Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

[steve-0o0]

Ok, heres the thing. I had built a computer for my brother a few months ago. I had eveything together all set up and installed windows and it ran for about 1 1/2 months great.

Now recently he told me that sometimes the computer will get a error and shut down or sometimes just shut down for no reason. So I toyed around with it, made sure no viruses or the firewall was messed up and it still had the problems. Did error checking and everything and still messed up so I decidied to reformat windows xp again.

Now I cant even finish getting to reformating it without having the computer shut down or get a error so its impossible to install windows now. I know it isnt overheating because i got him a nice 4 fan case and the airflow is great.

What I did figure out though after pouring over the computer manuals from all the parts is that the motherboard says it supports amd athlon socket A processors. Well I had a cheap little 1.65 amd athlon processor laying around so I stuck it in the mainboard I bought instead of buying a new processor. And the processor that i put in there was a socket 462 amd athlon processor.

Could this be my problem of the computer not being able to run any longer? How bad is it to mix different socket processors with the motherboard? Another question I have to ask is if i need to replace any parts do i need to buy a new processor for the mainboard or buy a new processor and mainboard or just the mainboard.

Its no biggie for me to replace the processor if thats the case I would just appreciate some help or input from the real computer wizzes here before I go ahead and do so. Thanks in advance.

[wayout44]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Socket A and Socket 462 are exactly the same.

[steve-0o0]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Ok since its the same processor I don't have to worry about that then. The problem is I just reformated it with windows xp professional sp2 and i get to the part where windows loads and it starts copying files and lets you choose your time and such.

What happens is I get that blue screen error where it says a fatal exception (or something like that occured). Is my copy of windows bad? Could it be hd or the mobo?

Please help me try to get his computer working again.

[PrairieDawg]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

I had almost the same problem with a system a few weeks ago. Problem turned out to be faulty RAM.

[maximus7001]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

First of all, full system specs would be nice. go here and get the latest iso version of memtest86+. This should tell you if the ram is toast.

[steve-0o0]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

ok system specs are: amd athlon xp 1700, gigabyte 7vt600-rz(-c), ati radeon 9600 se, 40 gig hg, 1 stick of 1 gig ram (sorry dont know exact make.

2nd thing is do i need to have windows installed to test the ram with memtest86+. Remeber the problem is that i can turn it on and everything, i just cant install windows onto it. after it finished the reformat and goes to installing windows i always get the blue screen thing.

[maximus7001]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Memtest86+ does not run in windows. The computer boots off the cd that you burned with the iso. You set it in the bios to boot from cd and it boots like a windows disc.
Oh and that is not a crappy cpu. The xp1700's that I have used could run @ 11x200(2.2ghz) with a decent hsf and proper tim.

[steve-0o0]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

ok ive had the memtest running for about 1 hour now and it said that no errors have came up so far in all tests. Should I keep running it or is there anything else I could try?

[maximus7001]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Let it run for a few more hours just to be sure. If the ram checks out ok then try a different psu. Is it a cheapo psu? Also make sure you are not connected to the internet until after windows is installed and the firewall is on.(if you have cable or a router)

[steve-0o0]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

K i got a quick question. Something wierd happend while it was running. It finished one of its tests and went to test #167 and the whole screen filled up with /J (dimand shaped symbol)then a +-/ . Does mean that I have a error or did the memtest freeze up or something?

Also when I try to start up the computer or start it up and boot to the winows xp disc to reformat it, after it finishes all the checks then goes to a screen saying : NTLDR is missing
Press alt+ctrl+del to restart

Can any of you tell me what a NTLDR is exactly? I can't even try to reformat now with that thing always preventing me from going any further.

[maximus7001]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

read this

I still suspect the psu since it got worse over time. You still never said what kind of psu it is. When installing xp, erase and recreate the partition before installing. And I am not sure about your description of what happened on test 167. Read the last post in this thread

[steve-0o0]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

How could it be the psu that is having the problems. It can boot up fine and everything and run for as long as you have it on. All I know is that it is a 420 watt psu. I'm not sure what the brand is but I will open the case up and look around to find out.

I also if it was the psu couldnt there be random shutdowns? In my case I keep getting that Stop blue screen of death thing.

I just switched out the ram with a stick of 256 memory from another computer and ill see if it crashes when installing xp.

Also is there a possiblilty that HD's can go bad after awhile? Beacause it is using a old 40 gig hd that I have owned for a few years now. Just trying to get at new idead at what the problem could be.

EDIT:

Ok first off i switched out the 1 gig stick of ram with a 256 i had lying around. Reformatted windows and everything seems to be working find.

The thing I find puzzling is that i ran that memtest program someone suggested and it turned up 0 errors for the 1 gig stick. Yet when i switched it out for the 256 everything worked slower but no blue screen ever came up.

Does this mean that my 1 gig ram could still be good or does it mean that the memtest program is inacurate in finding the errors?

Also the name of the psu is raid 420w. Can I get any input on this what you other people think. I'm pretty positive that its the ram now and the memtest was inacurate. And if thats the case with the ram then it might be time for a trip to frys to get a 512 or 1 gig ram.

[maximus7001]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Being in the computer building/fixing business, I have seen it all. There is no testing program that ever works 100%. A few occasions memtest86+ did not pick up an error on ram that was obviously faulty but goldmemory did. Of all the broken machines that I have worked on, the 3 things tend to die the most are psu, ram and mobo(in that order).
With larger sticks of ram, the timings tend to be more relaxed and sometimes spd does not set the timings accordingly. For example: I have seen spd set the cas to 2.5 on cas 3 ram. I have also seen ram that needed a little bit more voltage than default to run properly at the advertised timings or run at all. I even tested a r7000 64mb gfx card years ago that tended to "forget" about 32mb of it's memory sometimes when run in a mobo that had no agp volt adjustment. As soon as it was in a mobo that the had agp voltage turned up a notch, voila the gfx memory was all there again and stayed that way.

[steve-0o0]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Ok I see what you said about that the psu dies then ram and mobo. But ever since I stuck that 256 ram in it runs fine now with no errors. So all i have to replace is the ram now correct? Or are you saying that becase the psu could be faulty then thats what made the ram die.

So should I replace the psu or should I replace the ram? Cause im pretty sure its the ram that was faulty.

[maximus7001]

Re: Complicated problem involving possible incompatible parts.

Ok I see what you said about that the psu dies then ram and mobo. But ever since I stuck that 256 ram in it runs fine now with no errors. So all i have to replace is the ram now correct? Or are you saying that becase the psu could be faulty then thats what made the ram die.

So should I replace the psu or should I replace the ram? Cause im pretty sure its the ram that was faulty.

Try the ram in another machine I guess. With these things nothing is ever for sure. With ram there is more to it than just pluging it in. The timings are guessed by spd(the technology that is suposed to run the ram at the correct timings) and it is almost never correct. As I was saying try upping the dimm voltage a notch. The setting for this in in the frequency/voltage control of the bios. As for the timings being correct, I don't see a setting for this in your manual. Alot of times when the auto settings in this section are changed to manual then a whole new set of options become available and thats probably were the timing settings are.
As for parts failure, I did not mean that these things fail like that, I meant that psu is most common, second is ram, and third is mobo. And that is based on observation over the years.

About the psu, in the pc health status of the bios, the voltages are displayed in realtime. If they are visably fluctuating lots(by .200v or more, the last 2 digits dont mean much) or if they are incorect by more than 10% then there may be a problem)