Dreadful Crashes Galore!

[aerograd]

Ok so I am new here to Horizons. I've been trying to get on before my free 14 day trial expires. However, I've had a rough time with some weird crashes, so I need some major computer guru help. This crash thing may not be totally tied to Horizons, but I have noticed that it happens every time I try to patch the game. Any help you all could provide would be greatly appreciated!

First off, here is what I can remember about my hardware on my home computer:

ASUS A7N8X Deluze MB - using onboard sound
AMD Athlon XP 2500+ (1.83 GHz) - never been overclocked at all
Maxtor 60 GB (I think) HD
Windows XP Pro
ATI Radeon 8500 64MB graphics card
512MB/1GB PC3200 Kingston RAM (wait... it's related to the problem possibly)
400 or 450 Watt Power Supply (forgot the brand) - new in 2004

Ok so here is the problem. For several weeks I've been getting these weird crashes. Some came while playing Star Wars Galaxies. Some came while my wife would be checking her e-mail or browsing the web. I'm not talking blue screen of death or exiting a program or even the screen locking up. I'm talking the program/computer freezes for a second, I hear the fan in the case going for a couple seconds, then bam! - the computer totally shuts off. Sometimes I can hit the power button to reboot right away, other times I have to physically unplug the power cord from the back of the computer and replug it to get it to boot. Sometimes, I have to wait several minutes for no apparent reason before it will allow me to power it up again.

My original self-diagnosis was a RAM problem. I had one 512 MB stick of PC3200 Samsung RAM at the time and I had noticed that it had failed a couple of power on self-test memory checks from time to time. I also downloaded MemTest and would try to let it run overnight, but every morning when I did the computer had crashed and shut itself off again.

So, I borrowed a friend's stick of 512MB PC2700 RAM and tested it. It seemed to work fine for over a week. So, I said OK must be the dumb RAM. So I bought two sticks of PC3200 512MB Kingston RAM and installed them in place of my friend's single RAM stick. The computer seemed to work fine for several days - no crashes.

Then I tried to install the game FreeWorld. During installation I got the same kind of stupid crash followed by a hard shut down of the computer. I rebooted and it seemed to work fine for me again... I was able to play FreeWorld for a few hours.

The computer didn't give me any more problems until I tried to installHorizons. While the Horizons patcher attempts to download and install the patch files (over 5000 of them!!) the computer again does the same crash/power off thing. It has crashed while attempting to patch each and every time I have run the patcher... so maybe 6-8 times now.

Two nights ago I tried patching Horizons again and it crashed same as the other times. After that I said screw it and tried playing another game - Ashen Empires (AE). 3 crashes while playing AE. So I decided to start playing with the RAM again. I moved the RAM to the #2 and #3 slots (rather than #1 and #2 where they had been before). Played a while then crash. I took the RAM out of #2 so was left with a 512MB stick in slot #3 and it seemed to do fine. Ok... making progress right? Maybe that one new stick had went bad right? So I ran MemTest on the one "good" stick all night (covered the RAM like 170 times over) with no errors.

Last night I tried patching Horizons yet again with the single stick that had appeared to be doing fine. Another crash. I said screw it again and played AE for an hour or two crash free. I ran MemTest again last night and it showed no errors this morning... computer was still up and running fine.

So what the heck is this computer's problem? What could be causing these brutalpower off crashes? I can't pinpoint it to a specific program since it has crashedwhile runningHorizons, Outlook, Internet Explorer, FreeWorld, Star Wars Galaxies, Ashen Empires, MemTest, etc. I don't know what to try next to diagnose this thing properly. Is there a more reliable way to test RAM - like do stores have devices that test them more accurately than MemTest?

Please help. This is really frustrating and is making my whole home computer time not fun at all. Thanks!

[AA0]

There are a few things that can cause this, so its tough to really pinpoint it.

