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Geek Culture / Global Nuclear Thermal PC Meltdown

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 27th Apr 2013 04:03 Edited at: 27th Apr 2013 04:03
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Well, title says it all but... I dun messed up. I do not think I have had so much PC problems in one week haha! Hard Drive Failed this morning, blue screen of death, Possibly corrupt graphics drivers...

I have been noticing, some performance problems, and I knew my hard drive was near the cliff, but, the I really have no idea about my graphics card. I had updated, backdated, etc. I do not really know how to do it, and a friend of mine, said that my drivers were corrupt. First, an Nvidia update happened, and I was getting 120FPS, but with screen tearing, and frame skipping. I turned Vsync on which lowered the frame skipping and eliminated the screen tearing. At this point, I was getting 59.9FPS because 60 was causing some screen tearing. Another update happened and then I was only getting 50FPS and below, it would not go above 50FPS. Finally! Another update happened and now the FPS jumps rapidly between 50-58. I backdated to a driver that was last stable, but no result, and it only made it worse.

Also, this started to happen today, after the hard drive failure, although it recovered itself, some odd things started appearing, like artifacts of some sort. I think .



My Specs:
Operating System: MS Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit SP2

CPU: AMD FX 8350 (4.2GHz) 8-Core Vishera

RAM: 16.0 GB Dual-Channel DDR3 (7-7-7-20)

Motherboard: ASRock 970 Extreme3

Graphics: ASUS VH236H (1920x1080@60Hz)
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 FTW

Hard Drives: 488GB Western Digital WDC WD5000AAKS-65A7B2 ATA Device (SATA)

Audio: Sound Blaster Z

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 27th Apr 2013 04:45
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Well, now PC is reading 0C for CPU and -2 for Mobo... It must be cold, or lying to me! D:


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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 27th Apr 2013 13:22
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Apparently your CPU fans are also not spinning according to that software. Possibly BIOS/driver issue?

Have you got a big enough fan to get the heat off the CPU, and is the power supply sufficient for the rig?
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Green Gandalf
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Posted: 27th Apr 2013 14:47
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Check inside for dust?

I was having daily problems with my PC till I noticed an intake fan that I hadn't noticed or cleaned before. It was absolutely caked in dust, cat fur, etc. A good vac and the machine has been much more stable since.
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Benjamin
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Posted: 27th Apr 2013 17:05
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Rip the heat sink off the CPU, pour petrol on the motherboard, and throw it on a bonfire.

Or you could carefully remove the heat sink from the CPU, and give it (the heat sink) a good clean. Every so often I have to clean mine because it gets full of dust and fluff. I know when it needs it because when one of those naughty 100% CPU applications runs the main fan starts being really loud.

If you are unsure what a particular area will do then please consult the Assistance Table at the bottom of this page.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 27th Apr 2013 20:09
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I have 650Watt Bronze. Also, the install was new, and I clean it out of dust every week or two. So I do not think those are the problems(maybe). I did a PC shut down and turned it back on, the readings are there. I think its the hard drive, it can no longer start games, or read very much. I had a 3rd blue screen of death and I ordered a western digital black 1TB 7200RPM hard drive, and Windows 7 So, gunna try fresh install on everything on the new hard drive, smash my old one . I am going to not get the latest driver, and I think the frame skip was caused by windows vista, because right before it did it, vista did an update :\ I am not sure for what, but it said it was important xD. The same time I got a new driver for GPU. The temperature usually idles 40-48 when it is just basic use. For games, it gets as high as 55-58 depending on what game. CPU stays low 20% on games like BF3.

Another thing, randomly, I will close firefox, and my CPU will shoot to 100% and I Ctrl+Shift+Esc. and FireFox, BCU(Browser Configuration Utility), and Skype both are going nuts. Only happened twice. I stopped using those except Firefox and BCU, I think they are part of each other.

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Phaelax
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Posted: 28th Apr 2013 03:00
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If the temp sensors aren't working properly either your system has a software glitch, or I'm afraid to say your mobo is dying.

