tech help?

[amezri]

Right. So. Not having a huge ton of fun with this computer. I'd been having some green screening problems. Replaced the old PCI Express card with a new nvidia GeForce card -- no more green screen problems.

Except now, it just freezes randomly (in the middle of the night usually, when I'm not doing anything) and I have to hit the rest button. It's not overheating. The graphics card drivers are latest. MemTest came back clean after running for like 8 hours. Hard drives are not making weird noises.

I was wondering if it was the PSU, if only because the main difference between this card and the last is this new one has an onboard fan. Of course, if it's the PSU wouldn't the freeze happen more often and not in the middle of the night?

ozw suggested I update the chipset firmware. Well, that's a bitch and a half considering I can't find the right board anywhere. CPU-Z reports the following:

Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
GA-MA770-DS3 (version and revision unknown)

Processor:
Name AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+
Codename Brisbane
Specification AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5200+
Package Socket AM2 (940)
CPUID F.B.2
Extended CPUID F.6B
Core Speed 2712.4 MHz (13.5 x 200.9 MHz)
HT Link speed 1004.6 MHz
Stock frequency 2700 MHz
Instructions sets MMX (+), 3DNow! (+), SSE, SSE2, SSE3, x86-64

Chipset:
Northbridge ATI RD770 rev. 00
Southbridge ATI SB600 rev. 00
Graphic Interface PCI-Express
PCI-E Link Width x16
PCI-E Max Link Width x16
Memory Type DDR2
Memory Size 2048 MBytes
Channels Dual

So, now I don't know what I'm supposed to do as I can't find the specific firmware for that NB/SB on this board, but Gigabyte has downloads for that board, except I don't know if I should get rev 1 or rev 2 because I don't know if it matters??

Also, should I try swapping out the PSU for another in case this one is faulty or doesn't have enough wattage.

UGH. I hate computers.

Edit: It seems like there is no difference in the upgrades offered between revision 1 & revision 2?

In the comparison chart, there is a difference between the two. I know mine does not have onboard video, but it does have onboard sound.

I think maybe it's revision 1? 6 USB ports in back, 2 connected to the front of case... might be 2 open. So... 10 USB board?

Comments

[tirgaya.livejournal.com]

First off- Get a Mac. I am SO serious. That machine I drag up to phase 2, the big tower? Its four years old now. Excluding the times when I was moving the computer thus unplugging it, I've had about two hours of downtime in those four years. Altogether, in four years mind you, that downtime has cost me about 9 hours of work. (about an hour of that on phase 2.)

The reason is simple: Nobody else is making properly engineered computers right now. You can still get a better build quality if you buy into the "workstations" from HP or Dell with business support, but even those are a far cry from the Mac.

Once upon a time I used to build custom workstations for video and graphics- and I can tell you building a computer that is reliable from off the shelf parts is possible, but way beyond the skill set of most people. You need at least some background in electrical engineering and a good set of test hardware. (Not software!)

OK, now on to the practical advice.

The first thing I want to tell you here is that I'm working fairly blind. I too suspect a hardware issue, and if its hardware I think power is more likely than anything else.

Check your UPS. You do have one right? Make sure its in working order and that it has enough juice to run the system after a power failure. (I suggest the cheap and effective unplug the UPS while the computer is on test.)

If you don't have one, get a nice APC unit, ideally one with some "power conditioning." (The APC Back-UPS RS series is what I use and recommend.)

Step two would be to make sure that the system doesn't have Energy saver options on, like sleep set for the weird times you mention. Naturally that's only a problem in Windows- you may be getting a failed sleep/hibernate, which Windows is famous for.

Step 3: Boot the system with a Linux Live CD. Something recent that has the latest Nvidia drivers. Then live with the system for a weekend or so. It should be a fully functional internet machine, even if you can't run work software. You'll be able to run tests and such, as well as using Internet tools. So make it work hard.

If its a hardware problem, as opposed to a windows issue this step will show you fairly conclusively. Give me a call and/or drop me a line when you get this far.

As far as determining what firmware to install, YES the firmware revision matters. Usually there are two numbers, one is the hardware revision the firmware is for, the other is the version of that firmware.

Forget the software tools for examining your system. Open the case and examine the motherboard with your mark 1 eyeballs. The MB will be marked, somewhere, with its manufacturing revision or some other useful numbers. The downside to this method is that you may very well have to disassemble the computer fairly drastically to see what you need to see.

I further advise you to take some nice high resolution photos of the various boards and bits of hardware before you reassemble it, just in case this comes up again. Also, you can mail said photos to me or company tech support and ask for help.

Once you have that revision, then use the latest firmware and drivers for that revision of the board.

About the drivers, check the internet. Sometimes the generic drivers for your board's chipset work more reliably in Windows than the manufacturer drivers. That said if the manufacturer's drivers are reliable enough, they are often faster. In your case that would be the AMD driver set as opposed to the Gigabyte driver set.

OK, enough for now. Try some of this stuff and call me.

[amezri.livejournal.com]

Never an easy solution. I totally hate computers.

I've been running this machine right now for 4 hours and no problems whatsoever. I find it really strange that errors happen in the middle of the night. Which... actually, now that I think about it makes me wonder if it is a power issue. I have, on occasion, heard the UPS make a weird noise like.. a click and a beep and a hum. It's happened twice in maybe 3 or 4 months. IDK. I'm currently running an APC ES750.

