Windows 7 System Freeze among other issues

R

RBIII

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Feb 7, 2014
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So, I must say I'm at my wits end. I've been getting complete system freezes while going about my business, happening while doing various things. I could be simply browsing, playing games, watching video, and sometimes doing nothing. I don't BSOD, everything just locks. The mouse cursor won't move, no keyboard input, video and audio playback completely stop. Nothing responds. I've done the usual making sure my drivers are up to date, I've checked to make sure everything is securely connected (to my knowledge) inside the case.

In addition to that, while trying to burn discs or rip from a cd, my optical drive will "disconnect" and stop showing up as a connected device. In the same vein, i have two hard drives, an SSD and an HDD. When playing games that are installed on the HDD, the HDD will sometimes incur the same issue as the optical drive, and will "disconnect" (you can hear the remove device sound play) and no longer show up, causing the game to crash and force me to restart the computer. It only seems to happen when im playing a game (notably diablo 3), but never at any other time that i can recall.

These issues are all leading me to think that maybe there is a problem with my MB communicating with the devices attached? I honestly don't know at this point and am reaching out for help. I've been dealing with this with varying frequency on and off for about a year, trying to figure out what to do, and out of stubbornness have yet to ask for assistance.

Now, I know there are logs that can be pulled or events that you guys can look at to determine what the problem is, i just don't know what or where to look to go about doing that. As for what i've got in the case:

processor: i7-3820 cpu @3.6ghz
mb: asrock x79 extreme4
videocard: asus radeon hd7870 2g
ram: 16g gskill ripjaws

I don't know what else you guys might need, but feel free to let me know. I really would appreciate any and all help.
 
Solution
Perhaps the reason that there haven't been previous response is because the possibilities are numerous. The fastest solution...if available, is if you have a restore point or backup image that predates the problem's onset, use it. Otherwise, try sfc /scannow, scan for malware with Malwarebyte, do a full scan with your AV, run chkdsk etc. My hunch is that the problem is software based, not hardware, but you need to cover all bases.

EDIT: You said that all drivers are up to date, but in some instances (like video drivers) the most up to date driver may not be right for you.
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No one has any ideas? I was hoping to at least be pointed in the right direction. A few months ago my girlfriend posted some problems she was having on here and less than an hour later she had responses as to what she could do to identify the problem and potentially get some fixes.
 
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Perhaps the reason that there haven't been previous response is because the possibilities are numerous. The fastest solution...if available, is if you have a restore point or backup image that predates the problem's onset, use it. Otherwise, try sfc /scannow, scan for malware with Malwarebyte, do a full scan with your AV, run chkdsk etc. My hunch is that the problem is software based, not hardware, but you need to cover all bases.

EDIT: You said that all drivers are up to date, but in some instances (like video drivers) the most up to date driver may not be right for you.
 
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Solution
I understand it was a bit vague, and that's on me so I understand that. I've tried restore points in the past, that's something I usually do when there are problems but it hasn't resolved the issue. I keep on top of my malware and antivirus updates and scans, but I can give it another go and see what happens. I can run a chkdsk, and i can look into sfc /scannow since thats something new.

In regards to the drivers, when I put this rig together a few people tell me that Radeon was pretty notorious for having substandard drivers. Due to this, until about a week ago I hadn't updated my video card drivers in probably close to 9+ months since the previous time I did it was causing BSODs. I haven't had any BSOD incidents since these newest drivers, but the freezes still remain.

I know this is probably frustrating but I appreciate the response.
 
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It's not exactly definitive, but have you run a benchmark, like Unigine Heaven or Valley? I would be interesting to see if it would freeze on them also. If not, then your suspicion about the motherboard may be well founded, but I do not know how to diagnose that, except by the process of elimination.
 
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Well I'm rescanning with antivirus and the HDD disconnected itself again. I tend to notice that when it has to pull from the drive for an extended time, like when I were to play Diablo or in this instance scanning it, is when it "ejects" itself. I don't know if thats helpful or just a coincidence. It's a 2TB Seagate drive, if that makes a difference. Once I finish with the chkdsk and the sfc i can look at getting one of those benchmarks and seeing what happens.
 
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Ok, ran the chkdsk on both the main SSD and the storage/secondary HDD. Both showed there being no problems and didn't have to repair anything. Went to bed, next day come home from work, pop it on and do my thing. Just dicking around in Chrome and it pulls another freeze. Reboot, eat some dinner, come back and try the sfc /scannow. Says theres nothing it needed to fix. Now, is it possible to run the sfc on the HDD? When I was looking at how to run the check disk i found how to get it to do each drive, and when I tried to see if there was a way to do it on the non-main drive, I can't seem to find anything. Is this because its not possible? Or even if it is, is there no point, seeing as its not where windows is installed?

Anyway, with that being said I'll download a benchmark and HD Tune and see what happens.
 
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Oook, so, update. I ran the Heaven benchmark, had no freezes no crashes none of that. I ran HD Tune on the SSD and the HDD. I had no freezes during the benchmark or the scan for problems. I'm going to attack a zip file of all the results. maybe you can see something there that I don't, mainly because I don't know what I should be seeing.
 

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If someone else doesn't come up with a suggestion that helps, there is one thing you might try. Temporarily connect to the onboard video, instead of the stand-alone card, and see if it is the same.

EDIT: Make sure that the onboard video is enabled in the BIOS when you do.
 
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