"You're all wrong. You're all idiots." ~Fluffy Rabbit
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 28th Apr 2013 07:57
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I think it was a problem in the hard drive, it cant seem to run things properly atm

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Phaelax
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Posted: 28th Apr 2013 10:30
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Well you said you had a harddrive failure. I suggest you backup your data as soon as possible and replace it.

Get a program to run a test on your harddrive which will also display the SMART stats.

"You're all wrong. You're all idiots." ~Fluffy Rabbit
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 28th Apr 2013 19:48
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Here is the SMART TEST:



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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 30th Apr 2013 02:47
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Anyone know what these numbers mean? Are they good or bad

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Green Gandalf
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Posted: 30th Apr 2013 16:36
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I was wondering exactly the same.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 1st May 2013 04:14
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Well, I got a new Hard Drive, and Windows 7 . It runs smooth, no more of these problems, but I have not tested any games yet. Although, there is screen tearing while scrolling on the internet, it just looks odd, but I do not mind it.

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Phaelax
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Posted: 1st May 2013 05:59
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Most apps should show the tolerance values and you'll be able to see if they're within range. What's your harddrive model? Seagate and WD both have tools for RMA processes that scan for errors. (although in my opinion, seagates was useless)


Quote: "Although, there is screen tearing while scrolling on the internet, it just looks odd, but I do not mind it."

Driver issue, failing graphics card, overheating causing failures, could be any of several things.

"You're all wrong. You're all idiots." ~Fluffy Rabbit
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Isocadia
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Posted: 1st May 2013 10:06
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Most say that I had screen tearing when scrolling in mozilla, forcing VSync trough NVidia control panel for firefox fixed the problem
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bitJericho
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Posted: 1st May 2013 21:36
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Those numbers looked fine. The smart test isn't the end-all be-all though, since replacing it seems to have fixed it that was probably the problem.

Visit my blog http://www.canales.me.
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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 2nd May 2013 01:57
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Have you tried Hard Disk Sentinel? Might pull some data out to give you a clue.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 3rd May 2013 01:15 Edited at: 3rd May 2013 01:16
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I replaced the hard drive, everything is butter smooth. Mozilla still screen tears and flickers sometimes, its a bit annoying. I will try the V-Sync and see if that works.

Edit: It worked! Thanks! If my Graphics card was bad, I could cry D:

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 4th May 2013 09:30
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Well, all hell broke lose one day, was playing, and all of the sudden, my game froze and then BSOD(Blue Screen). Right after new hard drive, everything seemed to be so fine! So I rolled back NVidia drivers, no more BSOD, few hours later. The Screen Turned black, game froze I suspect, and speakers made a buzzing noise, and the only way to fix it was to shut down or restart PC but since my restart doesnt really restart and just does really stupid things that defy human logic, and I shut it down. Really annoying, and now, its back to BSODing during Total War, Warband, etc. I think im losing my mind about this PC stuff, none of this happened before new mobo/ram/processor/GPU. Now games crash, stop working, don't update. Sigh... :\

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Isocadia
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Posted: 5th May 2013 11:10
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Have you tried running memtest to see if your RAM is faulty? I don't know about the black screen but I've seen screen freezing and buzzing noises from speakers multiple times happen from bad RAM sticks ( I assembled a PC for a friend of mine, got 3 bad Corsair sticks in a row.... Talking about a bad batch xD ).

But Memtest for the RAM, I don't think there's anything wrong with the GPU, since your sound also starts buzzing.
Also, I'd measure your CPU and GPU temperatures during the games where everything goes blue, might be that your fans aren't properly cooling your components. Besides that, I wouldn't know what could be wrong...
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 6th May 2013 00:15 Edited at: 6th May 2013 00:38
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Alright, I will do a memtest, if I can find it xD

Edit: I did not have this before, but when I was trying to shove my optical drive in, I was attempting to remove one of the ram to fit it in. Should I remove that one ram and see if I still get crashing?

