was too hot. To test if it is the culprit, I had more than 4 weeks using a wet tissue to cool it off when the PC reboots. That way did not work well, because the heatsink is just too hot.

I add one 12mm fan to blow air out, but it's not enough. Now I add a second 12mm fan blowing almost directly on that heatsink. It is slightly warm now, and the reboot reduces to 1 or 2 in few days. I still can't know why. This symptom is more obvious with XP SP3, and less so with SP2. However, there is no way to prove it.

[WhiteEclipse]

Originally Posted by 266

I don't think dual boot for a beginner of computer.

Change to single boot.

Never dual boot.

The system is 100% stable again in dual boot. The flaky power supply was the problem.

Whether it was luck, or the computer gods, it never crashed in Vista. But I also don't use Vista as much. But everything is back to normal again!