PC Restarts when performing heavy tasks

[TheSephirothh]

Hi all,

 

I am looking for a bit of help for a friend, I have been attempting to help him troubleshoot his "random" restarts on his Windows PC. We have managed to narrow down what causes the pc to crash, being somewhat resource intensive tasks. Mainly when doing heavy gaming (Playing Overwatch he makes it through about a game and a half, then the PC shuts down and restarts). Sitting idle the pc also doesn't restart, however when watching YouTube videos he has said he gets about 15 minutes then the same thing happens.

 

We tested the GPU using fur mark for about an hour and temps stabilized at 75 C

Swapped the PSU for a larger unit, with still no avail

Ran memtestx86 to check the RAM with all things Passing

Reinstalled Windows to see if this was a Windows error, no issues there.

However, when we tried running Prime95, the moment he clicks start on the torture test the whole PC shuts down and restarts as if he was gaming.

 

I am thinking the CPU is unstable, we have watched the temps and they stay at around 45-50 when idle and climb to 65 C when under load, which I believed was ok.

I just wanted to get a second opinion on the matter before I tell him the CPU is unstable and he just needs a new one.

Any suggestions on what could be the issue?

 

System Specs:

Windows 7: 64 bit Home Premium

Motherboard: ASrock 970M Pro3

Processor: AMD FX-6300

RAM: 6GB (unmarked memory, presumably Dell)

GPU: Radeon HD 7770

HDDs: 750gb WD , 250gb Seagate

PSU: Corsair CX430W  / Corsair CX600W (Used in testing)

[InitializingDev]

1. Is there any overclocks? If so have you supplied enough power to the overclock in the BIOS or whatever overlocking method you use?
2. You said the memory is unmarked memory. Many system errors like these come from faulty ram. Especially random unmarked. Make sure its all the same brand if possible for maximum reliability

[TheSephirothh]

Just now, InitializingDev said:

1. Is there any overclocks? If so have you supplied enough power to the overclock in the BIOS or whatever overlocking method you use?
2. You said the memory is unmarked memory. Many system errors like these come from faulty ram. Especially random unmarked. Make sure its all the same brand if possible for maximum reliability

These are stock clocks, and the memory is the same brand, we pulled them out of a system he was previously using, which was an old Dell PC. We tried looking in Windows Event Viewer for any errors before the crashes and couldn't find anything at all.

[nmil]

1 minute ago, TheSephirothh said:

These are stock clocks, and the memory is the same brand, we pulled them out of a system he was previously using, which was an old Dell PC. We tried looking in Windows Event Viewer for any errors before the crashes and couldn't find anything at all.

Maybe add a bit of voltage to the CPU, but keep the same clock, my friend says that sometimes that helps with AMD CPUs, especially one's that are a bit older.

[Mark77]

PSU sagging?  Do you have a voltmeter?  Probe some of the rails, load it up, and see if you can replicate the crash conditions. 

[TheSephirothh]

Just now, nmil said:

Maybe add a bit of voltage to the CPU, but keep the same clock, my friend says that sometimes that helps with AMD CPUs, especially one's that are a bit older.

Any idea on about how much? I think it was at 1.5V when we looked in the BIOS. It wouldn't even run Prime95 normally without shutting down. I also turned off the turbo setting to see if it was the cause, but the same issue happened.

[TheSephirothh]

1 minute ago, Mark77 said:

PSU sagging?  Do you have a voltmeter?  Probe some of the rails, load it up, and see if you can replicate the crash conditions. 

We used 2 different PSUs with the same issue, also using different wall outlets and no powerstrip just in case it was dirty power.

[nmil]

2 minutes ago, TheSephirothh said:

Any idea on about how much? I think it was at 1.5V when we looked in the BIOS. It wouldn't even run Prime95 normally without shutting down. I also turned off the turbo setting to see if it was the cause, but the same issue happened.

Just edge it up slowly as you would when overclocking, then check it with Prime 95. Don't put too much voltage though. I think under 0.1 extra should be enoungh, but just go slowly so you don't fry anything. 

[TheSephirothh]

1 minute ago, nmil said:

Just edge it up slowly as you would when overclocking, then check it with Prime 95. Don't put too much voltage though. I think under 0.1 extra should be enoungh, but just go slowly so you don't fry anything. 

Thanks for the tip, I'll try and get him to do it tomorrow. If the issue persists, is there anything else to check?

[nmil]

Drivers maybe (probably not the problem though)

Check that you are using an 8 pin for the cpu, not a 4 pin, the cpu might not be getting enough power

That's I can think of.

[TheSephirothh]

Just now, nmil said:

Drivers maybe (probably not the problem though)

Check that you are using an 8 pin for the cpu, not a 4 pin, the cpu might not be getting enough power

That's I can think of.