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 7th May 2013 02:22
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Should I just pull one of the RAM sticks out, play something and see if it BSOD's? If it doesnt then the RAM stick I pulled out is bad?

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 8th May 2013 01:46
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Ok, I did a test and it ran for 15.30 hours. 5 Pass 0 Fail

It was still testing, but I did not know if it keeps going in infinite loops.

So, does this mean a RAM stick is bad? I dont think it does

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Isocadia
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Posted: 9th May 2013 12:44
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If you've been testing for over 15 hours without a fail, your RAM is fine xD

I'm out of ideas. Have you monitored your system temperatures while gaming, see if they are running too hot?

Have you tried putting in another GPU if possible? Because after all this, it might also be your motherboard that's the culprit. Might wanna RMA it if it's broken before your warranty goes void...

Besides that, I can't help you anymore...

Isocadia
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 10th May 2013 02:19
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Temperatures are fine, CPU stays at 55 full load, but goes down pretty quickly and has good ventilation. GPU gets to 70 at full which I read is ok, all the other temperatures are alright.

I think I have discovered the problem, I read the dump files of the BSOD's and I googled it and it appears to be a missing or corrupt windows file, that causes it to stop working. A lot of people had the problem and said to reinstall windows, so I did, and repaired it. Hopefully BSOD will not come back, or I will just read it again.

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 11th May 2013 05:50
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Interesting story, turns out. Mcaffee was causing the FPS problems and all, just not the blue screens $200 bucks wasted

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Isocadia
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Posted: 11th May 2013 11:56
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Damn, didn't know McAffee could be that aggressive xD
Well, I hope everything is fixed now
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 11th May 2013 20:37
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Everything except the BSOD's. They are all coming from that ntoskrnl.exe windows registry file. If I could launch off this effing disk for windows 7 to repair windows . So I contacted Microsoft tech support. They want $100 for Premium Tech Support so they can fix their already broken product -.-

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Isocadia
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Posted: 12th May 2013 14:42
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Have you considered reinstalling windows??? Instead of going through lots of tech support...
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 13th May 2013 05:07
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I reinstalled, and same thing, but I found out how to boot off the disk and I clicked repair. It says my version of Windows on HDD is different from the one on the disk, so it will not repair -.- Should have stuck with vista.

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 13th May 2013 05:59
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Here is the error.

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Isocadia
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Posted: 13th May 2013 08:59
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And you are sure you are putting in the windows 7 disk xD
Well, maybe someone else knows where to search the answer for this problem, because I've never seen it before
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 13th May 2013 16:28
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Well, the idiot I am, was booting off the wrong one, but regardless. Windows could not repair because it believes there is a camera or something attached to my PC that I must remove. Probably my sound card xD. I was up all night with microsoft, and I hoped they fixed my problem. Crazy me, giving screen control to microsoft xD

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 16th May 2013 08:05
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Well, things seem a bit better in the sense of no BSOD's, but it seems the games stop working before a BSOD happens. I suspect maybe the RAM in the GPU is maybe bad. The moments it seems like it would crash or BSOD is a loading like turning really fast, or looking at a new scene. I have GTX 670 FTW Edition which has 2GB of DDR3 RAM. The RAM on my motherboard seems fine, it ran for 15 hours on memtest and it passed a ton of times xD

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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 18th May 2013 01:44
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Well, now I suspect processor is bad, when I am playing, the CPU speed is jumping from 4300Mhz to 1500MHz. This means it is unstable right?

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Isocadia
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Posted: 18th May 2013 12:22
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Well, it might mean that it is overheating and the motherboard is automatically underclocking and undervolting it. Try to remove the heatsink, clean it and reapply, because I don't know a situation where a bad processor would only underclock, and not do any other strange stuff ( like instantly bluescreen ).
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Green Gandalf
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Posted: 18th May 2013 13:49
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Check and clean all the fans too.

