Hardware & Technical PC hangs the moment any game starts

Neutronium

Neutronium
The title should be self explanatory.

Running Nvidia surround on 3 TVs (5760x1080px60Hz) (not 3d - just plain surround)
Latest Nvidia drivers 368.81
Windows 7x64 with SP1
Nvidia GTX-780 6gb DDR5 ASUS stryx GPU (relatively new - bought spring 2015)
2 x SSDs (RAID0) total size ~800 GB OS volume (programs + games) (New - bought early 2016)
2 x Normal 7200 (RAID1) 2TB (Mirror RAID) for backups
Intel core-i7 970 6 core @ 3.2GHz (Old ~ 2012 )
ASUS P6T Deluxe V2 X58 chipset (Old - bought ~2010 - 2012)
12 GB DDR3 1333 RAM (6x2GB DIMMS mixed old and new but of the same brand, type and frequency)
1200 WATT PSU (Corsair) (Newest component)

The PC hangs during ship spinning (ED loading screen) or the very moment the cockpit of the ship becomes visible (but usually during ship spinning). This is the case for another space sim program I often use: Space Engine (see signature). The PC then appears to restart (fan noise levels rise) but it remains black (all three TVs - no signal). I have to hard shut down and restart. Then it brings up a message that overclocking has failed and asks to enter BIOS setup to reset to default but I never do overclocking. Anyway then it brings up the message that windows was not shut down properly and if I want to restart in safe mode, etc... I select normal and restart to dekstop usually with no problem. However lately it got worse: If I choose to Normal load windows it brings up a message that windows system files may be damaged and offers option to repair windows. I select that and it does its thing - wait and either asks for a system restore or restarts and loads into windows OK (afetr 1-2 more restarts). then I observe that the RAID 1 volume (the mirror raid with the 2 2GB conventional HDDs) is being rebuild. This is something that happens ALWAYS after the hang. It doesn;t make sense as the OS is loaded on the RAID 0 SSDs volume so it is installed on physically different disks.

Anyway after the many restarts, I select to play and if it doesn't hang again I can play for hours with no issue.. I check tempretarues and voltages and it all appears OK during gameplay.

I opened the PC case and removed as much of the dust as possible by blowing air. For a while it stopped doing it but then it started again. And with increasing frequency. I've run out of ideas any help is appreciated.
 

winterknight

W
With the symptoms you describe I would start to suspect the motherboard, or the BIOS chip(s) and battery. Therefore my first step would be to replace the BIOS battery with a new one. Preferably bought from a reliable supplier, and if possible checking the date of manufacture.

I would also contemplate doing a BIOS update.

Also do a physical check of the motherboard voltage regulators and their capacitors. If these are oldish type, they sometimes bulge which shows they are effective beyond their use by date.

P.S. I suspect that mobo is at best 2010, googling suggests introduction early 2009. [edit] Don't try Win 10 update without checking the ASUS site there is apparently a full listing somewhere of compatibility.
 
Last edited:

Neutronium

Neutronium
winterknight said:
With the symptoms you describe I would start to suspect the motherboard, or the BIOS chip(s) and battery. Therefore my first step would be to replace the BIOS battery with a new one. Preferably bought from a reliable supplier, and if possible checking the date of manufacture.

I would also contemplate doing a BIOS update.

Also do a physical check of the motherboard voltage regulators and their capacitors. If these are oldish type, they sometimes bulge which shows they are effective beyond their use by date.

P.S. I suspect that mobo is at best 2010, googling suggests introduction early 2009. [edit] Don't try Win 10 update without checking the ASUS site there is apparently a full listing somewhere of compatibility.
Click to expand...

Yes the motherboard is the oldest component.. If it is the Motherboard - I am in a really bad situation. There are no LGA 1366 boards in the market any more. This means Motherboard + CPU must be replaced. Possibly the RAM as well. At least 500 Euros (if I want to go 6 core ~ 1000 Euros at least) which I don't have [sad] .

Yesterday I did a windows memory diagnostics check. No problems there. Then I downloaded sandra and started doing a burn-in test. But I had to stop it because I was too tired and wanted to go to bed. I will try again later today. But it managed to finish the CPU arithmetic, multimedia and another CPU test one with no problems or hangs. So that is promising but perplexing as well. Anyway I am going vacation tomorrow and will return in 2 weeks so troubleshooting will have to be postponed until then.

PS: Definitely not updating to Win10 here. No win10 ASUS sepcific drivers for this mobo have been released but I wasn't going to update anyway..

Thanks for the advice.
 

MickyG1982

M
I'm going to put it out there.

There are some massive advantages to a full clean install of Windows every now and again rather than changing out too many components. Yes it is a ball ache, as you will have to go through the effort or reinstalling games and updates etc but it does thoroughly clean the system of any malware that may have been installed.

Other things to consider:

Take the heat sink off the cpu clean it and the processor, then reapply the thermal compound.

Try various graphics drivers (I'd start with rolling back to the recommended driver for SLI a link to which can be found in the knowledge base).

Try playing the game on a single screen and see if that stops the black screen from occurring. The black screen and crash could be a direct result of the resolution and graphics settings you are using and 3 screens is pushing a single 780 just too hard without dropping some of the other settings.
 

winterknight

W
If it is the Motherboard - I am in a really bad situation
Know how that feels, I have two perfectly good retested, Core2 Quads and memory but no motherboards anymore.
It was on one of these I had similar problems to yours, it looked like the BIOS was not saving settings and that was helped for about 3 months with a new battery, but after a while had problems booting or running programs as soon as possible. At that point it would work if I let it settle down for about 15 mins but then one morning it failed completely. Took components down to sons and they tested fine, the mobo was dead.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom