Repeated PC Crashes (This one is a doozy!)

[Asuke]

Alright, well, I've been reading posts on these forums the past day and a half, so I figure hey, let's give these guys a go, maybe they can see something I'm missing.

My hardware setup:
p4 3.2ghz, 1.5gb ram, ati radeon 9550 256MB(I believe it is made actually by ATI, since there are no distinguishing marks on the actual card, but I purchased it second-hand about a year ago, so I am not sure)
PSU: antec 300W
(let me know if I'm missing anything important...)

Alright, now here for the story:
I play an online game, Lineage II; and well, for the longest time I played, and I played fine, no problems, then one day I decided to reformat my computer to get rid of just the normal junk, no problems at all, just a "re-organization" reformat. So okay, reformat goes fine, all is good, I install drivers, good, good, but for some reason now in my game I cannot run it in high graphics or it lags to hell. I also notice something different reported in `dxdiag`, under the Display tab, AGP Texture Acceleration was now "Not Available", before was "Enabled". At this point I decide to mess around and install the latest graphics drivers in an attempt to fix this. I install drivers, yay, it's fixed, I can go into high graphics, but that night while I was sleeping, something must have happened... I wake up to my computer sitting at the windows logon screen. (I usually encounter this when windows update does new updates, but I had thought I turned them off...) Now for some reason at random intervals the PC black screens then reboots. (if I am watching it, the mouse, display lockup and then black screen, POST, and windows begins loading again) So I reformat (I needed to anyways, lots of spyware, and I've got enough hard drives to store all my personal files on anyways, so reformatting is simply copying 'my documents' and such to one of those and reformat), reinstall drivers, and bam... still the same issue.

I've even tried loading Omega drivers (I believe the ones I had before I got brave the night before). But now no matter what drivers I use, windows still crashes randomly/immediately when I try to load my game.

Now I KNOW my system runs >HOT< (it always has, even when I first built the system), it runs anywhere from 49C to 63C. But I do not believe this is an issue, since I always keep my system clear of dust and that it has adequate airflow. So I don't think my issue is heat.

My powersupply is 300W, I found a website that adds up the component Wattage in computers and it recomended me 396W, but uhh... It ran fine for 3 years NO PROBLEMS, so I don't think my issue is the powersupply.

Let's see... video card! ah! the video card... I've also got an ATI Radeon 9200 128MB I have in an MCE computer, so I decided I'd give that a go, and well, it >STILL< crashed, so it's probably not the video card. (I think it might just be drivers, but now there's more issues).

Memory... well, I've got 2 sticks of 512MB and 2 sticks of 256MB, I took out all but one of the 512MB sticks, booted up, and the system still crashes. I then took that stick out and placed the other 512MB stick in, again... still crashes. I then did the same with the 256MB sticks and again, still crashing.
(UPDATE: memtest just finished, PASS1 FAIL0 ERROR0, now I know bad memory can pass the tests, but I still don't think this is my problem)

Motherboard/CPU: ....no

Okay, now... I set windows to "not automatically reboot" on errors, and it shows the BSOD screen, and produces a STOP error at 0x000000F, which according to what I read is due to failed(-ing) hardware/mismatched memory/failing motherboard.

I can produce minidump logfiles if needed.

 

[alidabiri]

take out all your memory sticks and install them one by one to find the bad one. it seems that one of your memory sticks doesn't match the rest.

 

[Asuke]

I have not changed anything lately but the drivers for about 8 months, and before that everything worked, so basically, up until I got brave 2 days ago and decided to change drivers, it all worked perfect, no crashes, no BSOD's, nada.

From my original post:
Memory... well, I've got 2 sticks of 512MB and 2 sticks of 256MB, I took out all but one of the 512MB sticks, booted up, and the system still crashes. I then took that stick out and placed the other 512MB stick in, again... still crashes. I then did the same with the 256MB sticks and again, still crashing.
(UPDATE: memtest just finished, PASS1 FAIL0 ERROR0, now I know bad memory can pass the tests, but I still don't think this is my problem)

I also have done this already.


Edit:
I thought I might also add a few more items on my system config:
motherboard: ASUS P4P800-E Deluxe
OS: Windows XP Professional (crashes on SP1, and still after SP2 install)
the RAM is mixed speeds (i know, not so good for performance, but it works so hey), but up until now I have had no problems with anything:
256MB PC2100
256MB PC2100
512MB PC2700
512MB PC2700

 

[alidabiri]

..... up until I got brave 2 days ago and decided to change drivers, it all worked perfect, no crashes, no BSOD's, nada.

get rid of the driver(s) that you installed. or go back to last knows good configuration or do a system restore to the date the machine worked fine.

 

[Asuke]

get rid of the driver(s) that you installed. or go back to last knows good configuration or do a system restore to the date the machine worked fine.

I reformatted, so these really isn't an option for me. As for the drivers I used before, well, I will take a look at that, I'm sure I have an old copy of them somewhere on one of my drives.

System restore won't work... I reformatted.
"Last known good configuration" won't work.... reformatted, so...
drivers I used before MIGHT work, BUT, if i uninstall all ATI/Omega drivers and even use a driver cleaning utility, It still crashes when windows uses default vga drivers.

Thank you guys for replying, but like the title says, it's a doozy.
I've already tried most everything I can think of (I used to be a technician at a little computer store, fixing/repairing/building, so I know my share of computer hardware troubleshoots, but oh my god... this is just plain retarded.)

 

[alidabiri]

It still crashes when windows uses default vga drivers.

this tells you that theres a problem with graphic board(s). the mobo may have built-in vieo and another video card might be causing a clash with that one.
does this have a built in video?

 

[Asuke]

this tells you that theres a problem with graphic board(s). the mobo may have built-in vieo and another video card might be causing a clash with that one.
does this have a built in video?

Nope! No onboard video.

 

[Asuke]

I'm going to reformat again, maybe dig up the old video card drivers I used before I got brave (the older omega drivers). I'm out of ideas at this point, so really anything is a step forward.

 

[Asuke]

Wow... well, I'm now thinking it is my motherboard. After reinstaling windows, it hangs, and restarts randomly, just like before, so it's either the memory or the motherboard (in my opinion at least), but I'm leaning more towards the motherboard.

Please post any replies if you think otherwise!