stevrock

Well, I bought my first computer last saturday, and I'm popping my cherry with an AMD Sempron 2600 64bit processor (I think?), 80 gig harddrive, 512 3200 meg ram, dvd burner, speakers/keyboard/mouse, and a 17" flat screen CRT monitor.

Now, my question is, the first day when I bought it, the computer started up just fine, and ran great, and then it restarted itself. By restart, I mean like I reached over and hit the restart button. When the computer would boot back up, and windows would load, a window would say that, "Mircosoft has experienced a critical error" or something like that, and of course the error report and al that other garbage showed up.

Usually something like this I would just blame internet porn, but I haven't had a chance to surf yet

I brought it back, and they scanned everything under warranty and formatted the hd because they couldn't find any problem.
So I took it back, hooked it up, and then within 5 minutes, it went again (Say around 5pm last night). I left the computer on all ngiht to see if it would hapen again, and it hasn't happened since then.

Does anybody know what coud have caused this? I don't think it was a program I went and downloaded, because after they formatted it, it never happened again.

Thanks for the help guys...

Corey

iTrader: (1)

I had this same snafu when I first built my PC a few years back.
Random reboots.

It turned out if was the 52x speed CD ROM drive.
I also had a Sony CD/DVD burner in there, and I made it the master and took out the offending CD ROM drive.

The snafu went away after that.
You might try swapping out your drive with another one and see if it still happens or not.

Churnd

It's most likely a hardware problem, and I don't think it's the HD either. I'd bet either your memory or an overheating problem, but my hunch is the memory. Try www.memtest86.com for a memory scanning utility.

midiwall

Do you know what the video controller is? (edit: wow, that sounded cruel. What I meant is "do you know what _brand_ the video controller is?")

A buddy went through this with his AMD 64bit box... We traced it down to the video driver for his Nvidia controller. The key was to _back_ rev the driver...

This is the thread I had found for him at the time (August 2005):
http://www.planetamd64.com/lofiversi...php/t7473.html


To date, Nvidia still has issues on the 64bit machines.

stevrock

Sweet, thanks guys.

Now I just have to go and figure out what all those posts meant

ldivinag

my bet is the CPU overheating.

Lt. Dan

I read a story from a customer service guy about a computer restarting when ever anyone flushed the toilet.(No kidding, he said this really happened!)
Turned out the guy lived in a house that got it's water from a well, and the outlet he had plugged his computer into was on the same circuit as the pump for his well.
So everytime someone flushed the toilet, the pump would kick on and the slight dip in the power would cause his computer to restart.
True story!

Corey

iTrader: (1)

Nuthin' like a "crappy" power source 'eh

stevrock

I should tell you it has only happened after I started it up after being turned off for a period of time.

Pay up sucker.

It happened again, this time it was the afternoon, right after I rolled out of bed (worked backshift last night) and turned the comp on. Got my programs running for a couple minutes, and then *BAM*. I almost fell out fo the chair.


Now, for the wrench in the gears.

Around supper time I was sitting at the computer, and I heard a noise. I checked around the computer, and I deemed it to be my pop fizzing in the can.

Now, 8 hours later, I'm at the computer again, and I hear some noise. Actually, some music.
I check WMP, and that's on pause, check the volume on the speakers, you know, maybe it was just static in the wires or something, or just the normal buzz from electrical equipment. Open the task manager, nothing else is running that could make noise through the speakers or anything.

Well I start checking out everything around the computer, make sure it's off, then I check the speakers themselves.

Ladies and gentleman, I have 94.9 The Cape (Local radio station) coming in through my speakers.
I can adjust the volume on the speakers and nothing happens, but if I turn them off, it goes away. I unplug the speakers from the computer and it keeps going.

How could this happen? The frequency of the station being picked up and relayed through my speakers.

So weird. I think I'm going to have to call the priest.

*EDIT* Corey, that was horrible.
And my mouse won't work on a mousepad, only on a piece of corogated (sp?) cardboard.

midiwall

Have you looked into the maker of the video card yet? Again, the EXACT symptoms you're having happened to a buddy of mine with a VERY similar machine. Back revving the video driver fixed it.

