Crash... complete crash....heeeeeelp

[littleredrooster]

1. If you haven't wiped and re-installed your Operating System, get a copy of Norton Utilities and de-scramble your registry by running Windoctor.

2. Are you running any Anti-Virus software? If so, try disabling it temporarily to see if this makes any difference - be careful which sites you visit, though! If it's McAfee, be aware that there is a hotfix for the 4160 engine on Win98; without this it will lock-up intermittently.

3. After booting, do alt-ctrl-del to bring up the Task Manager and see what is running - close all except explorer and see if it's a rogue process that is giving you grief. Some internet sites download some absolute rubbish on to your machine and have them running in the background all the time.

4. Disable any screen savers and power save schemes, remove the wallpaper, especially if it is of the Webshots variety - some of these can be troublesome and consume huge resources.

5. If it does it again, give us more details - like does the mouse pointer still move; can you do alt-ctrl-del and get the task manager, can you do [windows-key - M] to minimise all windows; does it do it with one particular program; does it do it when you're connected (could be the modem).

Keep us posted!

 

[(RIP) willstatt]

More help

1. If you haven't wiped and re-installed your Operating System, get a copy of Norton Utilities and de-scramble your registry by running Windoctor.
**** I have wiped and re-installed****

2. Are you running any Anti-Virus software? If so, try disabling it temporarily to see if this makes any difference - be careful which sites you visit, though! If it's McAfee, be aware that there is a hotfix for the 4160 engine on Win98; without this it will lock-up intermittently.
****No antivirus running or installed****

3. After booting, do alt-ctrl-del to bring up the Task Manager and see what is running - close all except explorer and see if it's a rogue process that is giving you grief. Some internet sites download some absolute rubbish on to your machine and have them running in the background all the time.
****have not connected to internet since wiping/reinstalling****

4. Disable any screen savers and power save schemes, remove the wallpaper, especially if it is of the Webshots variety - some of these can be troublesome and consume huge resources.
****haven't tried this, but PC had always run ok before with alsorts of biking related screensavers etc!****

5. If it does it again, give us more details - like does the mouse pointer still move; can you do alt-ctrl-del and get the task manager, can you do [windows-key - M] to minimise all windows; does it do it with one particular program; does it do it when you're connected (could be the modem).
****when it happens, EVERYTHING is frozen... no mouse pointer movement; ctrl/alt/del doesn't work, I just have a frozen screen of whatever happened to be there at the time, and it has happened in many different programmes, some offline, some on!****

 

[cookie]

just a thought, have you got an older pc, upgraded with modern graphics card (gf3/4) or similar? maybe 2nd hard drive added?

if so are you still using old weedy psu? symptoms you describe are typical of failing psu.

if you've reinstalled & get identical problem it points to hardware problem i'd say.

 

[(RIP) willstatt]

Not that old

No, it's not that old....... about 4 years, and still in as supplied spec (Time) It's actually been v good performance, trouble-free machine till this problem. Yes, as you say... it's certainly a hardware problem....... but which bit!?

 

[cookie]

my money would be on a psu problem or possibly a heat related issue, but please bear in mind i'm no expert, but have sorted a few pc's including 1 that had this problem.

i now have a similar freezing problem on another of my pc's at the mo. it freezes within about 20 mins of switching on. no need to even touch it. re boot & it never freezes again 'til it's been rebooted a couple more times. this is what i plan to do with it, working on the "easiest things first" principal. maybe it will help you:

get the memory testing prog from www.simmtester.com & run that.

reseat all componants back in their slots on the motherboard (observe basic static precautions ie. touch an earth before anything inside pc). remove cpu heatsink & re-fit with new heatsink compound, after removing the manufacturers seating pad & cleaning with carb cleaner (yes, really).
i've done both of the above (memory passed), and am waiting to see if any improvement is apparent. not crashed yet, but i've not run it much.

still on the heat thing. run pc with cover off. this should make it run cooler. a desk fan directly on MB might be an idea too. heat would be more of an issue with AMD cpu than Intel i think BTW.

try a different (latest) graphics card driver.

try a different graphics card. fortunately i have a spare.

buy a new PSU. Q-Tek 550w about £30.

strip bits out of pc until i have bare minimum of componants ie. no network card, soundcard etc. just graphics. try that. if stable reinstall one by one til troublemaker is found.

reinstall windows xp. i don't think this is my prob as it did it with 98 too, but hey, i'm desperate now

give up & buy new MB,CPU & RAM and kid myself i wanted a faster pc anyhow

hope some of that helps. this sort of prob can be a total bastard to solve. took me 6 months last time. maybe i shouldn't have told you that?

