Introduction and the most generic problem in the world

[Arutha]

Good morning,
my name's Arutha and I've just registered on the board to bring to you the problem that's hardest to trace and fix: A complete computer crash.

Since I've upgraded all my hardware, I have been experiencing about one or two computer crashes per week. Some introduction info: I'm running Windows XP 64 on an Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4400+, 300 Gyg sata 1 harddisk, a single 1 gig strip of RAM.

Now.. I've been bugged to hell at what could cause this problem, but I have no idea where to look. It mostly happens when I use VLC media player to simply watch a movie, I do not experience it often while running more CPU-heavy applications. The effect is that I heard a plopping sound, the screen freezes up directly, and the computer reboots, after which it is working fine once more... I've run a memcheck program to see if it's the RAM, I've checked my harddisk with Norton, put in extra coolers to keep the harddisk and CPU in better shape and bought a new 650-ish Watt power supply, because I reckoned my Gefore 7900 GTX might be slurping too much away from the CPU...

Does anyone have any suggestions as to what else could be the cause ?

Regards, Arutha

 

[SNGX1275]

Download the hard drive diagnostic tools (or use the cd that may have came with the hard drive) and run a full test on it.
Where is the sound comming from? If its not your speakers then really the only places it could come from consistently are the hard drive and power supply (less likely). You really need to isolate that sound.

 

[danieldude]

hi

maybe you have an irq conflict, try swaping pci cards with one another.

my soundcArd did weird stuff once, it was on same irq as the net card. computers do not like that

 

[Arutha]

Harddrive

I already ran a diagnostics check on the harddisk using Norton. It found nothing, but I'll get a second opinion from another tool.

The sound originates from my speakers, it is the sound you hear when you reset the system, it does not come from the system case.

I have only one PCI card in the slot, the other is a PCI-express. The rest of the hardware is onboard. So that can't be it. Thanks for the reply so far though, I hadn't figured that could be it.

 

[danieldude]

could it just be the media player youre using is bugged? it happens
try unninstll and replace.

is your graphic card onboard? if so, take a geforce card or something and other onboard card from a friend , and try that(just for dissabling the onboard ones to rull them out)

good luck

 

[Arutha]

Re:

No, like I said, I own a PCI-Express Geforce 7900 GTX.
I searched for similar problems with people using VLC media player, but there are no other reports. I searched their known problems, nothing comes close.

The problem also occurs when I'm not using VLC.

Could it be a shortcut in the system case ? Like an electric flow somewhere where it is not supposed to run?

 

[danieldude]

hey

is the os 100% good?
did you check the event viewer?
how about the irq?
bios updated?
a jammed motherboard is the last last last thing .

:wave: good luck

 

[Arutha]

The bios has not been updated yet, but the mainboard is pretty new, so the current one should suffice. I'll update it none the less.

I know little of the event viewer and irq, could you elaborate on them ? Where can I check the event viewer, for example.

 

[danieldude]

hi

right click on my computer,mannage,- there you have event viewer

on the same page goto device manager, on the view tab(hope i got the translation right) choose " resources by type" and there is the irq list, look for conflicts.. like if the graphic card and the soundcard are on the same irq(irq is ,well, the virtual lines that take the cpu power, each by turn,for the computer can only do one thing at a time)

well

good luck

 

[Arutha]

Hey,

thanks, I cannot believe I never saw that manage button. There are only two similar IRQ's, the SCSI RAID controller and the MS ACPI-Compliant System. If this were the cause, would the reboot not be more frequent, or would windows partially or not at all be working ?

The Event Viewer is a long list of messages. Two interesting ones are there from around the time of my last crash

This warning :
Windows saved user HAWKE\Administrator registry while an application or service was still using the registry during log off. The memory used by the user's registry has not been freed. The registry will be unloaded when it is no longer in use.

This is often caused by services running as a user account, try configuring the services to run in either the LocalService or NetworkService account.

And this error preceiding it:
Faulting application iexplore.exe, version 6.0.3790.1830, faulting module getflash.dll, version 1.0.0.1, fault address 0x00008c40.

 

[danieldude]

hi
sorry but these msg you get doesnot say much to me... just ideas...
1. it looks like two users r trying to use the same process together, look in user accounts' or in the process menu to try and find mis-fits
2.try registry cleaning also , it helps, did you do a spy\trojen \virus check?
3.the getflash dll is related to flash based games and stuff.. does it ring a bell?

 

[SNGX1275]

Norton won't do the type of tests one of the hd manufacturer diagnostic tests will do, those are typically ran outside of the OS (although they don't always have to be). But with the further details it doesn't seem that is the cause.

Take a screenshot of the event viewer (alt+prt scr) and paste it into paint then save it as a jpg and upload it in your next post (will need to click the 'go advanced' button in this quick reply area to do that).

Indicate (if its not obvious) where the problem last occured. iexplorer.exe is what crashed in your example, likely because of something flash related. It could be that iexplorer is so integrated into the OS the crash also brought the system down, but I'd like to see any other issues that maybe reporting in the event viewer.

 

[Arutha]

Post problem

Thank you, I will check the areas mentioned.
Will this screenshot of the Event Viewer suffice ?

My system crashed again at around 1:10, and it is now 1:18. The logs are from that period.

I only have one user account and the Guest account is disabled, so that can't be it.

-> 3.the getflash dll is related to flash based games and stuff.. does it ring a bell?
I believe getflash.dll is part Flashget, a download assistant I use. Though Iexplorere.exe has been running most of the times I can recall a crash... I removed Flashget, stopped some in my eyes senseless Services of windows and ran Hitman Pro 2 ( an application that runs the most common anti-spyware and anti-virus programs around ). It found some of the expected cookies and programs I use myself that were recognized as spyware, nothing of interest.

It is the most horrible problem someone can have, a random complete system shutdown -.- . . .

 

[Arutha]

Do these logfiles tell anything about the problem ?