Windows 7: Motherboard or PSU issue?

Guys ,



Been tinkering around with my pc , last week i brought a new 3TB Hard drive , when i installed it the system seemed very sluggish , and on occasions s i got a MBR1 error when re-booting , After some research i realized all my drives were in incorrect sata ports and in the bios is was set to IDE instead of AHCI , So i went to take out my 7970 and i think i accidentley pulled it out with too much force , as i thought i pushed down the release lever , however....i think i may of pulled out the PCI Ex port from the motherboard slightly , i carried on anyway connecting the drives to the right ports , and the installed the o/s , After loading all my programs and games back on , every now and then the system just re-booted and gave me no error signs , I can play some games like max payne , skyrim dirt , but there are a selected few that cause the system to re-boot like crysis2 , and re-boot will happen when there is no load on the pc , Ive tried to back (...... pc just re-booted while is was typing this - thanks to chrome i can carry on ) track and the changes ive have made recently are updated bios ( successfully ) installed new hard drive. Ive run the event viewer , but dont really understand it , so i am wondering if i have screwed over my motherboard or its a power issue now ive added an extra hard drive , btw , i have not had any bsod.... any ideas??

Thanks

Corsair Obsidian 800D Case
XFX Radeon 7970x2 In Xfire
i5 2500K O/C 4.5ghz
16gb Kingston RAM
GA Z68x UD3H-B3 Mobo Bios f12
Xonar DGX 5.1 PCI-E Soundcard
Corsair SP2500 2.1 Speakers
Corsair Hydro H100 Cooler
120GB Crucial SSD ( System Drive )
Seagate Baracuda 2TB HDD ( Storage )
Seagate Baracude 3TB HHD ( storage )
Dell Ultrasharp U2711 Monitor
XFX 850W PSU
Corsair 1300 Headphones
Corsair 2500 2.1 Speakers
Razor Death adder 3500dpi 3.5sg Mouse
RazorBlackwidow Mechanical Keyboard
Microsoft HD LifeCam

Just looking at the event viewer it all has critical errors with a source of kernel power , i would post a screenshot of it but i dont know how...lol

this is what the event viewer critical error details gave me..........means nothing to me..


System

- Provider

[ Name] Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-Power
[ Guid] {331C3B3A-2005-44C2-AC5E-77220C37D6B4}

EventID 41

Version 2

Level 1

Task 63

Opcode 0

Keywords 0x8000000000000002

- TimeCreated

[ SystemTime] 2012-06-25T19:46:46.200403000Z

EventRecordID 5708

Correlation

- Execution

[ ProcessID] 4
[ ThreadID] 8

Channel System

Computer Steve-PC

- Security

[ UserID] S-1-5-18


- EventData

BugcheckCode 0
BugcheckParameter1 0x0
BugcheckParameter2 0x0
BugcheckParameter3 0x0
BugcheckParameter4 0x0
SleepInProgress false
PowerButtonTimestamp 0

The first thing to do is simplify the system. You want to try and isolate what component is causing the issue.

Unlike a no-boot problem, yours is on the OS side of things so we need to connect just enough hardware to start and run the OS.

Remove everything from the system not needed. You will want to have:

• the case and power supply and motherboard. Processor.
• One stick of RAM in the first (primary) slot A1 (see your manual)
• One video card - in the first PCI-e x16 slot. If that is the one you think may be damaged, then try the other one.
• One HDD: the SSD of course.
• Keyboard & Mouse. You should not use gaming mice and keyboards to test. And certainly not wireless ones. Borrow a wired keyboard and mouse if you need to.

Just that. Carefully remove all the other components. Disconnect all other USB connected devices.


Now run Windows and your games like that and try and recreate the problem. If it comes back then it is more likely to be one of the major components.


If it does not come back, then start adding components back one at a time to test to see if you can isolate which one triggers the event. Start with the RAM, adding one additional stick at a time.


Let us know what you discover.

Thanks for the reply ,

I decided to take the the graphics card out as i think maybe thats where the problem lies , I took out the second card and ran the games that was crashing , and........ they worked , so i think its where i may off pulled out the pci e ex slot off the board , although it looks as though its in ok , other than that it could be a power issue , maybe too much for my xfx 850W???

update: I put only one card in the system , and put it in the port which i think is now faulty , but it works my games play fine , so i stuck my other card in , but never connected it to crossfire , and again they worked , i then tried them in crossfire , and it crashed again , so it looks like either a crossfire issue or not enough power.....what do you think?

I think you ought to systematically work through the steps TVeblen gave you.

Ive now done that , and it only crashes when i have both my cards in Xfire , everything was fine a few days ago , all i changed was added a 3tb HDD and update my bios , so i am begining to think i did actually pull the pci slot out , although cant explain why a single card in that slot still works..

just notice my board has another bios update a uefi bios , is it worth trying that?

You need just that much to run X2 7970's and 90's in Xfire you need atleast 1000w