 

[(RIP) willstatt]

Motherboards and CPU's

Ok, so I'm going to buy both a new motherboard and a new CPU. But how do I know what to buy? I've got CD-RW/DVD/two hard disks/3/5" floppy and all the other normal stuff.... How do I know that a new M'board will be compatible? I think it's an ATX board.

The current dodgy one, is what was fitted in the original 'Time' PC and has an AMD k6 in it

What should I go for now without breaking the bank


Suggestions please!

 

[Paul G (BHT)]

A ha.... a Time PC that explains all the problems

AMD Athlon 2.0ghz processor approx £70 and any decent Mother Board £60'ish that accepts the AMD chip.

The CD-RW/DVD/two hard disks/3/5" floppy and all the other normal stuff will plug straight in.

Just a thought, most Time PC's have onboard graphics cards which means you will need to buy one of these too £35 for a 64meg card.

 

[(RIP) willstatt]

In Debt to again

In debt to you again Paul.... I'm gonna order what you suggest! Yes you're right, there isn't a separate graphics card... so I'll get one of those too.

Just another couple of probably stupid tech questions:

In the case of things like the CD drive.... there's the normal power and data cable, and then another little wire that goes to the mother board.

The 'on' switch also goes onto the motherboard, rather than to the psu, which I expected?

Will it be the same as above with the new 'stuff', and will it be obvious to someone like me, where everything plugs in? And will the motherboard come with software to install it??? And? and? and? Sorry!

My 'Time' machine has been pretty good though, till now. Bought it in '99, and it's had pretty substantial use, and never really given any problems, so maybe I've been lucky?


Will

 

[Paul G (BHT)]

Re: In Debt to again

In the case of things like the CD drive.... there's the normal power and data cable, and then another little wire that goes to the mother board.

Forgot about that, the Time PC also has on-board sound so you'll need to buy a sound card too... from about £10 up.

The 'on' switch also goes onto the motherboard, rather than to the psu, which I expected?

Will it be the same as above with the new 'stuff', and will it be obvious to someone like me, where everything plugs in? And will the motherboard come with software to install it??? And? and? and? Sorry!

yes, yes.....and yes, just make sure you plug the small s/w, reset, HDD, spkr etc wires onto the new board correctly

My 'Time' machine has been pretty good though, till now. Bought it in '99, and it's had pretty substantial use, and never really given any problems, so maybe I've been lucky?

You've been lucky

 

[cookie]

this is spec i was looking to build for a friend:

Case Nokia style midi case 26.14
CPU AMD Duron 1.3Ghz Processor 31.15
Cooler Icicle 765 Cooler 4.61
Motherboard MSI 6378 Mainboard 49.33
Graphics Card On Board
Soundcard On Board
Memory 256Mb PC133 Crucial SDRAM 19.79
HDD 30Gb 49.24
CDROM Philips CDRW 22.51
Floppy Drive 7.71
Modem 56k Speedcom+ Rockwell Int PCI 10.99
Operating System Windows XP Home 85.00

sorry it's all over the place but i cut & pasted it from Excell

you can pick bits you need.

MB has onboard sound & graphics. will be fine if you don't play games.

you will have to reinstall operating system if you swap motherboards (probably). do yourself a favour & get xp (PM me).

 

[cookie]

above board will accept athlon cpu if you need more umph.

if you do want athlon cpu, you will need pc2100 DDR memory.

if you're just surfing/emailing/home office type stuff you won't need seperate athlon/graphic/sound cards.

if you want to play modern pc games at all, i'd advise a totally different, & hugely more expensive spec.

ditto video editing.