Computer randomly freezes. Even reset button doesn't work.

[t1nm4n]

Your welcome, to me that voltage drop seems fishy, as if the Bios is still trying to initiate power savings mode and your frequency doesn't drop, that will cause a crash. You could try changing the minimum proc power to say 20% see if that clears things up for you. Not really familiar with Intel, but any freezing or crashing is bad for components. Hope you get it resolved.

 

[Xender]

What EVGA PSU do you have?

My PSU is EVGA SuperNova G2 850W.

Replacing my PSU does not solve the problem.

 

[wingman99]

My PSU is EVGA SuperNova G2 850W.

Replacing my PSU does not solve the problem.

Sorry to hear that, what have you not tried yet?

 

[catastrope]

Your welcome, to me that voltage drop seems fishy, as if the Bios is still trying to initiate power savings mode and your frequency doesn't drop, that will cause a crash. You could try changing the minimum proc power to say 20% see if that clears things up for you. Not really familiar with Intel, but any freezing or crashing is bad for components. Hope you get it resolved.

You're definitely right. And I think I'm close to solving the problem. Or at least that's what I think.

Tomorrow, I'll delete the ai suite (computer froze without this too, but perhaps disabling c state AND deleting this will disable all power saving options), and look for more power saving utilities of my motherboard to disable.

And then, I'm going to set a manual voltage to my cpu, something along the lines of 1.2 - 1.25 and try to stabilize the system. I don't want my system's core voltage to change, ever. I'm not going to OC the cpu, just going for stability here. I will let all of you know. Also, here is a list of the things I've tried so far, so that people can see how annoying the problem is, and how troubleshooting such problem is tedious.


Change my motherboard (it was maximus VIII Gene, and I upgraded it to formula and nothing changed)
Change my Power supply (it was another corsair 850w, and nothing changed)
Change my OS (it was win7, upgraded it to win 10 just to see if it would change anything. It didn't)
Changed HDDs all around (no combination worked, I tried all, even bought a new ssd)
Took it out of the case and placed it on a cardboard box to check if the issue was the case components. It wasn't, nothing changed.
Put my old GPU back (gtx 680) and it STILL happens.
Disabled network adapter, used a usb one. No change.
Disabled c-state, no change. (though this one should be done to achieve stability in the end I think)
Updated Bios.
Tried multiple GPU drivers.
Updated every motherboard driver there is (most of them have only one)
Changed my external audio card. Also, did nothing.

Two components I have not touched are RAM and CPU. But I've ran two memtests on the RAM and they seem error free. That leaves us the CPU, but I still think this is not a complete hardware issue but rather cpu combined with motherboard settings (default settings I mean) not playing well. Hopefully I'll fix it, with help of many others here.

I'll keep everybody posted of my findings.

 

[wh1sper]

Just froze... Error code 04 which refers to PCH initialization before microcode loading. What now?

EDIT: It can also be D4 - PCI resource allocation error. Out of resources. Can't tell if it's 04 or D4.

 

[wingman99]

Have both of you tried one memory stick at a time to see if you have a bad memory stick, also you could relax your memory timings to see if that will do the trick.

 

[Xender]

I still need to check RAM, GPU and CPU. Today I will test another GPU or run Memtest.

 

[catastrope]

Have both of you tried one memory stick at a time to see if you have a bad memory stick, also you could relax your memory timings to see if that will do the trick.

I've checked each memory stick on memtest individually. So I don't think it's that.

So today, I've created an XMP profile, and set my core voltage to 1.250 by hand. I've also disabled turbo so my cpu is working at 4.0 ghz atm. I've deleted all ai suite stuff from my computer, and also c-states and other power saving options (all the ones I could find, hopefully haven't missed anything) are disabled.

I've ran a two hour real bench test, and it passed with flying colors. Though HWMonitor showed my core voltage to 1.265, and it increase to 1.280 during the test, instead of the 1.250 number I manually set in the BIOS. Is that normal?

I'll continue using the computer today all day/night and will report back tomorrow.

 

[wingman99]

Memtest might not report bad memory, so what I'm trying to say is test one stick at a time and see if you don't have a freeze. Also you can relax your memory timings and see if you don't have a freeze.

 

[catastrope]

Memtest might not report bad memory, so what I'm trying to say is test one stick at a time and see if you don't have a freeze. Also you can relax your memory timings and see if you don't have a freeze.

Alright, let me try the computer like this for a while and I'll try that also afterwards.

 

[catastrope]

UPDATE: It's been two days, and no freezes so far.

I will post screenshots of my bios and every setting I've changed once I'm %100 sure that the system is completely stable.

