Windows Crashing/Not loading...sometimes!

[Cyrus79]

Hi All,

First lets get the PC specs out of the way:

Windows XP Home SP2 fully updated
M2N32 WS PRO
AMD Athlon 5200 64 X2 Dual Core Socket AM2
2GB 800MHz DDR2 Corsair
Nvidia 7950GX2 1GB

PSU:
650 Watt Power Supply (Antec TruePower Trio, Model: TP3-650)
DC Output +5v +3.3v + 12v +12v +12v -12v +5vsb
Max 24amp 24amp 19amp 19amp 19A 0.8amp 3.0amp
Min 0.3amp 0.5amp 1amp 1amp 1amp 0amp 0amp
Total 650W

2 x HDD 1 = SATA 250GB & 1 = IDE 200GB
3 x DVD RW 2 SATA 1 IDE
9 in 1 Memory card slot

Since purchasing the 2 SATA dvd drive,well a few days afterward things started crashing and Windows took an age to bootup, so I figured Windows must be corrupted or the HDD it was installed on (in this case the old IDE drive) had become knackered.

I reinstalled Windows on the same drive at first, but again within an hour or so it started doing the same thing so I AGAIN reinstalled it but on the SATA drive.

Everything was fine for about a week until this weekend when the same symptoms came back!!!!

I've also tried swapping the memory still with the same results.

Is it likely to be that the PSU is not capable of handling so much hardware or could the mobo be on it's way out??

The reason I think PSU is that I have unplugged both the new SATA DVD drives and it seems to be working at present.

Any help would be most appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[lipe123]

Did u run a memtest86? most random crashes is memory related.

a 650W psu can handle ur rig easy, I have 6 sata drives 1 scisi drive and 2 optical's and only using a 500W. Unless the psu is faulty of course.

Turn off the auto reboot on crash to get an idea of what caused the crashes, right click "my computer" -> properties ->advanced "startup and recovery" settings button -> turn off "automatic restart"

 

[Cyrus79]

Hi thanks for the reply,

I haven't run Memtest86 I didn't have the time as it takes a fair while.

I forgot to mention, the crashes weren't auto reboot type crashes, they were complete lockups nothing would work so I would have to hard reboot.

Since removing the SATA DVD drives it has been fine and running extremely fast as it should.

I have since installed Asus PC Probe II which monitors voltage usage, temperature etc. Everthing is well within the default 10% threshold.

I can't really do much more testing at the moment since it's a friends PC and I won't see him again until Friday. I'm sure he'll let me know if it crashes again mind you.

I know this may be a bit far fetched, but could one of the SATA DVD drives have some sort of fault to cause such crashing?

 

[almcneil]

Are you using the latest drivers for your SATA DVD drives? It could be you're using the Windows default drivers and they're not optimized for the newer SATA DVD drives. Make sure you're using the latest drivers by the manufacturer.

 

[Cyrus79]

Hi,

I'll have to try that, I installed the SATA drivers that came on the motherboard disk so they may already be fairly up to date.

Cheers.