Bluescreen/freeze

[Mikus]

Over the last week my desktop keeps freezing and has bluescreen'd a 3 or so times. I've googled what the issue could be and is likely to be: hd, graphics card, memory, overheating. I checked the temp via ati console and says it's around 43' C. I've ran microsoft diagnostic for memory and diag at startup (HP's version, I think) and both say memory is fine, although it froze twice while doing the test.

Right now I am using the desktop and it's been fine for about 20 minutes. This is the 6th time resetting the pc though due to 6 freezes this evening alone.

Does anyone have any input on this from experience? Or am I stuck with taking my pc to the local doctor for a looksee?

[arshesney]

Over the last week my desktop keeps freezing and has bluescreen'd a 3 or so times. I've googled what the issue could be and is likely to be: hd, graphics card, memory, overheating. I checked the temp via ati console and says it's around 43' C. I've ran microsoft diagnostic for memory and diag at startup (HP's version, I think) and both say memory is fine, although it froze twice while doing the test.

Right now I am using the desktop and it's been fine for about 20 minutes. This is the 6th time resetting the pc though due to 6 freezes this evening alone.

Does anyone have any input on this from experience? Or am I stuck with taking my pc to the local doctor for a looksee?

Smells like bad memory: a simple test, if you have multiple DIMM installed, would be run diagnostics with only one DIMM in each time to find if it is really the memory.

[Mikus]

Thank you for the suggestion Arshesney. I ran all 4 sticks separately and HP Diag said all were good. While having the case off I dusted and checked to make sure everything was tight, which it is. So far this morning I've had one BSOD.

Is it possible this has to do with not having a legit copy of W7 Ultimate? I was considering doing a reinstall of the OS as well before having a professional look at this. I can't afford a new pc. Thanks for any suggestions.

[Arkanna]

1) Is your BIOS equipped to up the voltage on your memory at all? If it's an OEM machine, probably not.. but you're not running a legit Windows OS, which makes me think you're on a self-built box.

2) How big and how old is your PSU?

[Mikus]

1) Is your BIOS equipped to up the voltage on your memory at all? If it's an OEM machine, probably not.. but you're not running a legit Windows OS, which makes me think you're on a self-built box.

2) How big and how old is your PSU?

It's an OEM box. PSU is 300W and is about 3 1/2 yr old. I was having issues before which led me to instal W7. I checked my windows updates and found an update that was suggested to never be installed. Here is the thread suggesting not to instal KB971033, which it was on my pc. I deleted it. I also had 3 ATI profiles on my pc. I deleted the 2 oldest.

Since mem checking, dusting, and deleting software, my pc has been up for over an hour and not one BSOD or freeze. We'll see how it goes.

edit: Here are specs of my pc. Graphics card is a HD Radeon Sapphire 4830.

[Arkanna]

Yeah, KB971033 is the Windows Activation Technologies update, always hide that one on a non-legit copy of Windows.

If your clean-up efforts don't resolve it for you, I'd look at your PSU next. If you have a known-good spare to help test, that would help.

[Mikus]

I left my pc on all day and night and it's still going. Not 1 freeze/bsod. I guess I'll just keep my fingers crossed that everything is ok.

[xopher]

blue screens have stop codes. They tell you why it is crashing.

[Elizara]

Xopher is right. I'd suggest you immediately go get WhoCrashed and install it. That might help you run down what is crashing. (did for me)

[Mikus]

thanks for the tips!