But just so if you want to try it, what I did was creating an XMP profile and modifying CPU voltage to 1.250 manually (this number might differ for your chip obviously but I think this is a decent middle ground number to start). And also I've turned of CPU boost which means you'll use your CPU in 4.0ghz clock instead of 4.2. This might not be necessary but that's what I've done atm, will test more in the upcoming days. Also, you should turn off every power saving setting there is and delete AI Suite if you have it installed. So your voltage will be completely stable at all loads, which I think what was causing the freeze in the first place, as others have suggested here.

All in all, it was a terrible experience but I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now.

 

[Johan45]

Ahh I never thought to ask about AIsuite. It can be a real PITA. I usually recommend that people don't use it on a permanent basis.

 

[catastrope]

Ahh I never thought to ask about AIsuite. It can be a real PITA. I usually recommend that people don't use it on a permanent basis.

AI Suite itself was not the cause alone. I had a freeze without it being installed, but I realized I never uninstalled it AFTER disabling c-states. So, long story short, anything interfering with CPU voltage in an inconsistent manner = bad. Now I know.

I'll update one last time on Sunday, if there are no freezes, and post my bios settings for everyone to see. I have a very strong suspicion that it will be the same thing (therefore the same solution) for everyone else struggling with the exact same type of freeze.

 

[wingman99]

UPDATE: It's been two days, and no freezes so far.

I will post screenshots of my bios and every setting I've changed once I'm %100 sure that the system is completely stable.

But just so if you want to try it, what I did was creating an XMP profile and modifying CPU voltage to 1.250 manually (this number might differ for your chip obviously but I think this is a decent middle ground number to start). And also I've turned of CPU boost which means you'll use your CPU in 4.0ghz clock instead of 4.2. This might not be necessary but that's what I've done atm, will test more in the upcoming days. Also, you should turn off every power saving setting there is and delete AI Suite if you have it installed. So your voltage will be completely stable at all loads, which I think what was causing the freeze in the first place, as others have suggested here.

All in all, it was a terrible experience but I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now.

What was your CPU voltage stock?

 

[catastrope]

What was your CPU voltage stock?

It was 1.265.

 

[wingman99]

It was 1.265.

That is amazing that it works better at a lower voltage?

 

[Xender]

Well few days ago I replaced PSU, my PC works 2 days without crash, i thought problem is solved but suddenly it crashed. Do not be so optimistic catastrope but I hope you found solution.

Still it is unacceptable for me to disable turbo to make my PC stable, also disabling power saving features shouldn't be necessary - something must be broken.

 

[wh1sper]

I turned fast boot in BIOS a few days ago and I am waiting for the computer to freeze (the computer usually freezes once in 3 days while gaming). It's nice that you still have ideas about what to try. If my computer freezes, I'll give your advice about the voltages a go.

 

[catastrope]

Well few days ago I replaced PSU, my PC works 2 days without crash, i thought problem is solved but suddenly it crashed. Do not be so optimistic catastrope but I hope you found solution.

Still it is unacceptable for me to disable turbo to make my PC stable, also disabling power saving features shouldn't be necessary - something must be broken.

Oh, don't worry. I know not to get my hopes up. I've had 3 days without a crash last time I disabled c-states, then it froze again. But this time, since the voltage is quite stable, I think I'm feeling optimistic. We'll see.

 

[Dungeon_Master]

UPDATE: It's been two days, and no freezes so far.

I will post screenshots of my bios and every setting I've changed once I'm %100 sure that the system is completely stable.

But just so if you want to try it, what I did was creating an XMP profile and modifying CPU voltage to 1.250 manually (this number might differ for your chip obviously but I think this is a decent middle ground number to start). And also I've turned of CPU boost which means you'll use your CPU in 4.0ghz clock instead of 4.2. This might not be necessary but that's what I've done atm, will test more in the upcoming days. Also, you should turn off every power saving setting there is and delete AI Suite if you have it installed. So your voltage will be completely stable at all loads, which I think what was causing the freeze in the first place, as others have suggested here.

All in all, it was a terrible experience but I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now.

Any update on this? I joined this forum specifically for this thread. I've been having the same problem since upgrading for the last two months and its driving me insane.

Asus Maximus VIII Hero
i7 6700k
32GB Corsair DDR4

I've replaced just about every other component in this box including a new HDD and PSU. No luck.

I tried doing what you mentioned, sans the voltage as I wasn't sure how to manually setup a XMP profile? Then I got endless blue screens (memory management) on bootup to Windows 10. So I turned of XMP for now, but have also turned off the other 'power saving' options I could find (C-States, Turbo, Etc.)

I'm ready to throw this (now very expensive) box out the window.