Do you have temperature monitors running, or do you check your cpu and any other temps (video card)?
What are your RAM settings in the bios? too aggressive maybe?
Have you updated your pc with windows update? including .net framework for horizons
Direct X up to date?

It could also be a windows problem, it doesn't always give you a blue screen, sometimes it just goes down.

If you have one stick of ram with no errors, then it seems there is more of a temperature or software issue, if the pc hasn't crashed since you replaced a bad stick of ram in normal applications, then it could have to do with direct x. You didn't mention if it crashes on regular programs since you replaced the stick

[aerograd]

Thanks for the reply. Hereis some clarifying info to help out.

I do have temp monitors running using Motherboard Monitor (and ASUS probe sometimes). I turned off my page file on C: drive and defrag'd it and while it was doing that the temps were something like this (to the best of my memory): CPU = 46-47C, CPU diode = 57C, mobo = 35C. The default ASUS CPU Overheat Protection feature kicks in at 72C CPU temp. I don't think I have a video card temp monitor. How can I get that? I'll probably have to dig my video card documentation out of the attic I guess.

My RAM settings are at PC3200 standard settings I believe. I had a PC3200 stick before and didn't make any changes to the new ones unless the system autodetected and changed something on it's own. I have thought about turning the RAM settingsdown some and letting them run like PC2700 would, but I haven't found the tweak in BIOS to do that yet. Got any ideas?

My computer is set to update windows automatically, so all that should be up-to-date. I will double check though. The Horizons install said my version of DirectX was ok for Horizons. I updated .NET recently I thought, but I will check on that.

I have notnoticed the crashes occuring using any programs other than games or game-related things since I got the new RAM. The one that caused the first crash after getting the new RAM was FreeWorld. I am planning on uninstalling that tonight first thing. The Horizons patcher crashes every time I use it. Also, Ashen Empires crashed ~3 times one night after getting a crash from the Horizons patcher. To my knowledge no crashes have occured while using stuff like IE, Outlook, etc. since the new RAM was installed.

After uninstalling FreeWorld, I am going to see if the Horizons patcher still crashes. I'm going to monitor the temps & voltages while it's running to make sure those don't go wacko just before a crash. I have had the side of the case off since I took out the bad stick of RAM like two weeks ago, so it should be getting enough airflow right? If not, then perhaps I can point a small stand alone fan into the open case to help rule that possibility out.

Any other ideas are welcome. I will post my results of tonight's testing tomorrow. Thanks again for your help!

[UlteriorModem]

Did you recently install SP2 for windows XP ?


There are some known issues with it. Also might look into spyware / malware issues.

[aerograd]

Not sure when/if I installed SP2 for windows. I can double check on that though. Someone else suggested to check to spyware/malware/adware. I will try to do that tonight along with my other tasks. Thanks for the tip!

[UlteriorModem]

Well I noticed in your previous post you had autoupdate enabled which means most likely you do have SP2 installed.

The vast majority of users do nt haveproblems with the service pack. Some do.

I would be most suspicious of adware, spyware, malware at this time.

Good luck to you. Spyware can be quite insidious. I have seen some cases where the only proper solution was to wipe the machine and start from a fresh install. The very first thing (before connecting to the internet) to install would be your firewall.

The best defense is a good firewall and virus protection. But if you already have these unwanted procesess running its too late for them.

[Nikodemus]

My advice is that you try a different power supply.
There's a slim chance that it might be short of breaking apart.

If that doesn't help then at least you can rule it out.

As it has been mentioned before, check your temperatures.
Check if the fans in your pc are still operating.

If one of the power supply fans is broken then the heat may cause a thermal shutdown which would explain why you had to wait a little before it would work again.

[Tzael]

I'm going to side with Nikodemus on this one. My money's on an overheating problem if it's occuring during the patching of Horizons. The .Net patcher is notorious for sending CPU utilisation to 100%, whereas the old patcher doesn't exhibit this trait so is worth trying. With regards to your setup, I have a computer here that is almost identical in terms of motherboard, cpu, it's the one my wife uses for playing Horizons. Works like a dream (the A7N8X Deluxe is a nice board, so nice that I've got quite a few computers here with the A7N8X Deluxe or A7N8X-E Deluxe motherboard in them).