Don't discount that ANY of the drivers could be causing something like this. That processor architecture is very new in the industry, as such, there's a LOT of new code running around.

Windows has ALWAYS (like WAY back) been vulnerable to drivers... One of the worst crossovers has been printer drivers causing issues with on-screen text.

If a systems architecture student were to propose the _real_ Windows architecture in a double blind test, he'd be laughed at. MS paints a pretty picture as to how separate "this" is from "that" but it's mostly smoke & mirrors. There're a LOT of holes in the OS which cause things like video drivers being able to cold boot a machine.

stevrock

So how would I got about checking them?

midiwall

The easiest place to start will be to install something like PC Wizard which will run through your machine and pull a lot of information about it.

Start here. Download and install the app, run it, and when it comes up it'll show you a "System Summary". On there is the type of video processor you have. Then click on the Monitor icon on the left side to get more info. Click on the "Video Card" line, then the "Drivers" tab and it'll show you the driver info in gross detail.

You can cut & paste from there... Share it with us and we'll figure out the next step.

I know this can be a pain, 'specially with the box rebooting, but unless you have more info about the box on paper somewhere, it's a necessity.

CynicX

this sucks its doing it with a new machine. If your some what computer savy I would start unpluging devices one at a time.

Example. Unplug the CD-ROM use the computer normally leave it on and see if it happens again. If it does plug the CD-ROM back in and disconnect something else. Keep doing this to all the devices and see if it finally works.

Might have something to do with the RAM also. Which wouldnt surprise me, I've always had new memory problems.

Another thing I would do is format myself and just install the minimum with all the latest drivers and all the windows updates. That will get rid of all that crap that the manufactor puts on there.

What brand machine is this? I hope its a brand name I know alot of cheaper machines will never work right. Guy I work with bought an E-Machine a few years ago and it would ALWAYS crash just from poor hardware design and setup. He ended up returning it and getting a Gateway (which isnt my fav but it worked alot better for him).

stevrock

Ummm, AMD procesor. That's about all I know. Forgot about this thread.

Today it was bad for the computer, unsure of why though. I'll get to work instegating.

stevrock

Well, here goes nothing...

General Information :
Place : c:\windows\system32
Driver : vtdisp.dll
Size : 1904 KB (1 949 696 bytes)

Properties :

Extended Information :
Device32-bit : Video Card
Build for : Windows NT, 32-bit
Created : Thursday 23 February 2006
Modified : Friday 19 December 2003
Accessed : Tuesday 28 February 2006

sasquatch

I read that already

and I was thinking......Question 1- were you connected to the internet when this was happening ? q2 - Do you have a firewall? q-3 Do you have an Anti-virus program installed? q4 - Do you have a Spyware program installed? q5 - Do you have a pop-up blocker? q6 - Do you open e-mail from people you don't know?

If you're answer to the 1st question was YES, then that's a BIG part of the problem. If the answer to anything after question #1 was no, you're very nieve



let me know

stevrock

1. Yes.
2. A couple.
3. Yes.
4. Yes.
5. I'm using Firefox.
6. No.

I noticed the first time it happened when I got the computer back that this program was the first thing installed, and it did it promptly afterwards.
But then the next question is, how can I have the software installed without screwing everything up on me?

I used the Sticky in this section as a basis for firewalls and spy ware protection, basically getting things that were recommended that I didn't already have.

86SR522REEFI

I dont know about you but I believe that not opening email from strangers was a good idea.

sasquatch

ok Steve..

lets narrow things down a bit more. What are the names of the firewall, anti-spyware, antivirus and such that you have running automatically when you boot up?

Are you using service pack 1 or 2?

What is the operating system you use?

When you get mail, do you have the settings to where you can *preview* it b4 you actually open it?

When you goto microsoft update, do you just download all the updates available...including the driver updates too?

For my spyware protection I use Trend Micro Anti-spyware and Webroot's Spysweeper and they work good together.

stevrock

Anti Virus is AVG free edition, the windows firewall and updates are on if that matters.

No idea about service pack, or which programs I have for spyware and firewall. I'm looking around for anything but I can't find them.
I think I'll go get some, just to be safe. (because I can't find anything)

I use Windows XP home.

I use hotmail, but I never open any attachments.