I've been staring at this thing all day and nowhere is there a revision indication on the board. It does, however, not have onboard video (which rev2 does?) nor does it have 12 USB ports (which rev 2 does).

Have you been to the AMD site? They don't have anything newer than 2004.

[amezri.livejournal.com]

Also, looking at the ports on the cards, I have the same ports at the rev 1... with that weird video connector. The rev 2 has two USB ports where that is.

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

Does the error log say anything?

[amezri.livejournal.com]

Nope. Error log is clear. Only errors are from Winamp, but I know about those as it was conflict with WMP when trying to sync with my Sansa Fuze.

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

This happens every night?

[amezri.livejournal.com]

Has happened two night in a row for sure. Once at 4am-ish and 2am.

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

What are you running overnight?

[amezri.livejournal.com]

In one instance, AVG was doing a virus scan. In the other, MemTest.

AVG ran without a problem after restart and MemTest had been running all day with no problems.

Now I'm having SpeedFan log voltage measurements to see if maybe that is a problem late at night? :\

This is all very frustrating.

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

No, I mean, why are you leaving it on overnight? Before you started trying to figure out what was wrong, the problem manifested when you left it on overnight. Are you downloading torrents? Defragging every night? Logging IRC chat? Just heating the earth to avoid waiting for it to start up in the morning?

I'm trying to get an idea of what your hardware might be doing that's causing this.

How long has it been freezing overnight every night?

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

That last line should have been, "How often does it freeze overnight?"

Like, once a month? Once a week? Happen for a few days in a row then you're good for six months?

[amezri.livejournal.com]

I leave my computer on 24/7. For about 5 or 6 months I've been having a problem where my screen would suddenly turn green with pink stripes. It happened very infrequently and then started happening more and more often -- but it would never freeze overnight while I was afk.

Three days ago I swapped out the video card for a new one and now have no green screen error -- now it seems to just freeze... while I am not at the computer. The last three times it has frozen, it was between the hours of 2am and 4am. The first time, I was still at the machine and just restarted. The last two times, I had not been at the machine and nothing except standard programs (OS things, AVG, Comodo Firewall) were running. It's frozen two nights in a row where I have no been at the machine to restart it immediately -- just woke up and found it that way.

As of now, I have decided to not do a BIOS or motherboard firmware update (brother says these two things are the same? ozw disagrees??) and am seeing if perhaps some weird voltage fluctuation might be causing it.

I'm only ruling out standard things because seriously, in three days, it has only frozen between the hours of 2am-4am and only since I changed the video card from an ATI Radeon to an NVidia GeForce (yep, I uninstalled ATI drivers before installing new card).

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

How big is your power supply?

MB Version/Revision info: http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Support/Motherboard/FAQ_List.aspx?FAQID=2234

BIOS and Motherboard Firmware are the same. Motherboard drivers are different.


Some workarounds in the meantime:
* Try installing folding@home and see if your computer stops freezing as it will actually be doing something.
* Have your computer automatically shut itself down at midnight or something, and set the BIOS to turn it on when you normally wake up.

[amezri.livejournal.com]

Power supply is 500W.

Ah ha! Most helpful :) It is, in fact, rev 1.0.

I suppose I could just turn it off when I'm done at night and then boot it in the morning :\

I don't know about the lack of activity freezing -- I just left the computer alone for 6 hours and nothing at all happened.

Is this really bizarre? It is, isn't it?

[xpashax.livejournal.com]

I have one theory that is less plausible if it happened two nights in a row, but certainly possible. I'm assuming you don't have registered memory.

Cosmic rays can and do bombard us, these rays can sometimes hit your memory chip and fuck things up. Most of the time end users don't notice this, because they shut down regularly, but if a computer is left on over a long period of time, the changes caused by the ray will manifest as problems. This is why machines intended to stay on 24/7 (such as servers) will be built with registered memory.

So if instances are spaced out by weeks/months, I tend to advise people to reboot on occasion. That or try buying registered memory.


Rebooting regularly doesn't have to require you to change your habits. As I mentioned, all OS's have some method of shutting themselves down at time X, and most BIOS have a setting to turn themselves on at time X. I'm a big fan of automation.


Your problem *might* be your power supply. If you got a new GPU, it might be sucking down more power than your previous one. If you got a bunch of stuff plugged into your computer, it's draw might be near the capacity of your PSU. To test for this, you could try unplugging things and see if that makes the freezing stop. In which case, the solution is to either get a bigger PSU, reduce the number of components, or replace components with more energy efficent ones.

[amezri.livejournal.com]

I do not have registered memory, nope.

Strangely enough.... it did NOT freeze last night. So that's actually 24 hours of up-time at the moment.

I'm going to see what happens today. The only change I made between the previous freeze and today was to shut the machine down completely at 4 or 5p, unplug the PSU, then plug it back in and turn it all back on. I have no idea why I did that or why it would have helped in any way. (Erm.. and my mom may have done some sort of energy treatment, which is neither here nor there.)

Thank you so much for all of your advice and help! I will reread this if it freezes again (which I hope it doesn't...)