Intermittent freezes

J

Jay Hanig

New Member
I've got an HP Pavillion a6827c with 6mb of RAM and a Pentium dual core CPU with Windows 7 Home premium installed. It has been reliable and rock steady since I bought it. However, I found it lacked the horsepower to effectively display certain screens using an astrology program called Starry Nights. The thought was to upgrade from the on-board graphics to a discrete video card.

I ordered an Asus HD 7770 Direct CU. Of course, it probably wasn't going to run with the 300 watt power supply, so I also ordered an Antek 750 watt Earthwatt PS. I installed both of them Friday; the video card into the only PCI-E x16 slot. Since then I've been getting occasional freezes. They always occur after a period of inactivity; the computer doesn't want to wake back up.

I have gone to the ATI website and downloaded the latest driver for the 7xxx HD cards along with their Catalyst software.

Obviously the installation of the video card seems most suspect. I did discover yesterday an incorrect setting in the CMOS which I set straight. Just the same, it was locked up this morning when I got up.

I've changed the power settings to put the monitor to sleep after 20 minutes but for the computer to always stay awake. The actual power "plan" is the one for performance. I am going to experiment this morning by changing the monitor setting to never shut off. I'll be gone for most of the day so I'll see if that did any good when I get home. In the meanwhile I'll just turn off my monitor manually.

I am not a gamer and the card is not overclocked.

Does anybody have any ideas where I should look next?
 
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OK, people seem a little reluctant to tackle this. I understand. *I* don't want to tackle this. But I have a new clue:

For the last 24 hours, I've left the power settings so that neither the computer nor its monitor ever go to sleep. I just turned off the monitor's power button whenever I walked away. No more freezes. As soon as I touched the monitor power button, my screen came back to life.

This suggests to me that the freezes definitely have something to do with the monitor going to sleep, as opposed to me turning it off completely. It freezes intermittently whenever the monitor goes to sleep. It makes no difference whether the computer sleeps or doesn't sleep; the difference is only whether the monitor sleeps. Does that remind anybody of anything they've seen in the past?
 
Did you upgrade the cooling or your case in any way before you upgraded? It sounds to me like the PC is overheating and that's why you may be getting freezes/crashes. Sorry for the late response, only just seen your thread.
 
No, I didn't upgrade the case cooling. The overclocking app that came with the Catalyst Software Suite shows the GPU temp to be just 42-43°C with the fan turning at 10%. That doesn't seem very hot to me. Besides, it locks up during periods of inactivity. Wouldn't it lock up during periods of usage if the temperature was an issue?

Not arguing; just want to understand.
 
You may wanna turn up that fan an issue, and yeah if overheating was the problem it would lock up during periods of use. Overheating could be the problem though, especially if airflow in your case isn't very good.

It may be your hard drive, or maybe some malware? Tried running scans with Malwarebytes?
 
I went ahead and ran the malware scan (found two object... now deleted). I really have my doubts that the problem lies anywhere beyond the newly installed video card. How much coincidence would it take for the problem to show up in the first 24 hours of use and it NOT be a graphics card issue?

Scans of my hard drive, cpu, RAM, etc. are all negative for problems.

Then there is the matter of I have not suffered another freeze since I disabled the monitor's ability to go to sleep. The freeze was the monitor didn't want to wake up.

Physically turning off the monitor using its switch allows me to save some power while at the same time not allowing the video card to go to sleep, thereby avoiding further freezes. But that's just a workaround; not really a solution.
 
Can you try using the onbaord video on your motherboard for a few days and removing the graphics card and see if you still get issues? Could be a driver issue, uninstall and reinstall them in Safe Mode perhaps?
 
Sounds like a driver issue in my thought process.

Drivers could've died, or the card is running too hot in your case.
 
Here's what I've found in another forum and it appears to be working: there is a setting called "enableULPS" in the registry. Disabling it with regedit appears to have solved the problem. I've been able to reset my power settings so the monitor goes to sleep after 20 minutes and the computer after 5 hours and I've experienced no further freezes.

Supposedly the Radeon HD 7xxx family cards have been having problems with waking up after sleep... which is what my problem was. Didn't have anything to do with heat, which never got higher than 43°C in any case.

Didn't have anything to do with malware either, although that little exercise was not a total waste of my time since I found two objects (now deleted).

But I think I'm good to go now. I'll come back and whine again if I'm premature.
 
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