Does this sound like a Software or Hardware issue? Lock-Up, Poor BIOS Performance

[DanTheMuffinMan]

Hey guys, got a problem I've never come across before. Specs are down below (and in sig). Thanks in advance for any help.

 

Getting occasional lock-ups in Windows 10, which is new for me, I remember these kinds of things back in the Windows ME days, but honestly I've been fine since moving to 10. These sometimes let me click on the start menu but Shut-Down, Restart don't work and I have to manually hold down the power button to cycle it.

 

My boot-up times have jumped from around 6-7 seconds to 60-90 seconds. My most recent BIOS time in Task Manager is a horrid 618.0 seconds.

 

Occasionally when starting up my PC it dumps me in the BIOS instead of Windows, and this is where it gets weird: the BIOS is running super poorly. My mouse jerks around and lags as if I'm trying to use Vista on an old 90's PC. It takes several mouse clicks or enter-presses for a selection to register, sometimes a ridiculous 20-30 times. So it's not practical to actually do anything in there, just exit which then dumps me to Windows.

 

This is a BIOS I've been using for years just fine, including to OC the CPU back when I set it all up. (good god the original build was Jan 2014, time flies)

 

Anyway I was first thinking maybe my Windows 10 install or boot SSD had gone bad, but then I saw the problem in the BIOS and to my understanding that would point to CPU/MOBO/RAM, right?

 

Any trouble-shooting I could do to narrow this down, or is this a known issue I'm ignorant on?

 

i7-4770k OC'd to 4.4 ghz

Asus Sabertooth Z87 Tuf MOBO

2 x 8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3-2866

Nvidia RTX 2070 Super

Corsair AX 760i

Boot Drive: Samsung EVO 480 GB

 

Edited July 23, 2020 by DanTheMuffinMan
Spelling

[TheBean]

this is going to sound dumb... but are you sure the mouse is not broken? try it on another pc and see if its working normally. 

[DanTheMuffinMan]

Ah yes, confirmed working mouse, I actually have 2 mice connected to this PC and they both work fine once I'm in Windows and are buggy in BIOS. Since it's also the keyboard inputs messing up (in BIOS only, again fine in Windows) that would lead me to believe it is not the input device.

[bmx6454]

i would try with only one stick of ram at a time, see if it goes away with one, or the other.

[DanTheMuffinMan]

13 minutes ago, bmx6454 said:

i would try with only one stick of ram at a time, see if it goes away with one, or the other.

I'll give that a try tomorrow, for what it's worth I ran the Windows Memory Diagnostic Test which came back with 0 problems.

[DanTheMuffinMan]

22 hours ago, bmx6454 said:

i would try with only one stick of ram at a time, see if it goes away with one, or the other.

I tried each stick of ram one a time and got the same issues in BIOS each time, so I guess it's not the RAM...

[DanTheMuffinMan]

Bump for additional help.

[Tan3l6]

Have you tried reseating CPU to socket and also are temperatures in normal range?

[DanTheMuffinMan]

3 hours ago, Tan3l6 said:

Have you tried reseating CPU to socket and also are temperatures in normal range?

No, I haven't tried that, I'd like to avoid it if possible, I don't think it's a CPU-socket problem since I can still do everything fine once I get into Windows (barring the occasional weird crash) including gaming, but let me know if I'm just ignorant there.

 

Temps seem normal, low 40's under normal use, maxing out at 60 during a quick cinebench test.

 

EDIT: Should also mention nothing has changed about my physical components this year and I haven't touched the CPU/cooler in years.

[DanTheMuffinMan]

Last ditch bump for more ideas

[Flubbles]

My money is on a bad mobo

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, Flubbles said:

My money is on a bad mobo

I'd put mine into a new system, but agreed. Mobo/bios.

[DanTheMuffinMan]

18 hours ago, ShrimpBrime said:

I'd put mine into a new system, but agreed. Mobo/bios.

That's what I was afraid of. Unfortuantly I'm one of the laid-off masses so now's not a great time to buy a new mobo/cpu/ram.

[DanTheMuffinMan]

The wierdness grows, now my PC is non responsive in Windows and shows the wrong time.

[Guest]

That sucks.

 

Have you tried a fresh installation on a new drive, removing the old drives?

 

 

[DanTheMuffinMan]

4 hours ago, ShrimpBrime said:

That sucks.

 

Have you tried a fresh installation on a new drive, removing the old drives?

 

 

I have not, since the problems are present while using the BIOS I assumed that meant the problem couldn't be with the drive or windows installation, is that an incorrect assumption on my part?

[Guest]

Just now, DanTheMuffinMan said:

I have not, since the problems are present while using the BIOS I assumed that meant the problem couldn't be with the drive or windows installation, is that an incorrect assumption on my part?

Yes and no.....

Windows EUFI is linked to bios.

So time change in windows will change time in bios and Visa versa.

 

It's worth a shot honestly. 

[DanTheMuffinMan]

1 hour ago, ShrimpBrime said:

Yes and no.....

Windows EUFI is linked to bios.

So time change in windows will change time in bios and Visa versa.

 

It's worth a shot honestly. 

OK, I'll try wiping my smaller ssd and installing windows on that and see if it makes a difference.

[DanTheMuffinMan]

Update: So as recommended I re-installed windows a month ago and for a time that seemed to fix the issue. However the past two days I've gotten the attached screen when booting up my pc. It looks like my oldest HDD is starting to fail, which is fair I think I'd have that drive for like a decade at this point and all it holds is games. However I'm not 100% sure it's related to my issues since this is NOT the boot drive. Could anyone shed any light on whether or not an error in a non-boot drive HDD could lead to the issues I've experienced? 

[DanTheMuffinMan]

Update: Well ladies, gentlemen and future googlers it looks like removing the bad drive, even though it wasn't the boot drive, cured the issues my PC has been having. So far it's been perfectly stable.