I was having continual intermittent problems with my PC till I noticed a fan lurking in the corner of the case that I hadn't cleaned before. It was caked in dust. A good vac and 99% of my problems disappeared - and since then the machine has been in almost constant use (for several months in fact).
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 19th May 2013 18:26
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@Isocadia The temps are fine, I read up that it had something to do with windows power saver options, so I turned that to high performance and it went back up to normal.

@Green Gandalf I checked all the fans and cleaned them, but there was not much to be cleaned. Microsoft seemed to have fix the BSOD's. Now games just "stop working". The only game I can play half way normally is Mount and Blade: Warband because it is not very intensive. Otherwise Shogun 2, Portal 2, Battlefield 3. They play normally with normal FPS, and then "Game.exe has stopped working". My friend said it was a memory problem. Is this RAM, HDD, or GPU RAM? Games have a problem loading, like the game loads, but all the textures are blurred, and after about 2 seconds, it all loads, which it has never done before.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 19th May 2013 18:40
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The processor jumping in speed is just how they work. They lower speed to conserve energy when higher speed isn't needed.

Visit my blog http://www.canales.me.
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Green Gandalf
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Posted: 20th May 2013 00:30
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Quote: "@Green Gandalf I checked all the fans and cleaned them, but there was not much to be cleaned."


That's what I thought - till I, four years later, found a fan I'd not noticed before. Perhaps my case is bigger than yours ...
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Isocadia
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Posted: 20th May 2013 00:59
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Ok, small overview:

-You've replaced you HDD, so that isn't causing the problems.
-Your RAM passed 15 hours of memtest, isn't the problem.
-BSOD only happen during gaming ( intensive GPU and CPU usage ).

Some test I would still run:

-Run Prime95 with a blend test for about 2 hours to see if the CPU is stable. If no workers stop and windows doesn't crash your CPU is fine.
-Use 3DMark11 to test your GPU. Launch one of the GPU tests with every setting maxed out to see if your PC crashes. If it doesn't, the GPU isn't bad. If it does, it's probably the GPU.

Also, did you finally repair your windows installation or not? Maybe reinstalling windows would work if the GPU turns out to cause the problems. Maybe even reinstalling the NVidia drivers would solve it.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 20th May 2013 06:26
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@Isocadia

Results for 3DMark11: http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/6597586
- It did not crash, and everything seemed to go fine, although I was using the free edition It did not crash so I suspect GPU is fine.

Prime95: Ran for about 45 minutes, and the BSOD by IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL, crash address was ntoskrnl.exe.

- There was 8 workers, I want to say 5 workers stopped working right away, or 5 minutes in. At least half of them said Errors: 1 and the other half said Warnings: 100. Im just gunna guess my processor is bad?

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Isocadia
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Posted: 20th May 2013 22:34
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Then your CPU is bad xD

If it's still under warranty, change it. Test the new one, if that one also fails also RMA the motherboard, though I don't think that will be necessary.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 21st May 2013 01:05
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Alright, thanks. Guess I should get a better CPU fan while I am at it, but I do not want to take the whole mobo out of the case D: Was a pain getting it in, and the custom fans are huge!

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Isocadia
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Posted: 21st May 2013 10:06
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Just test a the new CPU first, and what cooler are you currently using?
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 22nd May 2013 05:40
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The stock cooler

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Isocadia
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Posted: 22nd May 2013 08:07
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xD, well, if you keep that cooler, atleast replace the crappy thermal paste they pre-apply on those things xD.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 22nd May 2013 16:33
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Yeah, I use Arctic Paste 5 or something, it had really good reviews. I never use that stock thermal crap.

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Isocadia
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Posted: 25th May 2013 15:56
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Arctic Silver 5 , but it's kinda outdated now. I believe ceramic paste has taken over the silver based pastes.
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Crazy Acorn
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Posted: 26th May 2013 08:47
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I really hope the processor is the one causing the trouble. I would hate to send it to AMD, and then wait 2 weeks, only to have the same problem :\

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