Apparently random Win7 lockup and freezes...

[JackWH]

Hello,

I successfully installed Windows 7 64-bit RC today. However, I have a problem.

Running Windows, win7 will randomly lock up and completely freeze permanently at random points during opertion. So far I have not been able to run Windows for more than about 20 minutes without it locking up.

Il assume this is a hardware problem, since it is a clean install.

Specs:
4GB Ram
80GB HDD
Intel Pentium 4 640 (3.2 GHz)
NVidia Geforce 7900

If there's anything else I should list, please say.

Thanks!

 

[zigzag3143]

Hello,

I successfully installed Windows 7 64-bit RC today. However, I have a problem.

Running Windows, win7 will randomly lock up and completely freeze permanently at random points during opertion. So far I have not been able to run Windows for more than about 20 minutes without it locking up.

Il assume this is a hardware problem, since it is a clean install.

Specs:
4GB Ram
80GB HDD
Intel Pentium 4 640 (3.2 GHz)
NVidia Geforce 7900

If there's anything else I should list, please say.

Thanks!

Jack

Randon freezes can be caused by power, sleep, hibernation settings. You ever get a BSOD? id so could you zip and upload it? could you go into event vierwer (ebent viewer in search) and see if there are any errors relating to this problem?

Ken

 

[Tews]

Dont assume anything ... this could be anything from an outdated driver to a bad burn on your DVD... I suggest that you try re burning a new DVD at the slowest possible speed and re install. If, after doing that, you still have problems, we'll go from there.

 

[Antman]

Tews and Ken (toosenken)

This presents exactly like the overheat issue earlier. P4 3.2 = hot.

JackWH - please download and run RealTemp.
Real Temp - CPU temperature monitoring

 

[chev65]

Here we go again.

Freezing can be from so many things. Memory settings, drivers, low voltages, overheating, bad installation of the OP system or flawed ISO, something plugged into a USB port when installing Windows or just general instablity.

 

[Antman]

Here we go again.

Freezing can be from so many things. Memory settings, drivers, low voltages, overheating, bad installation of the OP system or flawed ISO, something plugged into a USB port when installing Windows or just general instablity.

Chuckle. Yes. I am flinching.

Just want to rule out a possible problem that Windows provides no native indication of. Other than freezing 20 minutes into a boot.

 

[zigzag3143]

the "20 minutes" didnt stand out till you mentioned Heat

Ken

 

[Antman]

the "20 minutes" didnt stand out till you mentioned Heat

We learned a valuable lesson in the previous challenge. In this thread, I think there is a possible second indicator (besides the higher temps on this processor) - it is reasonable to conclude that the mobo/cpu assembly has some age on it.

Tews - like my new sig?

 

[JackWH]

Thanks for the help so far guys. I saw some of you noticed my other hardware post (and perhaps weren't taking it too seriously... ) but I didn't mean to double post or whatever, they were two seperate issues really.

Anyway, back on topic.

There are no Bsods at all. Just freezes, however they are no longer 'permanent' as I first thought.

The 'hangs' happen now at ANY point after 7's startup. It's been as late as an hour and as soon as 30 seconds. The hangs appear to be for RANDOM amounts of time. Anything from 1 minute to 1 hour iv experienced. The clock will freeze and any mouse movements I do or butto s I press don't register - but when the computer unfreeze, everything I did whilst frozen suddenly 'happens' on the screen, if you get me.

It is not an overheating issue. I talked to a chap in PC World today about it. It's a PCW unit and he said the spec wouldn't overheat like that (of course, he may be wrong, but I have a bloomin noisy fan and the CPU in tests never went over 55 degrees). Intels website says operating range goes up to 65 degrees C, so again I don't think it's overheating.

I will re-burn slowly my ISO tomorrow morning and reinstall, but in the meantime, do you guys have any other ideas or tests to try first?

Thank you!

 

[JackWH]

Righto. Looking at my Event Viewer for the times of two crashes, I can glean absolutely nothing...

One crash happened at 11:19. This crash lasted 4 minutes. The event log shows these entries for 11:19:

[B]Application:[/B]
Desktop Window Manager - The Desktop Window Manager was unable to start

[B]System:[/B]
Service Control Manager - NVidia Drivers successfully installed *
UserPnP
UserPnp
Service Control Manager - NVidia entered a running state
UserPnP
Windows Update - NVidia Installed

* I was installing some driver updates when the crash happened, although I can pretty much confirm it was not my NVIdia card or its drivers that are causing the crash - re-installing Windows 7 AND taking the graphics card out (using onboard chip) still creates the crash, before 7 has even seen the graphics card)

My next crash was at 11:30. This lasted around 5 minutes. But there were no logs written to the event viewer at all during this...?!

Any further ideas before I re-install with a fresh burn?

 

[Antman]

To be taken really seriously, please complete your system specs in the User CP.

 

[SoLiD]

humm that guy is having the same problem as me... ive made a thread avout it yesterday...lets hope we found the answer.

