[Starman01]

Hello,

can anyone point me to a good Utility that is able to check for real hardware conflicts (mostly IRQ I suppose) ? Pls no shareware with "congratulations, we found 285,3 errors in your system. If you want to fix them, buy the ****ing software"

Seriously, I now own this PC for about 12 months, and the day I bought it (for 1500,- €) is erased from my calender.

As soon as I start any game, my system becomes unstable. It freezes randomly (and very often). Sometimes I can play only 5 Seconds, some other day more than a hour. Because it only happens when playing games, it must have to do with some DirectX Hardware. The new games which seem to have the most problem are HL2, Earth 2160 and UFO-Aftershock. These are virtually unplayable (and no techsupport or bugfix seems to fix my problem)

Unfortunatly, in 95% off all crashes I'm not even getting a error message, CTD or BSOD. It just freezes and clicking, lopping sounds came out of the speakers. So I can only hit the reset-button (it's already getting some use-up symptons), and of course there will no entry in the systemprotokoll.

I already replaced my soundcard (and swapped the PCI slots) my drives, tried nearly all bios-configs but everything to no avail,

Now I think it's either a problem with the GPU  or the motherboard, or just some form of IRQ-Conflict (because very seldom I saw the blue crash screen saying "IRQ not less or equal", but there is no conflict noted in the device manager (like if windows utilitys and helpscreens would be a really help )
I have also disabled and USB-Hubs, Com-Ports and all other stuff I don't need (including the onboard audio of course)

So, I'm now really frustrated, in fact I have no idea what to do. If I would really have do the step and bring the box back to the shop, I will have to pay for a repair, and they will probably connect it and see that it runs and fine and I pay for nothing. But
as said, 99% of all crashes are only when playing games, and they will not play a few hours to encounter the error.

So, any help would be really appreciated.

Regards

a frustrated Starman©

[Fury]

Check this.

You can check hardware resources with msinfo32 by typing the name to your start menu > run dialog. Or alternatively with Everest.

[Kie99]

Typed in XP Config Utility on Download.com and found this.  It says $19.99 to buy, but the demo version has no limitations apparently.

[Col. Fishguts]

It could also be a overheated CPU or GPU, with the gaming-related crashes and all. I had a similar problem once.

Try opening your case and then play some high-end game, and see if it still crashes.

[Nix]

might want to use Everest that Mr. Fury suggested, cause it will do temperature monitoring as well as probe for system resources.

[Starman01]

No luck so far. I already tried keeping the case open, but it still keeps crashing.

Heats seems to be fine (according to everquest, nice program btw, thanks for the link). CPU is around 60° and the harddisk is around 45°.

In calm state (desktop) CPU is around 50°, and the harddisk at 38°. I guess that's o.K., isn't it ?

No IRQ seems to be shared, but some memory adresses are shared between compontens. This is the list :

E/A-Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7   PCI-Bus
E/A-Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7   DMA-Controller
   
E/A-Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF   Intel(R) 82865G/PE/P/GV/82848P Prozessor-zu-AGP-Controller - 2571
E/A-Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF   RADEON 9800 PRO (Omega 2.6.71)
   
memory adress 0xA0000-0xBFFFF   PCI-Bus
memory adress 0xA0000-0xBFFFF   Intel(R) 82865G/PE/P/GV/82848P Prozessor-zu-AGP-Controller - 2571
memory adress 0xA0000-0xBFFFF   RADEON 9800 PRO (Omega 2.6.71)
   
E/A-Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB   Intel(R) 82865G/PE/P/GV/82848P Prozessor-zu-AGP-Controller - 2571
E/A-Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB   RADEON 9800 PRO (Omega 2.6.71)
   
E/A-Port 0x0000C000-0x0000CFFF   Intel(R) 82865G/PE/P/GV/82848P Prozessor-zu-AGP-Controller - 2571
E/A-Port 0x0000C000-0x0000CFFF   RADEON 9800 PRO (Omega 2.6.71)

Something in there, that should worry me ?

[Fury]

You're running Omega drivers. My advise would be to get rid of them and to install ATI's own drivers. (uninstall - reboot - install)

I take you have also updated your motherboard BIOS and resetted BIOS defaults after the update as well? Did you also update your motherboard chipset drivers?

[Starman01]

Actually I'm only using Omega drivers because the problem were also there with official drivers and the omega drivers seem to have a great performance boost to my card.

I will also look for some new chipset drivers, but the one I find are useless because I'm not using the components (disabled in bios) they are offering drivers for.

I haven't done a BIOS update to this moment, that is something I would rather leave my hands of, but I guess in this case I have no other choice.

So, you say I should update my bios, restore the bios default (maybe reboot) and then make the neceassary bios-changes again ?

[Descenterace]

Have you tried erasing the disk and reinstalling anything?

When Windows breaks this badly, it's the first thing you should try.

[Bobboau]

have you ruled out a faulty hard drive?

[Fury]

Originally posted by Starman01
Actually I'm only using Omega drivers because the problem were also there with official drivers and the omega drivers seem to have a great performance boost to my card.

Pfft. 3rd-party drivers are not trustworthy. Only a viable option on laptops where manufacturers may not update their video drivers often enough. But even ATI has started to offer Mobility Radeon drivers, although only a handful of laptop manufacturers are officially supported for now.

Originally posted by Starman01
I will also look for some new chipset drivers, but the one I find are useless because I'm not using the components (disabled in bios) they are offering drivers for.

Don't tell me you're running ALi or SiS chipset.

Originally posted by Starman01
I haven't done a BIOS update to this moment, that is something I would rather leave my hands of, but I guess in this case I have no other choice.

So, you say I should update my bios, restore the bios default (maybe reboot) and then make the neceassary bios-changes again ?

BIOS-updates can solve a myriad of problems, starting from hardware incompatibility issues.  You need to update the BIOS, restart computer and then reset BIOS-defaults and then restart computer again. If you really have to make changes to BIOS settings, then I strongly advise you to read this while making those changes.