Checking a website and purple screen crash, then BSOD on start-up

ICIT2LOL · 17 Jun 2015

Well I am just interested in the power the GPU is getting and if you cannot pull up the HW Info stuff then test the supply cable manually with a digital multimeter. Just detach the lead to the GPU while the machine is powered on of course and test the "live" cable against the black ground one. It is usually a 12v supply (live) and anything that is +/- 5% of that voltage is not going to let it work properly ie < than 11.4v or > 12.6v.
The meters are so cheap now too. If you are not familiar with them see my pic.

Having said that I think Arc is probably more qualified on these things than I but do try

Laith · 17 Jun 2015

Hmm, my guess it's a failing GPU. As you get purple screens instead of blue ones, the dumps blame the GPU driver and you can't boot into normal mode because of the heavy fail that's going on in the GPU.

ICIT2LOL · 17 Jun 2015

Laith said:

Hmm, my guess it's a failing GPU. As you get purple screens instead of blue ones, the dumps blame the GPU driver and you can't boot into normal mode because of the heavy fail that's going on in the GPU.

Yes Laith am inclined to agree but my thought was rule out something very obvious and simple and it takes no time to do. I say this because as one Scott Mueller says in a book that is linked to this
Power Supply 101: A Reference Of Specifications - Power Supplies PSU's are very underrated as a cause of computer failure. From that link this section is valuable info Voltage Rails - Power Supply 101: A Reference Of Specifications

I have both his books from that first link and used them when I first started building and to me he is the guru.

Laith · 17 Jun 2015

Hm, i should read those sometime.

ICIT2LOL · 17 Jun 2015

Laith said:

Hm, i should read those sometime.

Yes the article I linked mate the books are a bit dated now except for the absolute electronic basics

I don't know about you but having a bit of hobby background mucking around with electronics since I was a kid (long time ago) I am more hardware based these days.

Laith · 18 Jun 2015

Hmm, i just remembered i had my DOS 6.22 book to read, that thing is huge

Shinjikuna · 04 Jul 2015

Okay, Sorry for not being back here in a while. I was in the middle of a move when my computer decided to crap out, just my luck eh? And I have a few things I've kind of come to through this process.

I believe it was my graphics card that went boom. So I'm going to expend some extra money i have one getting a new one. I was thinking a Geforce GTX 750. Especially since they say it doesn't require as much power as my 460 needed.

On the topic of power. I honestly do not think it was a power issue since my computer had run completely fine for 5 years before this issue. It was probably a combination of old equipment and me taking less than adequate care of the system. I plan on taking a can of air and cleaning the sucker out and putting a new card.. Hopefully that helps..

Now. My main questions are, because I'm not familiar with actually working on computers, how would I go about taking my card out and putting in the new one? Also, is the geforce gtx 750 a good choice?

EDIT: Also, Look at this: CyberpowerPC Desktop PC Gamer Xtreme 1076 Intel Core i5 760 (2.80GHz) 4GB DDR3 1TB HDD Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit - Newegg.com This is the computer I bought backin 2010, no changes to the system parts at all since then. It says a 700w power supply, so I couldn't see how that could be the issue in the first place.

ICIT2LOL · 05 Jul 2015

Well personally I would go for the GTX 750Ti if you were not looking at a great amount os work for it and it is very reasonably priced.

As for the power well mate the choice is yours - but five years is reasonably getting on for a PSU and if I suggested running the HW Info (test) on it well it only takes a few minutes and it would be peace of mind but the choice again is yours. Just remember just one capacitor out of whack or commission and the whole thing falls around it and they are not the only components that are affected by the functioning of the unit.

You have to remember too that starting up and shutting down over five years has produced a lot of heating up and cooling down - another thing that creates "wear and tear" on the circuitry.

Shinjikuna · 05 Jul 2015

Oh, I'm sure there is probably other problems. I'm sure that the power supply may not be completely up to par, but I still can't run that HW info because I can only run my system in safe mode still and I only got enough money to get a new graphics card.. so getting that device you suggested to test the power would pretty much screw me on getting a graphics card for a very long time. I'm sort of jobless at the moment.

So, I'm not denying that it may be a factor in this problem, but I don't think it was the main problem. If it turns out that it doesn't solve my problem, getting a new graphics card, it may at least give the ability to open in normal mode and allow me to use the HW test, see what I'm getting at?

ICIT2LOL · 05 Jul 2015

Well those meters can be got for around $10 for what you need and you only need test the different power cables especially the 24 pin board connector see this for the colour coding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_...unit_(computer) scroll down and the colours are the same for the GPU and any other cables.

But again the choice is yours - it is a bit like putting inferior fuel into an engine and expecting top performance.

You can make a portable HW info stick HWiNFO Portable | PortableApps.com - Portable software for USB, portable and cloud drives and use it in safe mode but the meter cannot lie. Of particular interest to me it the volts at pin 8 (grey cable) on that 24 pin connector because if the PSU is not up to scratch that signal to that pin form the PSU will not allow the CPU and therefore the system to fire up or also drop out.