 

[Leatherneck]

Same thing. Just started last night.

System specs can be found here: Product Specifications 

I've added a BFG LS 550 Power Supply and a PNY GeForce 250 GTX video card.

No indication of the problem in events. No warning. No error message. No dump. It just freezes until I do a hard reset. I'm thinking I'm going to have to dump Win7.

I put in the new video card a week ago and it worked fine up until last night. I have been running Win7 since the RC release early this year.

Last night, I was doing some system tweaks (shutting off unneeded services, etc). That's when the lockups started.

Eventually I gave up and re-installed Win7. In desperation, I went to the March 2009 drivers for the video card.

All to no avail.

 

[chev65]

Thanks for the help so far guys. I saw some of you noticed my other hardware post (and perhaps weren't taking it too seriously... ) but I didn't mean to double post or whatever, they were two seperate issues really.

Anyway, back on topic.

There are no Bsods at all. Just freezes, however they are no longer 'permanent' as I first thought.

The 'hangs' happen now at ANY point after 7's startup. It's been as late as an hour and as soon as 30 seconds. The hangs appear to be for RANDOM amounts of time. Anything from 1 minute to 1 hour iv experienced. The clock will freeze and any mouse movements I do or butto s I press don't register - but when the computer unfreeze, everything I did whilst frozen suddenly 'happens' on the screen, if you get me.

It is not an overheating issue. I talked to a chap in PC World today about it. It's a PCW unit and he said the spec wouldn't overheat like that (of course, he may be wrong, but I have a bloomin noisy fan and the CPU in tests never went over 55 degrees). Intels website says operating range goes up to 65 degrees C, so again I don't think it's overheating.

I will re-burn slowly my ISO tomorrow morning and reinstall, but in the meantime, do you guys have any other ideas or tests to try first?

Thank you!

Un-perminate freezes usually relate to a harddrive problem of some sort but until the driver situation with a new Op system has run it's course it's hard to tell what the problem might actually be. You might try looking around for a newer set of chipset drivers.

 

[Antman]

...Last night, I was doing some system tweaks (shutting off unneeded services, etc). That's when the lockups started...

Hmm...

A system restore is in order. Select a restore point that pre-dates your tweaks.

 

[chev65]

Hmm...

A system restore is in order. Select a restore point that pre-dates your tweaks.

I agree, move to safe distance and nuke the Op system from space...It's the only way to be sure.

 

[Leatherneck]

Hmm...

A system restore is in order. Select a restore point that pre-dates your tweaks.

I'm sorry. I failed to mention that I did as well before re-installing the OS.

I've taken the system physically apart and reseated everything. I've pulled the fans out and gave them some shots of canned air. Since reassembly, no issues.

If it manages to stay up overnight, I'll feel a bit better about it.

 

[diggers253]

Same problem

Hi, I have the same problem. Its hard to describe in brief, but the screen freezes, you can still move the mouse but the clicks etc do nothing and then after a random amount of time it catches up. Usually if it hasn't unstuck by 10 mins I reboot but I've seen it leap back at 30 minutes before.

I'm using a retail version of win 7 pro - so I dont think it can be a DVD burning issue. For me it happened first within moment sof installing win 7 and every time the wallpaper changes since. I've turned off the wall paper and its more stable b ut now a random issue. Its the same with just win 7 installed so its not to do with any other software I'm sure. I have installed other software and it can be triggered by openeing a browser for example. Anything that seems to change the screen a lot seems to trigger it. Its MUCH worse with aero turned on or much better without it depending on how you look at it.

We have a multimonoitor setup and its much better with just one screen. I'm using an Nvidia 9800GT as the main card and an NVIDIA 6200 as the second card. I've tried all the Nvidia drivers - no change at all. The ones that come with win 7 seem the most stable.

I initially set up a raid drive but reinstalled without it - it made no difference. I initially had an external HD - but reinstalled without it - it made no difference.

Updating all the windows updates made no difference.

Updating the motherboard bios made no difference.

Disabling all processes and startup programs in msconfig - made no difference.

Disabling / detaching all hardware possible (sound card / network card etc) made no difference..

Running in safe mode disables the screen down to just a basic low resolution and that seems to do the trick.

Turning off all aero / pretty parts of win 7 seems to also do the trick.

I reinstalled a win 7 win vista dual boot - alarmingly vista is much quicker and much more stable (with SP2 installed). Apart from this mouse freezing thing win 7 seems a bit fragile e.g it "mouse freezes" so you ctl alt delete - that screen works fine - but when you click on task manager all you get is a black screen with a white mouse that moves but does nothing else. Then you have to reboot (again).

I spent 3 hours on the phone to microsoft and its absolutely a waste of time / breath / phone bill. 100% no idea at all and he said he would get someone to call me back but they didn't.

Any ideas?

Anthony

 

[mike408]

My computer had the same problem with vista and windows 7, to fix it i went into the power options and changed to the high performance rather than balanced and it solved the problem

Mike