7 Crashes - Can't Figure It Out

[dakrisht]

Having a really strange issue with one of my 7 systems.

When being used the system simply freezes. Ctrl+Alt+Delete does nothing, no HDD activity, just fans on, system frozen.

Usually happens when I'm working in Excel 2007.

I just replaced the Video Card of this machine with a brand new one (initially thought it was a video card and/or driver). Still crashes once in a while.

Specs:

Intel Core i3
Gigabyte Motherboard
4GB DDR3 RAM
EVGA 9500GT Card

Latest video card drivers, latest motherboard bios drivers, Windows 7 updates, etc.

Two questions:

1) What could be causing this crash?
2) Are there any logs I can look at to see exactly what happened before the freeze (and where can I find them)

Thanks in advance for the tips and helps

 

[Jonathan_King]

Hello,

Start by running driver verifier: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/101379-driver-verifier-enable-disable.html

Upload a jcriff2 report as well: http://www.sevenforums.com/crashes-debugging/96879-blue-screen-death-bsod-posting-instructions.html

 

[dakrisht]

Thanks Jonathan,

I'll try Driver Verifier

To clarify: I'm not getting a BSOD, I'm just getting a screen freeze - Excel or the program I'm using simply freezes, nothing works (mouse, key commands, reset button on the tower, etc. must do a hard power reset only)

 

[Jonathan_King]

I realize you are not getting BSODs; the driver verifier will test drivers, though, causing a BSOD if it encounters a software problem.

 

[dakrisht]

Jonathan,

I ran the Driver Verifier, nothing.

I'm suspecting either bad RAM, a virus (although not likely)...

What are some good Memory RAM checkers?

My next steps are:

1) Test the RAM
2) Do a deep anti-virus scan
3) not sure....

 

[Jonathan_King]

Keep Verifier running for maybe 24 or 48 hours, while using your computer normally.

To test RAM, you can use Memtest86. See this guide for detailed directions: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/105647-ram-test-memtest86.html