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Computer freezing watching videos online, possibly CPU-related

2K views 13 replies 4 participants last post by  Rich-M 
#1 · (Edited)
Computer freezing watching videos online, possibly codec related?

Hey, I've got a pretty annoying problem where the computer will freeze and monitor will turn black and speakers will play sort of a cut off buzzing sound. The only way to actually do anything is to force shut down the computer again.

This happens mostly while watching videos online but basically whenever the browser is running from what I can recall. It doesn't always occur either so it's hard to track down but when it does occur, I usually have no problem reproducing the problem after a reboot.

I have no problem playing games or anything else that may task the computer more which leads me to believe it is a codec-related problem.

Somewhat related may be that I have a problem with Spotify where it doesn't automatically play new local music in the play queue unless I specifically queue up new things to play.

Restarting the computer when it occurs ocassionally complains about the CPU being overclocked and this is the reason for the crash but I doubt this is actually the problem seeing as I've tried running it without any overclocking and running it at around 3.8-4.0 GHz (Turbo setting since the default CPU ratio is locked) and passing Memtest and Prime95 tests for 10 hours without any problems.

Computer doesn't crash due to overheating from what I can tell, freezing even when idling due to browser running or during Power-saving mode and is at about 40-50 degrees C.

System is about 1 ½ years old and this has been an ongoing problem ever since. At first I thought it was related to overclocking issues but it's really hard to tell considering the tests were fine.

Specs:
MB: ASUS Rampage IV Formula
CPU: Intel Core I7-3820, right now running at stock 3.60 GHz
CPU Cooler: Corsair H80i
GFX-card: Gigabytes GeForce GTX 660Ti
Ram: G-Skill Sniper F3-14900CL9D-8GBSR, running at XMP Profile #1, basically the baseline speed, voltage and latencies.
PSU: XFX ProSeries XXX Edition 850W
SSD running OS: Kingston HyperX 3K SSD 120GB (SH103S3120G)
HDDs: Some Western Digital 1TB HDD (WD1002FAEX-00Y9A0) and an old Seagate Barracuda 400gb (ST3400620A) running on a SATA-IDE adapter.

Running on Windows 7 Professional N x64, Service Pack 1.
Browser is Mozilla Firefox v 31.0 but IE does the same thing.

Running ESET Smart Security 6 as the anti-virus program.

What I've tried so far:
I've tried running Microsoft FixIt to remove any faulty codecs (Playing video files crashes or freezes Internet Explorer - Windows)

I also installed K-Lite Codec pack and tried tweaking various codecs that may have been offending with the Codec Tweak Tool with no effect.

Tried reinstalling & updating Adobe Flash, tried running with/without Hardware acceleration.

Monitoring voltages and temperature when the crash occurs with nothing looking particulary suspicious.

Probably tried various other things that I forgot to mention.

I'm sorry if I forgot some crucial information, I'm a bit scatterbrained like that.

Ask away and thanks for the help!
Zell
 
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#2 ·
Update:
I realized that I gave a poor first description, the monitors don't turn black, they display what was previously displayed when the freeze occurs.

And the sort of cut off buzzing sound is simply from power getting cut to all devices, including mouse and keyboard not getting any power.

I also forgot to mention that I've tried running chkdsk, found no issues.

I'm gonna try running Accessible Event Watcher from the Windows SDK in order to see if I can identify anything suspect occuring when the freeze occurs. I'll check the normal Event Viewer to see anything for reference when it occurs again.

Otherwise, maybe this belongs in the Motherboards, Bios & CPU-section? If I had to guess, this is starting to feel like it is related to the PSU or the motherboard acting up.
 
#3 ·
Just induced the problem, couldn't find anything reported aside from the obvious 6008 event-id (Qualifier 32768) in addition to Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-Power. PowerButtonTimestamp was set at 0, so didn't register me shutting it off, no other event data set either.
 
#6 ·
What Bios version are you running?
The last 3 including the latest 4901 were to "improve system stability"> ROG - RAMPAGE IV FORMULA - ASUS

HWM is not reading the voltages for the 12v 5v and 3.3v(at least not correctly for the 3.3v), do you have the Asus AI Suite installed?
If you do launch AI Suite and click on Monitor > Sensor in the main menu to launch the sensor panel it should look like this Text Technology Electronic device Font Mobile device


Grab a screen shot of that lets rule out voltages if we can.
 
#9 ·
I'd suggest removing AI suite and any associated APPs such as fast charge as they can and are know to cause issues.
Also the PATA drive is fairly old tech now and will be coming to the end of its life as it is rated for 50,000 cycles, the MTBF wasn't stated in the PDF document for that drive.
 
#10 ·
Right, well I'm not running AI Suite. What about Intel Rapid Storage Tech.?

And I'm well aware it's old, I needed the extra storage. I've got money now to get it but I wanted to see where this was going before going out and purchasing anything.

Anyways, I've got BIOS v. 4901 running now. Will report back and see how it goes.
 
#13 ·
So far, I've yet to encounter the problem again. So if anything, it is definitely less frequent after removing the softwares and updating the BIOS.

It's a SATA-IDE bi-directional adapter.

I'm going to try and revisit the tests and see how it holds up, I've just been very busy lately.
 
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