Use Asus Probe to check the cpu and motherboard temperatures, if it's an Asus graphics card then use Smart Doctor to check that it's ok too, otherwise use whatever utility your graphics card manufacturer has supplied to check the gpu and ram temps.

The other option that Nikodemus mentioned is the possibility that the power supply is playing up. It's possible, but more difficult to diagnose. Let us know how you get on with checking the system's health and if that draws us to a dead end then we can consider checking the voltage rails for the power supply.

Give the Horizons patcher another go, but when you're on the login site, uncheck the checkbox for the .Net patcher, that will make it revert to the old patcher which shouldn't put much stress on the computer - ie it won't overheat so quickly if there is a thermal problem.

Referring to some other things you were checking, specifically memory timings. You've got an Athlon 2500 in there, best you can hope for is to run the memory as PC2700 because you won't gain any performance (but will obtain instability) by running the CPU and memory asynchronously. Here's some links of use :

Quick guide to setting memory timings in BIOS :
http://support.asus.com/faq/faq_righ...Language=en-us
Warning about running cpu and memory out of sync :
http://support.asus.com/faq/faq_righ...Language=en-us
Link to A7N8X Deluxe motherboard manual for full information about BIOS settings :
http://dlsvr01.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...n8x_deluxe.zip

It's a nice motherboard, shame to hear you're having so many problems with it [:(]

[Orlac]

One simple solution to try would be turn off fast writes in your BIOS if they are on...the symptoms you describe may be due to that.

I can not play many games very long if fast write is on.

[Tzael]

Fast writes are absolutely fine for the A7N8X Deluxe motherboards, providing that the memory modules used are approved by Asus. Having said that, most memory should be ok, the ones on their approved lists are only the ones that memory manufacturers have sent Asus to be tested. AGP fast writes while slightly different again are fine with this motherboard, speaking from experience with a veriety of nVidia and Ati cards currently used in systems containing that motherboard.

If you're having problems with fast writes, I'd recommend that you increase the spread spectrums for AGP and the FSB since the symptoms you described are completely typical of unwanted EMI. The only way to address EMI is to remove the offending equipment or increase the spread spectrum.

[Kerik]

Did you apply your heatsink yourself?

Check it for any play what-so-ever.

We had about a dozen or so HPs come in here with shipping 'rough handling' that had cracked the mounting latchtes on the MB. Just enough wiggle room to break the seal.

The ones that made it to the floor were obvious, they'd run fine for a while - sometimes days - then the fans would go haywire, sounding like a 747 coming in for a landing and they'd sometimes power down.

Mis-application of your thermal compound could cause this as well as a poor installation of the heatsink.

Nine times out of ten, problems like this are power supply issues. I'd swap your memory out and test it at your friend's pc and see how that goes too. And, if you decide to buy a new one, buy a leading name brand and spend more than 65-75 bucks.. it will be well worth it.

[Tzael]

if you decide to buy a new one, buy a leading name brand and spend more than 65-75 bucks.. it will be well worth it.

You make it sound like the Asus A7N8X is something to be ashamed of ! Do a little research, the A7N8X series of boards have all won numerous awards for reliability, performance, value, and support [:)] They may not be desirable to you because of the relatively low cost, but in terms of the best Socket A motherboards out there right now, you'd be a fool if you didn't buy the current A7N8X-E Deluxe [:P]

[Cloe]

Since your friend is willing to let you trouble shoot with their ram perhaps they'dlet you try the video card. I had a dust clogged fan that wore out.. I know shame on me [:$] That only takes once. Anyway some of what you describe reminds me of what was happening before the graphic accleration gave up the ghost.

[Kerik]

If you re-read my post, I am talking about a power supply.