OT: PC's going bad...but which part??

MyST wrote on 1/2/2004, 1:43 PM
Hi,

Here's a list of things that have happened recently that makes me think something's about to die.

- I've had a couple error mssgs today where Acid had to close down. Also getting error mssgs when saving or opening a file in Acid.
- I had a couple mssgs today that Win XP had to close down because of a serious error. Windows was making me shut down/reboot to save my PC.
- I can no longer perform a "disk clean". It starts compressing the files and stalls at about 1/5th it's task. Chkdsk and defrag both perform OK. If I cntr-alt-dlt while it's disk cleaning, the graph shows the CPU at 100% usage.
- It's happened a few times in the past months that the hard-drives are not detected when booting up. If I reboot, they're detected and everything's fine.

When the error occured, Windows asked me if I wanted to send the info. I answered yes. That took me to a page that mentioned that it might be a driver.
Thing is I haven't change anything in the last few days.

Forgive me if some of the terms aren't correct, I'm using WinXP Home French edition.

I'm thinking the mobo might be going(isn't that where the controller for the drives is? Forgive my ignorance). That would explain the random undetected drives when booting up. Also might explain the error mssgs when opening or saving Acid.

AMD Athlon 850Mhz T-Bird
Chaintach motherboard 7AJA (Via chipset)
512 SDRAM
Window XP Home with all critical updates installed
20 Gig Maxtor system hard-drive
40 Gig Quantum media hard-drive
Echo Mia soundcard
ATI 7500 Radeon videocard

I haven't tried an XP reinstall yet, mostly because of my inexperience in doing so.

Any and all help greatly appreciated.

Thanks

M

Comments

Yoyodyne wrote on 1/2/2004, 2:18 PM
hmmm - boy that doesn't sound good.

First off, back up your data! (if you haven't already) The second thing I'd do is get a drive test utility and check those hard drives, my bet is that your system hard drive is going bad. Go to the maxtor and quantum site & they should have some sort of drive test thing. Download it, run it & see what it says.

good luck!
shawnm wrote on 1/2/2004, 2:19 PM
Hi Myst, two questions - is your drive recognized in the BIOS and is it starting to make any noises that you haven't noticed before?

Thanks ,

Shawn
craftech wrote on 1/2/2004, 2:34 PM
1. Are your hard drives down to 15% or less? If so, eliminate some stuff.

2. To solve the problem where Disk Cleanup fails to complete the "compress
old files" option, go to Start/Run/Regedit and navigate to this key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Volume
Caches\Compress Old Files

Remove all the keys under "Compress old files" to get this cleanup
program to run to completion.

alternatively, try disk cleanup in "Safe Mode".

3. With that particular mainboard there have been some issues with the ram sockets. Get a magnifier and reseat them. Make sure that they are firmly inserted. May require some effort. They should also match one another. The board is fussy about it's ram as well as having poorly manufactured ram sockets.

John

MyST wrote on 1/2/2004, 4:32 PM
John... You Da Mann!! :)

My Disk Cleanup is up and running again now that I cleaned the registry.

My system drive is at 31%.
I had tried cleaning in safe mode but still stalled.
I'll check the RAM to make sure it's properly seated. That being said though, I always see the proper 512 in my system properties when I check there.

Another thing that I just checked that maybe influenced all this, is that I have a USB Sandisk card reader for my digital camera. When I checked out my System properties, under Hard-Drives, my USB Sandisk was listed BEFORE the Maxtor and the Quantum. Could that have had something to do with it?

Thanks all for the suggestions.

Shawn... Both drives are listed in the BIOS and no unusual sounds lately.
Yoyodyne...I'll check out the utilities for the hard drives.
I was thinking along the lines of the motherboard since both drives aren't detected at boot-up sometimes, not just one or the other.

Any other ideas?

M
RexA wrote on 1/2/2004, 4:49 PM
>> Any other ideas?

Make sure you don't have overheating due to clogged filters or dust accumulation. Make sure fans are all working, including in the power supply.

While you have the box open, you might look for signs of bad capacitors. In the last few weeks Tor started a big thread where he had the problem on his motherboard.

This link Capacitor Problem
has pictures and descriptions.
MyST wrote on 1/2/2004, 5:07 PM
Thanks Rex, I'll check that out.

I have an update...
I was just now working in Acid and when minimizing, I got this error,

