Solved Windows crashes on startup only when powering on system

[MelancholyRose]

I tried it with my other RAM stick. Something happened.... The Windows logo appeared in this graphical horror LSD looking puddle that looked as if someone sat on it. I'm actually kind of scared.

If you see that long red band/line at the top of the screen, that happened again after I tried booting again with that other RAM stick, when trying to boot into Safe Mode.

Strangely, I can hear the case and CPU fans picking up speed when this happens.

I'm going to try with just the one stick again. I'm going to assume the other stick is bad if I can boot with it again.

 

[MelancholyRose]

Tried with one stick again and it booted successfully into Safe Mode, now. So I guess that other stick is bad, too?! This can't be happening to me.

Is it more likely that there's something wrong with the RAM sticks and not with the DIMM slot? If there's something wrong with the slot and I have to RMA another motherboard and wait another month for it... sigh.

I guess I'll try putting each "bad" stick in the first slot and see what happens, and if the same thing happens, I'll know it's the RAM, not the slot.

Either way, I'm this close to drowning myself in both booze and sorrow.

 

[MelancholyRose]

Well, the stick that caused the discoloring still caused it even if it was the only stick, so that's garbage. Although, I'm trying the other bad stick right now on its own and it hasn't crashed yet. I'm going to continue to test it, though.

 

[MelancholyRose]

I put the supposed "bad" stick in slot one. It successfully booted with no freezing or crashing about 4 times.

So now, I'm annoyed. Something has got to be wrong with one of these sticks, but I don't know which one, now. They both can power on the machine. When I have 2 sticks of RAM in the slots, the system freezes. However, I don't know why, but the BSODs stopped. I haven't seen one in a while. All that seems to be happening is the Windows logo freezing. or auto-restarting.

Safe Mode freezes too, but it also doesn't crash to a BSOD anymore.

What in the hell is going on here?

 

[essenbe]

You might try the 'good stick' in the bad slot. Sometimes it can be the dimm slot and not the ram. If you have a CD, you can create a repair/rescue disk in control panel that will do startup repair.

 

[MelancholyRose]

I tried that, except only with the bad stick in the "Good" slot. I didn't try only putting the "good" stick in the "bad" slot to see what happens.

I need to stop right now because I'm losing my mind. I'll check back later in case any more ideas come up from others. I can't keep working on this all day and go crazy doing it.

 

[essenbe]

I've asked someone else to give us a hand on this. He knows more about ram settings than I do. One of our resident ram gurus.

 

[MelancholyRose]

Thanks, man, you've been a big help, I appreciate it.

 

[essenbe]

I'm not going anywhere.

 

[MelancholyRose]

Well, I figured I'd still thank you, lol.

 

[essenbe]

Well, thanks. If you can still boot, I'd like to see screenshots from cpuz. I'd like the CPU tab, the memory tab and the SPD tab. If you don't have it, download it here.

 

[MelancholyRose]

I did post them, they're on the top of page 10. You might not have gotten a chance to see them.

 

[essenbe]

I'll look now. Guess between hopping between threads I missed them.

 

[essenbe]

What did you change in bios to get your ram to run at 1600? AMD CPUs memory controller is on the chip. The fastest they will run ram is 1333 (or 666 on cpuz dual channel). The only way to get them to run at 1600 is to change voltages and settings in bios. Whatever was changed may be what is causing you problems. It is OK to do that. I did that on my AMD rig. But, we need to get you running stable at stock first.

 

[MelancholyRose]

I never changed anything, everything has always been on auto and I never adjusted voltages or speed or anything.

Unless updating the BIOS caused it.

 

[pRUSSIANq]

you can try holding f8 just as you start it to bring up startup options , then choose "last known good configuration" that worked for me

 

[essenbe]

Do you have an option in bios called dram/FSB ratio? if you do, set that to default.

 

[MelancholyRose]

you can try holding f8 just as you start it to bring up startup options , then choose "last known good configuration" that worked for me

Would that erase and personal files?

 

[MelancholyRose]

Do you have an option in bios called dram/FSB ratio? if you do, set that to default.

I don't know, I'll have to check another time, he's home from work and using the machine now, and I have a headache.

 

[Britton30]

Using F8 to go to start up repairs won't erase anything, but may or may not find your problem.
I've read this whole thread, and here is my 2¢ worth.

You mentioned something buzzing, which is never good. It could be your PSU, DVD, or some fan hanging.

Go into Bios and reset to factory setting, except what you need for your RAID array.

As essenbe said, your RAM shouldn't run at 1600 without some tweaking, seems yours is though.:sarc:

CPU NB is the Front side bus for AMD and controls the memory frequency in part.

You DVD drive is probably shot, try another one if possible.

If you got your RAM as 2 4GB kits, you may have mixed the stick up and the matched ones are separated. It would seem that some RAM or a slot is bad.

With sooo many different bug check errors this is quite confusing. Note that I have no RAID experience and I won't try to speak to those issues. But, on my gigabyte board to use RAID I would have to use specific SATA headers.