Random reboots, shutdowns, hangs, STOP messages and a bunch of other crap

After a month of sending my computer to different technicians, and with none having found anything, I have come to you, OC gurus for some help

Problem? When using my computer more often than not it will just shutdown(when it does i have to unplug the power cord for a few secs and plug it back in, otherwise it doesnt even turn on), reboot, freeze or give me a 0x8E STOP message. Every now and then when windows boots and tells me the system just recovered from a big error, and tells me it is most likely related to an uncompatible device driver.

Oh, and it messes up more often when the pc is being used, if I leave it off for a day, It will most likely run without a problem for a day aswell. It doesnt crash while using any particular application, I've had it mess up on me while gaming, internet surfing, even while it's idle!

I havent installed any new hardware lately, except for a video card I pulled out of a pc I was given, but it was about a month before it started giving problems.

I have no idea what's going on, Windows also takes like 4 minutes to load, when like 3 months ago I was on my desktop in like 2 minutes.

Everytime I sent it to a technician, the guy just leaves it run for like a day or two, and it doesnt show any problems, good, I said, until I came back to my house, plugged it in and have it crap out on me in like 15 minutes.

I've run memory tests, upgraded every possible driver, bought an UPS. nothing. I'm desperate here, If I only knew what's wrong I'd be happier.

Please help, and thanks in advance

Have you done the basics? Scanned for viruses&spyware, done a disk check and defrag? I'm leaning towards the viruses/spyware because you say it's taking longer for windows to load than it used to.

I keep my virus definitions up to date and check for new ones almost every day, but havent chcked for viruses in like a week. And am checking for spyware as of now.

I should also mention I tried formatting a month ago, but it kept giving me hell nevertheless.

If you just formatted and had the problems before and after the format, then it must be a hardware problem. Have you run Memtest86? or any diagnotstic utilities?

What exactly happened during that format? If you wern't able to complete it your drive may be corrupted now.

the format went smoothly.

Ad-Aware just found 4 spyware objects, and Spybot found 2, deleted them.

then I got up to get some cereal and when I get back i have a BSOD, STOP message 0x50. That's new for me

If it is of any help, the STOP messages are always about the file win32k.sys

and yes, Ive run like 2 different memory testing utilities and none has found anything

Well if you formatted I assume you're on a fresh install of XP. The only other thing I can recommend is trying a install/fix of XP. I've never had to do this so some one else will have to tell you how if you don't already know. Other than that i'm completly out of ideas, other than buying a new drive.

Kino said:

Problem? When using my computer more often than not it will just shutdown(when it does i have to unplug the power cord for a few secs and plug it back in, otherwise it doesnt even turn on), reboot, freeze or give me a 0x8E STOP message. Every now and then when windows boots and tells me the system just recovered from a big error, and tells me it is most likely related to an uncompatible device driver.

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I had intermittent problems like that and it turned out to be the system cache memory chips. I don't think memory tests stress the cache. But Prime95 does, so it should crash pretty fast using the small FTT setting. Can you turn your cache off in the bios?

I should add that according to MicroSoft, 70% of random crashes are due to device drivers that are out of date or damaged....though that usually results in the blue screen of death rather than a reboot. So check your device drivers so they are up to date.

i'm having a very similar problem with all the random BSOD's.

what kind of performance loss would be seen if you disable the system cache though?

Hmmm, thats starting to sound an aweful lot like a power supply issue. Do yourself a favor. When you boot the PC up, open up the side panel and make sure the CPU fan is spinning. Its enitrly possible that your CPU fan is dead and is making your Processor overheat.

However, the powersupply is making me very suspicious.... What brand and wattage?

iD10t said:

i'm having a very similar problem with all the random BSOD's.

what kind of performance loss would be seen if you disable the system cache though?

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It would be horrible, dont even try it.

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Kino if you would like us to help you, we need a *full* system specification

^^ hehe, kinda thought so...

now that you mention it though, it could very well be a power supply issue (at least in my case). as all the bad stuff started to happen after i got my Swifty pump that runs off a molex from the PS (TP430).

hmmm......

iD10t said:

i'm having a very similar problem with all the random BSOD's.

what kind of performance loss would be seen if you disable the system cache though?

Click to expand...

The idea isn't to do that permanently, but instead to see if it stops the crashing. If it does then you have your answer, its a cache problem.

it's a 350W no-namer

hm.... strange, problems started shortly after i got that new HDD and Video card, I hadn't seen it that way.

All the fans are running smooth.

BSOD's lately mention the file ati3d-something, so I'm still not sure power is the only problem I got

Kino said:

BSOD's lately mention the file ati3d-something, so I'm still not sure power is the only problem I got

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Oh oh, ATI drivers are the cause of lots of problems. I suggest you completely uninstall the ATI software and then search and delete any reference to ATI in the registry. Then reinstall the card once. That might well fix things. I had lots of problems with my ATI card and when I finally figured out it was the ATI card, I had over 700 references to it in my registry. I deleted them all, reinstalled the card and voila...it worked fine.

That would also explain taking so long to load windows. You have some kind of driver conflict and the puter is waiting for it to be resolved before it continues. Once you remove the ATI drivers from the registry (you have to use regedit and search for ATI) I bet the puter boots faster right away.

One reason this happens with ATI is multiple reinstalls or upgrades to the drivers. Have you done that?

reinstalls, uninstalls, upgrades... done a lot of that, since I can't watch video files on my computer when the drivers are installed =/ but when I use the windows crappy driver i can watch them

....what the hell, I search for ATI in the registry and it finds nothing, just takes me to random entried related to every program except ATI

Kino said:

reinstalls, uninstalls, upgrades... done a lot of that, since I can't watch video files on my computer when the drivers are installed =/ but when I use the windows crappy driver i can watch them

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Ok, figured that's what you did, because I did the same thing and my video was also screwed up.

Don't know why you can't find references to ATI though. What kind of ATI card is it? Are you using WinXP? When you search the registry you have to click on the top most item so the search begins from the top, otherwise it just searches a single branch.

It could be a driver problem, but it could also be your PSU. You said this started after you installed a new HD and vid card. Your comp could be drawing to much power for your PSU to handle now. I'd try fixing the drivers first. Go to ATI's website download the latest CAT's. Also download driver cleaner and run that first (read the instructions too). If that doesn't fix it then it probably is your PSU.