Thanks for the help, I checked drivers earlier and that wasn't the issue either. When we were swapping PSUs we plugged an 8 pin into the board and still had the same issue. When he first received the CPU there weren't any issues but as time went on they have gotten more and more frequent. Hopefully tomorrow will yield some nice results. With it being an AM3+ board maybe I can put an old Athlon II X2 in it and see if we can run prime95 without restarting.

[2Fast2Quik]

Doing some research on your motherboard, it probably is your motherboard, just look at some of the reviews on newegg. 

 

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157582

[TheSephirothh]

1 minute ago, 2Fast2Quik said:

Doing some research on your motherboard, it probably is your motherboard, just look at some of the reviews on newegg. 

 

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157582

Thumbs up for you, I'll be sure to pass that information along. Side note, is there any way to test a bad motherboard other than just moving the CPU and RAM to another board and seeing if the issue persists?

[2Fast2Quik]

1 minute ago, TheSephirothh said:

Thumbs up for you, I'll be sure to pass that information along. Side note, is there any way to test a bad motherboard other than just moving the CPU and RAM to another board and seeing if the issue persists?

 

Ummm, not a hundred percent sure if there is any other way, perhaps googling the symptoms with your motherboard model? Perhaps a type of benchmark? I don't think there is a way. 

 

Adding on to your problem , I have never hear of a faulty cpu boot into windows so I am really sure that it's your motherboard.

[TheSephirothh]

2 minutes ago, 2Fast2Quik said:

Ummm, not a hundred percent sure if there is any other way, perhaps googling the symptoms with your motherboard model? Perhaps a type of benchmark? I don't think there is a way. 

 

Adding on to your problem , I have never hear of a faulty cpu boot into windows so I am really sure that it's your motherboard.

Hey thanks for the help anyways. Would a faulty motherboard instant restart when trying to run Prime95? At least we have narrowed things down. But I'd say you are right because if a CPU was faulty at stock clocks with turbo turned off, I couldn't imagine it would be able to idly sit in windows, let alone run any application.

[kronickiller]

 

whens tha last time u cleaned ur heatsink and re-did thermal pastes

[TheSephirothh]

Just now, kronickiller said:

check ur temps

whens tha last time u cleaned ur heatsink and re-did thermal pastes

Temps were fine. CPU sits at 40 C Idle and GPU under FurMark for about an hour was stable at 75 C. The thing is I can't get a load temp on the CPU because the instant it goes under load the screen goes black and restarts. Also everything was new. Purchased in February. So no new thermal paste since then and there was little to no dust in the system.

[kronickiller]

default ur bios and try to dial in as many settings as u can manually

might have to google alot of krap for your processor and motherboard to find its ideal normal setting

auto options are a bitch kill turbo options if u got em

drop ur ram to lowest settings maybe if u cant figure out what they are think 1333 is the default krap setting

[TheSephirothh]

2 minutes ago, kronickiller said:

default ur bios and try to dial in as many settings as u can manually

might have to google alot of krap for your processor and motherboard to find its ideal normal setting

auto options are a bitch kill turbo options if u got em

drop ur ram to lowest settings maybe if u cant figure out what they are think 1333 is the default krap setting

Everything is stock clocks. And turbo was turned off as stated above. The ram is stock at 1333 I believe, maybe 1600 not sure. The bios has never been changed or updated until I turned turbo off, which was done in this testing.

[kronickiller]

tried reinstalling? me and windows 7 never got along for too long lol

especially with crashing and scandisk getting ahold of the hard drive

[TheSephirothh]

Just now, kronickiller said:

tried reinstalling? me and windows 7 never got along for too long lol

 

The issue originated in Windows 10 actually. I thought maybe the OS was messed up myself, but then I formatted the drives and went back to Win 7. It's persisted across the fresh OS installs.

[kronickiller]

only thing u can try is dialing in all ur processor settings manually

i have had bad luck with amd and anything set to auto

[TheSephirothh]

Update: Contacted AsRock, they have agreed to send a new motherboard directly, hopefully this fixes it.

[2Fast2Quik]

1 minute ago, TheSephirothh said:

Update: Contacted AsRock, they have agreed to send a new motherboard directly, hopefully this fixes it.

Good for you. Hopefully it fixes it. If it doesn't I'd check out another cpu or psu if possible. 

[TheSephirothh]

1 minute ago, 2Fast2Quik said:

Good for you. Hopefully it fixes it. If it doesn't I'd check out another cpu or psu if possible. 

Right on, It would be the 3rd psu, although I wouldn't totally rule it out. Will keep the cpu in mind.