Sony ACID Pro 4.0
Version 4.0f (Build 446)
Exception 0xC0000005 (access violation) READ:0x10 IP:0x11D449A
In Module 'acid40k.dll' at Address 0x1000000 + 0x1D449A
Thread: GUI ID=0x270 Stack=0x12F000-0x130000
Registers:
EAX=00000002 CS=001b EIP=011d449a EFLGS=00010246
EBX=00000000 SS=0023 ESP=0012f63c EBP=032eb008
ECX=002062d8 DS=0023 ESI=00000000 FS=0038
EDX=001fd470 ES=0023 EDI=0022e1e4 GS=0000
Bytes at CS:EIP:
011D449A: F6 46 10 04 74 09 B8 05 .F..t...
011D44A2: 00 07 80 5E C2 0C 00 8B ...^....
Stack Dump:
0012F63C: 00000000
0012F640: 0119A3A8 01000000 + 19A3A8 (acid40k.dll)
0012F644: 002062D8 00140000 + C62D8
0012F648: 00000000
0012F64C: 00004000
0012F650: 00000000
0012F654: 00000000
0012F658: 000003C4
0012F65C: 031F7F78 030F0000 + 107F78
0012F660: 0119A456 01000000 + 19A456 (acid40k.dll)
0012F664: 002062D8 00140000 + C62D8
0012F668: 0009B780 00030000 + 6B780
0012F66C: 00000000
0012F670: 032EB008 030F0000 + 1FB008
0012F674: 00000000
0012F678: 032EB008 030F0000 + 1FB008
> 0012F67C: 0119970C 01000000 + 19970C (acid40k.dll)
0012F680: 002062D8 00140000 + C62D8
0012F684: 000003C4
0012F688: 00000000
0012F68C: 0009B780 00030000 + 6B780
> 0012F69C: 011D48E4 01000000 + 1D48E4 (acid40k.dll)
0012F6A0: 002062D8 00140000 + C62D8
0012F6A4: 000003C4
0012F6A8: 0022DF98 00140000 + EDF98
0012F6AC: 00000000
> 0012F6C0: 011D4690 01000000 + 1D4690 (acid40k.dll)
0012F6C4: 04B8BF90 04AF0000 + 9BF90
0012F6C8: 031F7F78 030F0000 + 107F78
0012F6CC: 0012F6F4 00030000 + FF6F4
> 0012F6D0: 76AE2271 76AE0000 + 2271 (WINMM.dll)
> 0012F6F0: 76AF76AB 76AE0000 + 176AB (WINMM.dll)
> 0012F6F8: 6BD01645 6BD00000 + 1645 (usbmn1x1.dll) <<<<<<<<<
> 0012F6FC: 011D4690 01000000 + 1D4690 (acid40k.dll)
- - -
0012FFF0: 00000000
0012FFF4: 00000000
0012FFF8: 005F356A 00400000 + 1F356A (acid40.exe)
0012FFFC: 00000000

Notice the usbmn1x1.dll near the end. That would probably be my USB M-Audio Uno for my midi keyboard. I've unplugged it and I'll look for the latest drivers for XP.
I've heard M-Audio sound card drivers sometimes don't get along with Via chipsets, maybe the Uno driver is also problematic.

Thanks all...
I'll check out the thread.

M
johnmeyer wrote on 1/2/2004, 5:37 PM
Two things to suggest, in this order:

1. Run Scandisk. If a file is corrupt, this will find it. (Right click on the drive, and select Properties and then Tools).

2. If you have System Restore enabled, this is the time to use it. (Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> System ). This feature lets you return your system's software to an earlier date. Be aware that any data stored on this drive prior to the restore point may disappear. Good idea to backup data before proceeding (although the System Restore process is reversable). I'd recommend going to the earliest restore point and then running your system for awhile to see if the problem goes away.
craftech wrote on 1/2/2004, 7:40 PM
MOre things to try:
1. You mentioned an Echo Mia then M-Audio later. Which do you have?
If you installed an Echo Mia and removed an M-Audio card, you need an uninstaller to completely remove the M-Audio drivers. Also the Echo Mia cannot share an IRQ with an ethernet card. It should have it's own IRQ.
Did you disable the onboard sound in the bios?


2. VIA has lots of problems with AGP driver and 4X AGP. Switch to AGP 2X and also try switching memory timing from 2 to 3.

3. Which bios revision do you have?

4. Try uninstalling and then reinstalling the VIA drivers.

5. To my knowledge that board was not one of the ones which had bad capacitors.

John
MyST wrote on 1/2/2004, 7:58 PM
John, thanks again.

I'll check those out, but in the meantime to clarify...

I have the Echo Mia sound card. However, the Mia doesn't have midi input, so I purchased an M-Audio UNO usb device to plug-in my midi keyboard. Basically, you plug the keyboard into the UNO and the UNO into the USB input on the PC.
I tried unplugging the UNO for now to see if that helps. If it does, I guess I'll have to plug it in when in use only and unplug when not being used.

M
craftech wrote on 1/4/2004, 6:36 AM
MyST,
Do you have the latest driver for the UNO? It is dated December 18 and includes improvements in Windows XP performance:



Uno December 18, 2003 Version 4.1.20 2.47 MB Uno_1020.exe

Release Notes Windows 2000,Windows 98 SE,Windows ME,Windows XP

Windows 2000,Windows 98 SE,Windows ME,Windows XP

Now include Driver Installer application.

Updates:
- Multi-Device Support Updated
- Window XP Support Improved

Updated Manual with new install "How-To" available on the manual download page.


John

MyST wrote on 1/4/2004, 8:54 AM
Well, it hasn't crashed since I've unplugged the UNO, so my guess is a conflict between the UNO and the Via chipset.

I tried installing the new driver for the UNO but Windows keeps trying to overwrite it. How do I force Windows to accept the Dec 18th driver? When rebooting Windows keeps showing the "new device detected" message unless I install the Windows driver for it.

M
craftech wrote on 1/4/2004, 2:01 PM
Disconnect the cable between the computer and USB device at either end.
Wait a few minutes. Remove the UNO driver. Shut down the machine
and power off. Wait a minute and restart. Install the UNO driver
with the device not connected. After installing the software, turn
the device on and connect the USB cable. It should install properly.

John