Someone, Anyone; a little help please

[G5]

G'day to all here at overclockers,

This is my fist post here although I have lurked around the site for a few years occasionally picking up on some really good ideas and tips, many thanks to all.

I'm not an uber OC'er as this post will undoubtedly prove and have felt that I could not contribute "we're unworthy" as I knew little or nothing about serious OC'ing. I have always ran my systems above spec picking up and using a stable setting that someone else had worked out; again many thanks to those who helped me set up rigs that were not too hard core in the past.

Yes I have a problem. ( long post )

My systems and building confidence have grown over many years since I first replace a 20 meg Hard drive and added an extra 360k of ram to my first Amstrad. I now finally have what I thought would be a dream system (nightmare). It should be stable, usable and have just enough edge to keep me working and playing without too much hassle. (WRONG) .

(please note this is not a new or total rebuild, it has evolved over time, and so I may have unknowingly introduced or resolved issues as I went)

Current System

CPU - i7 920 2.6ghz running @ 3.6ghz
MOBO - ASUS P6T Deluxe V2
RAM - 12Gb DDR3 OCZ gold 1600Mhz 8-8-8-24 1.65v
SOUND - Sound Blaster XiFi Titanium
GRAPHICS - 2x ASUS (Ati) EAH5970 2GbDDR5 in crossfire
PSU - Thermaltake Toughpower 1500W
C DRIVE - 3x Western Digital 10000rpm 300Gb VelociRaptor in RAID 0
D DRIVE - 3 x Western Digital 7200rpm 1TB Black in RAID 5
OPTIC 1 - Liteon DVD RW
OPTIC 2 - Liteon Light scribe DVD RW
CPU COOLING - Zalman CNP9700 on adapted base
CASE - Coolermaster 810 Stacker
CASE COOLING - 4 x 120mm and 2 x 80 mm diamond stealth fans

OS - Windows 7 Professional 64 bit

Problems / Issues

Last / Most recent system would not load OS - 0xc0000225 error , a recent hardware change (etc, etc)

History:
1. System has never quite felt right since changing out previous MOBO, CPU, PSU and RAM, (Dec 2009) - many "jerks" in screen and "crackles" in sounds
Previous MOBO ASUS a8n, CPU AMD FX60, PSU True Power 1000W and RAM 4 Gb of DDR 400Mhz also changed from Windows XP SP3 to Windows 7 64bit. (No OC'ing at this stage)

2. Four weeks later, (Jan 2010) PSU fried out, - returned it to place of purchase received and installed replacement (all worked well {except occasional odd crackle heard} did minor OC)

3. Replaced C Drive Array - new 3 x 300Gb WD VelociRaptors, previous 3 x 74GB WD Raptors. (no other change to system - system stable)

4. Replaced D Array - new 3 x 1TB WD Black previous 3 x 500GB WD Green.(no other change to system - system stable)

5. Replaced Graphic cards - new 2 x ASUS EAH 5970 in crossfire, previous 2 x XFX 8800GTX in sli. (reloaded all drivers etc lost Nvidia PhysX and reinstalled it) (system OC'ed to 3.6Ghz - temp 39C and stable) Played Metro 2033 for 6 hours with all settings Maxed, I truly could not believe how smooth and incredible amazing the graphics were. I shut down the system and went to bed with the biggest smile on my face "ever".

6. Next Day system would not load OS, it would boot to xpress gate no problems, I reset BIOS to default, and system would still not load OS.

7. I stripped out 1/2 of the RAM unplugged D Array, replaced a single 8800 card and still no joy.

Then

Stripped out everything down to MOBO, CPU, 3Gb RAM, 1 ati card and broke down the C array (loosing C drive in process ) tried to reload Windows 7 64 Bit onto restructed C array. It would not even reinstall from DVD.

Tried Widows 7 32 bit and it would install. Pulled out everything and started again this time MOBO, CPU, RAM Ati Card and C Array and Window 7 64 bit would and did install. { I don't understand this }

Reinstalled all hardware and system continued to run.
Reinstalled a lot of software and updates and the system continued to run
Re OCed - system still continued to run

Final round of updates completed including all new drivers, new BIOS and all Microsoft updates and on the last reboot the system Hung (locked during post after mem check but before SATA check. Hit reset and system booted fully.

System has now been running for 16 hours straight since then (I'm afraid to turn it off). All temps are really good CPU maxed at 39C there are still the occasional crackles and on the last boot there was a small green flash across one of the screens.

If anyone knows where/what the problem is could they please please tell me.

I'm beginning to think it could be either power supply, CPU, mother board or RAM or Video Cards or ,

I have never extreme OC'ed any of my systems and always watch the temps,

I don't believe this system should be behaving badly but I'm not sure what is causing the problems.

