Hello, I'm having a terrible problem with my computer, and I think it's my motherboard that is causing the trouble. I have ASUS M2N-X plus motherboard with AMD Athlon 64 LE-1640 CPU @ 2.7 GHz, ASUS Radeon X1550 Series with HyperMemory 512 MB (but showing 1024 MB in system properties) Now, the issue started for quite some time, it's just freezing, anywhere, anytime. At first, those freezing issues were rare, say... once a month, but then they became often and often. The first episode started like this: While either surfing the net of playing any game (Plants vs. Zombies back then) the system freeze and the only way to get it back was to hit the Reset button. The freeze was happening very often, until, after after pressing Restart (usually the BIOS checkup for anything attached to the mobo), it shut down completely. I pressed the Power button, again, usually checkups, and again shutdown. I've been doing this for 30 mins, and after that, the freeze was happening viceversa, often then rarely. After anothe year, the same issue came up again. During this year the mobo was functioning properly. Now, it's the same. Powering up will shutdown completely. If, it doesn't shutdown, and somehow it is able to run, it will not last. It will either freeze during memory counting, either during checking up for any physical drives, either during windows loading, either after windows is loading. It doesn't have a fixed moment when freezing... After hitting Restart again, the system repeats that issue. This issue happened since last year, so I didn't got any clue for why my system behaves like that. Now i have an Intel based mobo, but... during games like Counter-Strike, i get huge FPS brakes, from 100 fps to 20 fps, when viewing team or enemies, things that didn't happened with the ASUS mobo. Even AION works awful, even with low settings in graphics, while with the ASUS mobo, it went smooth at high settings graphics, although the CPU is 2.8 GHz. I have tested already every component, including the CPU. Memories are ok, HDD is ok, the video board is ok, DVD-RW unit is ok. I already cleared BIOS several times, even tried a new battery. I have no idea what is wrong. Any ideas?
Test ram with memtest86. Test Hard Drive Check for heat issues, e.g. dust/blocked CPU/GPU fan or heatsink. If all above is fine then it's possibly your PSU.
Memories were tested for over a month on another computer, no issues HDD tested with HDD tune, all are OK PSU checked for swollen capacitors. Also, the mobo was checked for swollen capacitors. Nothing wrong.
I found out the Intel based mobo is ECS P4M-9000 Memories were tested on another system for over a month. I even got them on the ECS P4M-9000 mobo. HDD also tested with HDD tune. Everything works fine, and are on the ECS P4M-9000 mobo. However, this Intel based mobo has a OnBoard video that I cannot disable, and it works worse than with the other mobo, the ASUS one. It is equipped with Intel Celeron @ 2.8 GHz, thus, better than my AMD Athlon 64 @ 2.7 GHz. It should work better technically. Also, the heat sink was clean all the time. I did saw what dust can do to a computer. The PSU is also clean... functioning properly on the ECS P4M-9000 mobo.
Wait What? ? The A64 is at least twice as fast as that shltty Northwood. No wonder your games run like crap.
That Intel processor is 2.8 Ghz, and the AMD Athlon 64 is 2.7 GHz. How come Athlon is faster? Or my blonde hair betrays me... again... On the P4M-9000 mobo there is the OnBoard video which i cannot disable it from BIOS
Onboard video should be disabled automatically when a video card is installed. The Celeron and the A64 use completely different architectures, CPU clock speed helps, but it isn't everything. For example my FX 8320 at 4.8Ghz is about the same as a 4Ghz i5 2500K. Kinda like a big V8 Cadillac vs a 4 cylinder Porche. The Cadillac may have a bigger engine but the Porche is still faster..... Anyway, it's quite possible the PSU is causing freezes with your rig, do you have another PSU you can test with?
Yes, sure i'm very... resourceful, although keeping it would be a problem Any idea why the PSU might be behind this? I mean... on the new architecture it performs brilliantly, no problem, no nothing. Why is it performing bad on that specific piece of mobo? I'll gonna strip the computer to get the motherboard "outside the box". If the PSU might be the problem, then, the ASUS mobo might have some burned "tissue" on it... hopefully I don't have to replace it, 'cause that's an old mobo for these days... dunno where i'll gonna get one.
Now I'm confused; didn't you say both systems were freezing up? Or was it just the Intel? Anyway PSU's wear out and when they do voltage fluctuation can happen which causes freezing. However since you just said only 1 system freezes up it's probably not the PSU. If the Intel rig is the only one with issues your CPU is to blame, as it's only single core.
No, just the ASUS one. The ASUS motherboard I've changed the motherboard only. The other equipement is the same. ASUS freeze, P4M-9000 doesn't LE. The AMD Processor was tested, along with the RAM on a different system. They all worked. So it isn't the CPU.