Hello,
I have been experiencing system lock ups recently, and cannot seem to put my finger on the cause. My first guess was that the CPU might've been damaged, because rather stupidly I didn't reapply thermal paste when I swapped my mobo. It was the first time I had swapped a mobo, and simply didn't use any out of ignorance ( I know, bad move! ). I did eventually add some paste when I realised it's importance, but I fear that it might've been too late.
Now, If I have damaged my cpu, I guess i'll have to invest in another, but the only thing is I don't really want to fork out another hundred quid if I am not absolutely certain that is the problem. I have tried swapping the ram for some other sticks but to no avail. I even did a full system format and reinstalled windows XP, which did 'half-solve' the issue. My computer used to freeze up more frequently, but now it only tends to do it when 1) i'm playing a high performance game, or 2) Surfing on the net, generally when moving images are involved. It does occasionally seem to freeze 'randomly' though, when nothing much is happening CPU-wise.
I have tried running various CPU stress tests, including Prime95, which I ran for almost a full day without any crashes (Until I stopped it manually). I'm not sure on the accuracy of these tests, as I'm no expert here, but I read somewhere that if the program runs ok, then generally the CPU is fine? When searching on google i've found symptoms that sound like mine, but regarding power supply issues. The thing with that is, I don't see why my system would have run fine for a month, and then started to act funny if it was the power supply. Don't think it's a heating problem either as the comp runs at a pretty safe level as far as I can see. The only cause that makes sense to me, is that it is a damaged CPU due to the fact that I did not protect it with thermal paste, but as I say, i'm not expert!
If anybody knows of any way of finding out if a CPU is damaged could you let me know please.
Thanks in advance.
System Specs :
Windows XP Pro
Gigabyte P35C-DS3R Mobo
Quad Core Q6600 Intel CPU
8800 GT
2gb Ram
I have been experiencing system lock ups recently, and cannot seem to put my finger on the cause. My first guess was that the CPU might've been damaged, because rather stupidly I didn't reapply thermal paste when I swapped my mobo. It was the first time I had swapped a mobo, and simply didn't use any out of ignorance ( I know, bad move! ). I did eventually add some paste when I realised it's importance, but I fear that it might've been too late.
Now, If I have damaged my cpu, I guess i'll have to invest in another, but the only thing is I don't really want to fork out another hundred quid if I am not absolutely certain that is the problem. I have tried swapping the ram for some other sticks but to no avail. I even did a full system format and reinstalled windows XP, which did 'half-solve' the issue. My computer used to freeze up more frequently, but now it only tends to do it when 1) i'm playing a high performance game, or 2) Surfing on the net, generally when moving images are involved. It does occasionally seem to freeze 'randomly' though, when nothing much is happening CPU-wise.
I have tried running various CPU stress tests, including Prime95, which I ran for almost a full day without any crashes (Until I stopped it manually). I'm not sure on the accuracy of these tests, as I'm no expert here, but I read somewhere that if the program runs ok, then generally the CPU is fine? When searching on google i've found symptoms that sound like mine, but regarding power supply issues. The thing with that is, I don't see why my system would have run fine for a month, and then started to act funny if it was the power supply. Don't think it's a heating problem either as the comp runs at a pretty safe level as far as I can see. The only cause that makes sense to me, is that it is a damaged CPU due to the fact that I did not protect it with thermal paste, but as I say, i'm not expert!
If anybody knows of any way of finding out if a CPU is damaged could you let me know please.
Thanks in advance.
System Specs :
Windows XP Pro
Gigabyte P35C-DS3R Mobo
Quad Core Q6600 Intel CPU
8800 GT
2gb Ram