OC settings:
AI Overcloclock Tuner - Manual
Speed Step - Disabled
BLCK Freq - 190
PCIE Freq - 100
DRAM Freq - DDR3 - 1523Mhz
UCLK Freq - Auto
QPI Line Data Rate - Auto

CPU - 1.225v
CPU PLL Voltage - Auto
QPI/DRAM Core 1.26875v
DRAM BUS Voltage 1.64 (Bios wont let this go to 1.65v)

Line Load Calibration - Enabled
Spread Spectrum - Disabled

All others setting - Auto.

I don't know what all these setting do as basically I grabbed someones stable settings and have been using them.


Please help

 

[faxi]

Few questions, did you upgrade windows or do a clean install. Also did you have a raided volume for you're boot disk before? This sounds similar to a problem I had with raid when i was changing motherboards. I'm no super guru here so don't get your hopes up but it might be along the same lines as my problem.

 

[G5]

G'day faxi,

The change from Xp to 7 was a clean install, I did a backup of all my key files onto an external drive then formatted the array and then a fresh install.

The install was onto a RAID 0 array made up of 3 x 74Gb WD Raptors. When I changed out the 3 x 74Gb Raptors to 3 x new 300Gb VelociRaptors I did a clone using Acronis true image. Transfering first to an external and then back to the new Array, the system ran pretty much Ok after this. (except any flicker or crackle still had me a little concerned about hardware failure).

The change to the new VelociRaptor array was in March/April.

After the system "crash" I have done a fresh install of windows 7. (I lost my entire C Drive when I broke up the Array - and the last C backup I had was pre changing to Ati drivers so I deleted it from my backup drive and was going to do a new backup after some tidying up and defraging {didn't quite get that done }.

 

[faxi]

Ah, then its not the same problem mine was I installed windows onto a non raided volume with raid enabled in the bios I was thinking that might be the same thing only flipped. What about flashing the bios? I'm just putting out ideas now maybe we'll luck out and find something that works, or a SuperMOD will come in was wow us with his power lol. (that wasn't sarcasm, I have witnessed the powers...)

 

[TyrAntilles]

Hi G5. Like you say it can be from really many causes. "I'm beginning to think it could be either power supply, CPU, mother board or RAM or Video Cards or..."

It can even be a software problem (not too likely but who knows). For example I installed from windows update for Win7x64 a new ATI driver and at next reboot my system went BSOD. My luck is that I had a backup. After my windows was back running I was very careful not to install that update again. It was totally unnecessary since I use Catalyst anyway.

Your BIOS settings looks OK to me, so I suspect a hardware problem... but what kind...?!?! You can try to boot with Line Load Calibration disabled and see if you are stable.
But if your system hung after reset it should be something wrong with settings... maybe voltages on BIOS or even power supply if you hear crackling noises...
You should get your system running at stock without overclocking at all first and do some tests to be sure is 100% stable at defaults, then if it is, you can try to narrow down the problem step by step.
Sorry I can't help too much but this behavior can happen from many things.

 

[G5]

Thanks faxi,

I had done a BIOS flash because I thought it may have been a compatability problems with the newer cards.

Thanks TyrAntilles,

Interesting, when I changed the graphic cards I removed all Nvidia drivers and utilities etc and downloaded all new ATI drivers and utilities. After installing the system didn't do anything strange; but then again I was pretty keen on seeing what the new 5970s were capable of so I didn't do a whole lot of "stability testing".

I'll give stock settings a bit of ago and see what happens.

CPUID HW monitor has my 12v running at 11.77v Does anyone know what undervoltage is too little?

 

[OnDborder]

Welcome to the Forum! http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=491697 G5
I'd check the voltage with a digitalmultimeter.

 

[G5]

G'day OnDborder,

I have a multimeter, where do I test the PSU (cable colour please). Is there a thread about this? It also has CMS (Cable Management System) so any idea of where I should test the sockets?

When I shut down the system I don't know if it will come back up, so if there is a tutorial or a guide I can download before doing that it would be helpful.

 

[OnDborder]

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=403837
Just use the dmm on a 4 pin molex to begin with. Test idle/load. Yellow/black-12 volt Red/black-5 volt.
Then test the 24 pin atx plug by using a jumper wire to the green to black. Then check the yellow, red, and orange pins, grounding to one of the black pins.

 

[G5]

Thanks guys for all the help, so far.

I have rebooted the system several times now with no sign of the failure or crashing the system.

I will slowly do more checks but perhaps pulling everything out and then replacing it may have done the trick

Again many thank ......................................so far