PC Lock-Up...May Be My Overclock.

[will h4x 4 food]

hello,
i have been noticing the past few days or so that my pc has been freezing and there is no way of getting out of it unless i hard restart. i have been having problems like this in the past and i never really got a solution to it. soo im really getting frustrated with it and i am just thinking about getting a whole new processor and RAM. i have an overclocked system with an AMD 3700+ OC'ed to 2.8 ghz. from what i know of is that its pretty stable. i dont have an overheating issue with my cpu so thats not the problem. The thing that i think is the problem is the RAM. its OZC "Performance" Memory(4*512MB) that is pretty crappy. It cant even get to stock settings while my cpu is overclocked. i have to set it to about 187 mhz for it to be semi stable and be able to play video. when its at stock i get all these little dots on my screen and it cant play video without freezing up. if anyone has any suggestions or answers i would really appreciate it. this must be at least the 5th thread ive mad regarding this.

P.s. this is a link to thread in which some other peeople are having the same problem with the same mobo and ram. http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?p=606377&posted=1#post606377

EDIT: my lockups only occur in games.

 

[lazer_viking]

Well, your problem is definatly your overclock. Run prime95 for 24 hours and then you will see how stable your overclock really is. My suggestion is to put your hardware back at their stock settings.
Also, your RAM should run at atleast DDR400. If not, then you've done something wrong. My suggestion is read up on overclocking a little bit more. I'm not saying that you shouldn't overclock, but I'm saying more research is needed.
edit: At any rate, more information is needed on your RAM. "Performance" series is not enough. What timings are you running? voltage? stock speed?

 

[will h4x 4 food]

messing with my timings really doesnt do anything except mess things up even more. im pretty sure the timings i have now are stock and ive messed with them a lot so i dont think it will help to loosen them up. i think the vdimm is at 2.7 or 2.8...dont remember...but it didnt help.

 

[bigr5026]

lol


4x512 is your problem

get 2 x 1gb and you will be fine

 

[Nitestick]

Well, your problem is definatly your overclock. Run prime95 for 24 hours and then you will see how stable your overclock really is. My suggestion is to put your hardware back at their stock settings.
Also, your RAM should run at atleast DDR400. If not, then you've done something wrong. My suggestion is read up on overclocking a little bit more. I'm not saying that you shouldn't overclock, but I'm saying more research is needed.
edit: At any rate, more information is needed on your RAM. "Performance" series is not enough. What timings are you running? voltage? stock speed?

my boy is learning i remember when you first came here with your FX-57 and i told you to buy that LanParty to overclock........


anyway bigr5026 has a point though slightly incorrect. i wouldn't call it a problem per se however to run 4 sticks of double sided ram you need to set the "Command Rate" to "2T".

i would like to see a complete list of hardware specs before i pass judgement. as lazer said you should run a decent length stability test and report back. in my opinion though, quite simply just don't overclock that far if it causes issues. don't bother buying a new processor for overclocking unless you are a career overclocker or hardcore enthusiast with money to burn.

basically could you provide all information including temperatures under load and idle so we can make an informed decision rather than use your assumptions.

 

[CrazeD]

lol


4x512 is your problem

get 2 x 1gb and you will be fine

I agree. From what I understand, AMD 64 chips only want to run 4 sticks of memory at 166MHz (DDR333 speeds).

I have 4x512mb too, and I went back to stock settings until I can get 2x1GB.

 

[will h4x 4 food]

yea thats exactly why i thought it was my memory. just wanted to clarify before i got new stuff. thanks a lot u guys.

EDIT: I'm positive its not my temps cause i have a zalman 3rd party heatsink with AS5 and my temps get to 48C at the highest. it idles at 37C. also, i set my ram to a 1/2 divider and ran prime for about 5-7 hours with no problems. i also ran a buncha other test programs like superpi and OC something...i forgot what its called. once i put my ram back to stock, everything went downhill. it may be something wrong with the processor's memory controller, but i havnt set the voltages high enough to burn it out or cause any harm to it. but im not really sure.

 

[reggie_da_man]

Well when it sets itself down at 333MHz your basically using a divider and the ram should have no problem running with the HTT freq. at 225 with the ram already downclocked. You'll most likely be able to get a more stable overclock with your new ram because it will simply be better quality then the old ram.

 

[lazer_viking]

my boy is learning i remember when you first came here with your FX-57 and i told you to buy that LanParty to overclock........

haha yea i remember that. i got that lanparty too, i love it.
i also got rid of that FX-57 and got a 4800. the 4800 is so much better. i easily got it past 2800mhz with watercooling (yes, i got watercooling). the fx-57 overclocked like crap compared to my new dual core.

anyway 5-7 hours with prime95 isn't enough. ive let prime95 go for 24 hours once. i came back to my computer and saw the icon was red, i went to get some water and when i came back it was yellow. it said "Torture Test ran for 24 hours, 15 minutes - 1 errors, 0 warnings." i was like "NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!11one". so that proves right there that 5-7 hours isn't anywhere near enough. After that incident, i let prime95 run 2-3 days during the week when i dont need to use my gaming computer for anything. that'll make sure that its stable. i guess the theory is if prime95 cant run indefinatly, then there is always a little chance that something could crash, and that could be right in the middle of a HDD write which i think can corrupt the whole thing (not sure, ive only heard that from one source)

 

[Nitestick]

i guess the theory is if prime95 cant run indefinatly, then there is always a little chance that something could crash, and that could be right in the middle of a HDD write which i think can corrupt the whole thing (not sure, ive only heard that from one source)

good theory. i agree. if you're going to say a computer is stable you should hold it to server standards which means being able to run at high/full load for indefinite periods of time. we all know servers can't afford down time and it's good to have your pc to the same high standards . that one crash every now and then that some people consider stable could happen at the worst possible time and put you in a lot of trouble. though the thing about corrupting an entire disk isn't entirely true, a windows (or any OS) installation can be corrupted to a point where it fails to boot, that happens because system files are corrupted. i have experienced this first hand, it tends to happen during the boot of a VERY unstable overclock, it happens during boot because at this point in time the pc is only accessing system files so that makes it a very high probability that any instability could corrupt the OS.