Computer Freezing may be VPU problem

T

TrogdorTB001

New Member
Hey, I just recently(a day ago) finished building my new computer. I am not the smartest person when it comes to the terminology of computers, but im sure that I put everything together right.

When I installed windows XP, everything went fine. Then I booted up my computer, and after a little while, it just froze. I rebooted, and again, after a little while, it just froze.

I have lasted for a while on my computer without freezing, but it eventually just does it, and it is really annoying me. A couple of times it froze, but I got a message from my video card( ATI Radeon X800GTO), saying that it has restarted my VPU, then everything is fine until a little while after, it freezes again and it doesnt automatically reset the VPU.

This must be some sort of Video card problem, but i really dont have a clue. Thank you very much.
 
sry never heard that problem before. it does sound like a video card problem though. when it freezes what are you doing? (games, internet, word processing, etc.)
 
The message about restarting the VPU is ATI's VPU recovery tool going to work to restore the desktop. It shows that the card is doing what it is supposed to. I suspect a possible bad dimm if you have more then one installed would see system locks or your bios needs an update.
 
Well when it freezes I can be doing anything. I can be playing a game, surfing the internet, just doin stuff on the desktop, and i will freeze.

I may talk to newegg and see if i can get a replacement card.
 
What board and cpu are you running? Often the advice given when seeing problems on a new build is to update the bios. Recently when reinstalling Windows on a drive due to disk failure errors seen it turned out that the drive wasn't a problem there. Right when you reached the desktop everything locked solid! When backing the memory timings down a notch the system suddenly ran like nothing ever happened. The old board was the problem despite seeing some 573 errors when testing the memory still in use in the new build with 0% errors seen there. It could be something overheating too.
 
StrangleHold said:
Did you update your chipset drivers
Click to expand...

The question should be if he installed the SMBus as well as memory controllers drivers found on the mother board cd. If Windows, video, sound, and softwares was all that was installed after assembly that will cause problems.
 
The motherboard is ASRock AMD SLi-SATA2

My CPU is AMD X2 3800+.

I bought the board a few months before the CPU and GPU, due to money shortage :P

I dont know what SMbus is, and I couldnt find any memory controller drivers on my boards cd.
 
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XP would have asked for drivers when the initial installation was taking place. If you simply decided to wait until later those may not have gone in. But a quick look in the device manager will let you there if you see any yellow marks on anything there. You would simply choose the automatic search for an update to see if Windows will download what is needed from the XP data base. The main installer on the cd should see the drivers put in as well. The SMbus is an abbreviation for System Management. The drivers on the board's cd won't be individually named for what they are for. Windows will id them when the disk is browsed when choosing the manual method to search the disk. You browse into the driver folder for the XP or 2000, XP folder.
 
hmm well, i dont see an automatic update for my device manager, but i browsed inside my motherboard cd, and i reinstalled everything, but im still having this problem.

Im very sorry that i dont know a lot of this stuff, as this is my first complete built computer, but i thank you for your time, and for having patience.
 
In the Device Manager you look for any items with a yellow exclaimation mark next to them. Often those are found under the "other devices" heading for unidentified hardwares needing drivers. You should also SATA/RAID as one of the items. By right clicking on those you can choose the "Let Windows install software automatically" option to have XP search online for the correct drivers needed. If that fails you then go to the manufacturer's support site or see if your model is listed at http://www.techspot.com/drivers/driver/file/category/2/
 
hmm,

I was playing a game earlier today, and all of a sudden it froze up. I proceeded to exit out, try to start it back up, and it wouldnt. I then tried starting up any and all of the games i had installed on my computer, and they didnt work. I have come to the conclusion that the graphics card is the problem, and i am exchanging it.
 
What if any antivirus programs do you have running? Many games have problems with antivirus software running in the background. Here even AVG is disabled from starting along with Windows. You can also use the msconfig to remove other stuff from loading automatically when starting the system. Hopefully it will turn out to be a simple software problem then hardware issue. If your card had a problem you would known that sooner.
 
jeez i dont know what to do...

ill just send my x800 back, and get somethin like a 7600gt

thanks for your time everyone
 
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Just remember games are softwares. If you are running something in the background causing a driver clash of some type swapping cards may be futile. Making sure the correct drivers are in or removing the current ones for a fresh update can often correct a few problems. Everyone rushes to blame a card when games lockup. Any software can see problems when trying to access reserved memory addresses. Something running in the background may have dibs on the same addresses needed for gaming.
 
Generally when you have a bad card you'll hear an alert at post time unless it is from overheating while gaming or running a large app. There are a few things like memory that will cause concerns if faults are found there. Have you tried running a memory tool liike memtest to see there are errors found there?
 
umm,

I dont have a floppy disk in my computer, but, I remember i put that gig of RAM that I have into a friends computer, but he kept getting a whole bunch of errors.

Now that I think of it, it makes a huge load of sense that my RAM is the problem. I am going to go ahead and return the RAM(if possible as i bought it months ago) and get a new one.

Thank you very much, and if you have any more insight on this problem I would appreciate it too.

Thanks
 
Edit:

Crap. Well, I found out that when i was computer retarded(about 6 months ago) I bought DDR 500 RAM, not knowing that my motherboard supported DDR 400. So, I was thinking that this was the only problem, and I told one of my friends, but he shot down that idea, because he said if I buy RAM that is higher than supported, it will just run at what it supports(aka DDR500 will run as DDR400). I have no clue what the problem is now, and im getting pretty stressed. I think I will hold off on ordering/returning parts until I know exactly whats going on. I would have checked the RAM for errors, but as I said above, I dont have a floppy drive in my computer. Further help is deeply deeply appreciated.
 
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