Computer been unstable for years, nothing seem to remedy the problem.

[Ungwelianti]

2013 I purchased the base of the computer I'm still using today, currently has the following hardware.

 

Asus rampage IV Black edition

Xeon 2697v2

Corsair VENGEANCE® Pro Series — 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3 DRAM 2133MHz C11 (kit)

a couple of SSD's (2x250gb in Raid-0) 1x250gb System

2x NVMe drives in separate PCI-e controller cards (does not change the situation I'll describe below)

Zotac GTX 1070 AMP!

Corsair HX850i PSU (Brand new)

 

I have since around 2016 (as I can remember it) Had some problems with this setup. What happens is that randomly (it seems) mostly if I'm playing games, watching videos but really any moment my screen turns black, The sound is still running in the background and then the sound also stops, the computer never reboots or showing any crash/error messages it just turns black.

 

I have Change the PSU from a Corsair HX850W which I purchased when this computer was built, I have changed the CPU which used to be a i7 4930K, I have changed the GPU to the one in my GF's computer (GTX 970) Changed SSD's, tried different PCI-E ports for the GFX card, changing between GEN2 - GEN3 on PCI-E ports, upping voltages, overclocked, running defaults. Absolutely nothing seem to work and never did.

 

It seems like I can make all this somewhat more stable sometimes, but it's really a hit or miss with OC'n or not, but preliminary overvolting certain things in DIGI+ RAM and what not. I'm almost totally unable to run my DDR's at it's given clockspeed (I'm aware of the support only reaching to 1866mhz)

 

I have yet to try my gf's DDR's into my comp, but been running several memory tests and they have always come out clean.. Of course I have already suspected that my motherboard might be defect, as it's only THAT or the Memory modules left that could be faulty/causing this thing. But I have also read that others have had similar problems during the years of looking for a solution, and with this particular motherboard. 

 

I suppose it's quite obvious that it is my motherboard that is the culprit, but maybe there are some settings I could try in the BIOS that I haven't thought of or tried yet?

 

As mentioned above, sometimes it seem to be more stable with certain BIOS settings, but I'm not totally confident that has all to do with it. But I've had times where this problem haven't happened for up to or even over a week, when it usually happens almost every day, and even several times a day. I usually let my computer run during the night, maybe 50% of the times I have to reset the computer as it has locked this way.

 

Oh and every time this happens and when I restart, I'm hit with the message saying "the Overclock settings failed bla bla" something, Hit F1 for Setup, even though I haven't OC'd anything, but running Optimized defaults.

 

Also, I've always had problems with my Corsair Watercooling, I used to have a H100i, now I've got H150i Capellix, and literally every time this crash happens I have to go into bios and change USB , forgot what it was but say it's between LEGACY AUTO and ENABLED settings, or it won't register with windows, thus it's running in default hardware settings.

 

Also, the chipset (OC'd or not) Chipset/VRM's? The cooled parts on the Motherboard, seem quite hot to the touch, haven't got an IR thermometer so can't check that way, but it's showing ~80-95C in HWmonitor, although it's only showing ~40C in the BIOS, I know HWmonitor can show these temps wrong though. But I'm guessing if it was actually 90C+ then I'd actually get burned touching the heatsinks, so maybe it's all as it should on that part.

 

So, what's your take on this? Does it seem like it's the motherboard that's faulty, or could it be settings? Could it be something else disturbing the system, or is it the RAM?

 

I'm asking NOW, mainly because it's not the perfect time to get a new computer, everything is overpriced and/or hard to come by, so I would hope to find a solution (if there is one) Rather then the 2nd option. Economy isn't the best right now either

[Hairless Monkey Boy]

You have the RAM installed in the correct slots? And you've tried running it at 1600MHz?

 

[Dutch_Master]

If you're OC-ing and you have stability issues, DON'T OC! Do a full CMOS reset on the system and let it run some benchmarks for a day or so. Keep it stock speeds, so NO OC!

 

First rule of overclocking: if you can't, don't.

[Hairless Monkey Boy]

3 minutes ago, Dutch_Master said:

If you're OC-ing and you have stability issues, DON'T OC!

 

11 minutes ago, Ungwelianti said:

tried different PCI-E ports for the GFX card, changing between GEN2 - GEN3 on PCI-E ports, upping voltages, overclocked, running defaults.

 

11 minutes ago, Ungwelianti said:

but it's really a hit or miss with OC'n or not

 

11 minutes ago, Ungwelianti said:

even though I haven't OC'd anything

 

11 minutes ago, Ungwelianti said:

(OC'd or not)

 

[Dutch_Master]

@HairlessMonkeyBoyAnd how did he "un-overclock" his system? Unless he does a full CMOS reset, you can't be sure any remnants of the OC attempt are gone. further testing needs a methodical approach: test one RAM stick, no drives. If stable, add more RAM. If all RAM is stable, add drives, again, one at a time. And so on.

[Ungwelianti]

2 hours ago, HairlessMonkeyBoy said:

You have the RAM installed in the correct slots? And you've tried running it at 1600MHz?

 

Yes, I have put them in the correct configuration, also Tried running @ 1600mhz, even 1333mhz. I can't tell if it really helped or not, but It kind of have felt like lower clockspeeds on the ram have somewhat been resulting in less of these type of crashes. But as I mentioned before, it doesn't really seem to matter and I've been trying so many things, sometimes it just works better for maybe a week if I'm lucky, then quite often when i "jinx" it, yeah actually almost every time when I say something like "Wow, maybe I've finally sorted it out" then It comes back, and wow, it's almost as if I'm being punished by some outer force, because it tend to come back with these crashes A LOT, even more then usual. It's literally driving me crazy, as I've always been able to fix or at least find out what the problem is.

I'm not a rookie in this, been building tweaking and fixing computers for almost 3 decades for myself and many many other. That's why this thing drives me nuts. Going to try my gf's RAM modules, see if anything changes. (Didn't have any extra modules before she got her computer which is quite recent)

[Ungwelianti]

2 hours ago, Dutch_Master said:

If you're OC-ing and you have stability issues, DON'T OC! Do a full CMOS reset on the system and let it run some benchmarks for a day or so. Keep it stock speeds, so NO OC!

 

First rule of overclocking: if you can't, don't.

Think I did that quite recently, but to make sure I just did it again. But no I have not been OC'n anything since I got the XEON, well I tried it but not too much (BCLK) Couldn't go that far without disabling my PCI-E M.2 controller cards though. Basically the only thing I've been focusing on have been to add some extra voltages on memory controllers and what not. Never too far, as in, keeping within grey area so to speak. Done that of course to see if it would help with the problems.