Oh yeah, I did take a look at your CPU-Z screenshots yesterday briefly. You did not include all slots under the SPD tab, though. It appears that you have two 4 GB modules and two 2 GB modules. That may account for the crashes due to the mix and match RAM. I would need more info to be sure, though. Please provide an image of each slot under the SPD tab.
As to the USB bootable drive: Universal USB Installer – Easy as 1 2 3 | USB Pen Drive Linux
How am I ever gonna be able to thank you for all of this? Sorry about the pix. I have included all 4 this time. I also added a text file from PC Wizard detailing my motherboard stats which included RAM stats somewhere in the middle.
You are are right about me having two 2 gig RAM sticks and two 4G. Wow I had never noticed that. I had always assumed they were 4 X 3G.
Those look like they should be fine... I am suspecting more and more a corrupted registry being the issue.
Read through steps 1-3 and 5-7 of Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7. You are not going to do the full clean re-install (yet), so just read through steps 1-3 and 5-7.Code:Event[15081]: Log Name: System Source: Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-General Date: 2012-06-04T11:27:58.809 Event ID: 5 Task: N/A Level: Error Opcode: Info Keyword: N/A User: S-1-5-18 User Name: NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM Computer: Michael-PC Description: {Registry Hive Recovered} Registry hive (file): '\??\C:\System Volume Information\Syscache.hve' was corrupted and it has been recovered. Some data might have been lost.
Then do a Repair Install of Windows 7.
You're suspecting a corrupted registry? yeah me too though the cpu heat thing and my HD and MB are still questions for me.
As to SeaTools I used Universal-USB-Installer-1.9.0.1 to put it in my flash drive and I got the following message on reboot: SysLinux bla bla bla, Bootfile . . . . Failed to load boot file. Here's the thing. When I created the boot I had choices of Linux distros, which obviously were not chosen. The only ono-linux related choices were (Under "Other non-listed") Hiren's Boot CD, Kon-boot Windows Vista, Windows7 and Windows8. I chose Windows 7. Was I wrong? Or did I perhaps do something else wrong?
As to your most recent instructions:
If I go to C:\Users I have the following folders:
Administrator, All Users, Default, Default User, Michael, Public.
Step 3 says, "Back up your files externally by dragging your named User account or active User folders to another HD'
I assume my 'named User account ' is that one I have named 'Michael', is this correct?
But what are "active User folders" ?
Also within the 'Michael' folder are many folders, files and shortcuts. Is the whole 'Michael' folder with all those files, subfolders and shortcuts supposed to be copied? Some files within this folder have names/extensions such as,
NTUSER.DAT{31e3bc01-9240-11e1-9ba4-20cf308c48c4}.TMContainer00000000000000000001.regtrans-ms
(44 such files)
and
NTUSER.DAT{31e3bc01-9240-11e1-9ba4-20cf308c48c4}.TM.blf
(22 such files)
Step 7 says, "Gather your program installers." By this I assume they mean gather my CD/DVD of Photoshop, Office, and all executables I have installed such as Skype, Avast, Comodo etc. Is this correct?
Try Hiren's Boot CD for SeaTools.
I would recommend backing up your files using Robocopy. That is what I use for mine. Open an Elevated Command Prompt and do the following command (I assume your external drive is letter D:, so replace yours accordingly)
You are correct for Step 7. Make sure to get all your license keys, as well. The Belarc Advisor can help with that step.Code:robocopy /s /r:5 /w:0 /xo /xj c:\users\Michael D:\usersBackup\Michael
Assuming I did "
robocopy /s /r:5 /w:0 /xo /xj c:\users\Michael D:\usersBackup\Michael "
Would this not mean that in my D drive I would find a folder named Michael
or one named 'usersBackup'?
I ask this because I think I did such a command and after doing so the DOS
window started working for quite a while but then, later, checking in my
drive I could not see any new folder having been created. I then looked at my
other drives and could not see any newly created folders either.
The thing is, after keying in the above command line and tapping on enter it
occurred to me that perhaps I forgot to add the ':' colon after my drive.
In other words I never typed in: --- --- D:\usersBackup\Michael
but rather, D\usersBackup\Michael
If so then what was the cmd doing all of this time?
If a new folder was indeed supposed to be created then obviously I did forget
the colon. Also, as I was watching the CMD window I noticed it was creating
a bunch of files with names of software I have installed. Well what if I don't
want such software the 2nd time around?
Also, it appears to me that there is a space after every forward slash and after every backslash. Is there a space or is there not?
Oh yeah, one last thing; Is it necessary for the above to be done to an external drive? My backup drive is actually internally connected and it is this drive (E: in my case) which I used the above command line on.
You probably now have a C:\Windows\System32\D\usersBackup\Michael directory...
You should delete that full D directory (you will need to provide administrator authorization when you try to delete it, so make sure you are logged in as an administrator).
I will put where the spaces are within <>
If you do not want certain program data saved, you would have to add a /xd after the commands...Code:robocopy /s /r:5 /w:0 /xo /xj c:\users\Michael D:\usersBackup\Michael robocopy<space>/s<space>/r:5<space>/w:0<space>/xo<space>/xj<space>c:\users\Michael<space>D:\usersBackup\Michael
The above will exclude all directories named Adobe and all directories named Application Data from the backup. I am not saying you should exclude these; this was just an example.Code:robocopy /s /r:5 /w:0 /xo /xj c:\users\Michael D:\usersBackup\Michael /xd "Adobe" "Application Data" robocopy<space>/s<space>/r:5<space>/w:0<space>/xo<space>/xj<space>c:\users\Michael<space>D:\usersBackup\Michael<space>/xd<space>"Adobe"<space>"Application Data"
Hi
The above steps: 1 to 3 and 5 to 7 are back up stuff and info gathering stuff. I have done so. Now what?
Also, if I may we did confirm that there was a problem with the CPU heating thing, did we not? What should be done about such thing? Also I have attached a photo of the inside of my PC showing the CPU and heatsink and stuff, in the hope that it helps some.
Everything looks good, but it is very difficult to know without taking the heatsink off and checking the thermal compound directly. Are you comfortable doing so?
Make sure to avoid static damage to the PC when removing or replacing components.
Assuming I was told exactly what to do and exactly what to look for and assuming I could understand what I was doing/seeing, then yes, I would be comfortable doing so.
Having said this, though we can agree on a heatsink problem and how this should indeed be taken care of regardless of what I am about tosay, I am not sure to what degree it would solve the actual problem I have with the crash/self reboot since it does so even if the computer is 'cold' --just turned on.
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