problem with pc it hangs out of the blue

[tooya777]

recently i have been experiencing problems with my pc every now and then it hangs out of nowhere may it be when im playing games, browsing the net, watching videos, or leaving my pc idle. i dont have any idea whats wrong if its my motherboard or my vid card or a virus. my system specs are:

asus p5s-mx se motherboard
ati radeon x1900
1x2gig ddr2 ram
1x512mb ddr2 ram
1.8ghz intel dual core proc
win+ 550w power supply

if anyone can help me in any way just tell me please because i can barely do anything on my pc now since it hangs at a random time i can barely play games or even do projects xD thanks guys

[pharoah]

first thing id try is yank that 512 stick of ram out.try it with just the 2gig stick see if that helps.also does your motherboard support sticks of ram that large?

[Mcninjaguy]

specs are this for the motherboard

- LGA775 socket for Intel® Core™2 Duo/Pentium D/Pentium 4/Celeron
- SIS 671FX+SIS 968
- FSB 1066/800/533MHz
- Single-channel DDR2 667/533
- SIS Mirage 3 Integrated Graphics
- 2x SATA 3Gb/s with Raid 0, 1 funtion
- Gb LAN

2 x240-pin DIMM, Max. 4 GB, DDR2 667/533/400 Non-ECC,Un-buffered Memory

so I would have 2 matching sticks of ram and sell that 512mb of ram ram of keep for, I dunno as a spare i guess

[tooya777]

i took out my 512 ram stick and yeah it still freezes up twice while running games (Test Drive Unlimited and, dawn of war 2) how would i know if my ram is compatible with my motherboard? and if its not could it really cause the pc to freeze?

[Mcninjaguy]

what speed is the 2 gb ram stick? 800mhz?

if its 800mhz it might be imcompatible and the motherboard has to slow it down manually

[dai]

which model ati radeon x1900

[tooya777]

its just the ordinary x1900 and as for the ram speed im not sure its been a year since i bought the ram cuz i had a diff mobo then how do i check the speed of the ram?

[Mcninjaguy]

download CPU-Z
and post a screen shot of the "SPD" tab
http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

[tooya777]

[Mcninjaguy]

so your ram is 667mhz (5300)

that ram should be fine

use memtext86
http://www.memtest86.com/

it show if your stick of ram is ok. let it test overnight, but I don't really suspect your ram anymore

I think your CPU is overheating

download Everest and check the CPU temp during idle
http://majorgeeks.com/download4181.html

[dai]

this will monitor temps while running

http://www.download.com/Core-Temp/30...-10794077.html

check the voltage range of your ram on the kingston site and see if you have room to lift it

[tooya777]

ok heres the updates. recently it hasnt hanged as much which im thankful for guys thank you. as for everest maybe im noob at it but i cant find the details you asked me for mcninjaguy. but as for coretemp my it reported tjmax at 100 oC core 0 being at 55 oC and core 1 at 56 oC Dai

[Mcninjaguy]

are those temps at idle or load?

[dai]

they are to hot even under load

blow the dust out with a can of air and redo the paste on the cpu with some arctic silver

http://www.arcticsilver.com/arctic_s...structions.htm

[tooya777]

ok ill try to see if the local shops have those here. god the phil sucks for pc parts xD

[tooya777]

UPDATE i dont know if this is my windows that has a problem or if its my mobo but recently ive been experiencing alot of hangs and usage spikes in my cpu at first i thought it might be a virus so i scanned and even reformatted my pc and reinstalled everything. and recently i checked task manager and i saw that my cpu usage was irregular because apparently my cpu is only using one of the 2 cores of my proc. my proc is a intel dual core 1.66ghz and my mobo is a p5s mx-se i run with a 2 gig 667 ram and a ati radeon x1900 please help

[Mcninjaguy]

yea what are you idle at for processor percentage. The CPU never uses both cores equally

[tooya777]

i usually torrent or listen to music but its weird cuz when i get spikes my 1st core is at 56% and my 2nd core is at 2% thats so unequal the hangig problem still hasnt been fixed but like i said it doesnt always hanged i played mirrors edge and dow2 for 5 hours till it hanged sometimes it hangs like 3 mins after i start my pc. when im idle its usually like 2-7% but gets random usage spikes up to 60%

[Mcninjaguy]

yea 60% is when you're opening new windows and stuff like that, i get that too

I'm more worried about you're CPU temps than what seems like normal CPU operations

did you blow the dust out of your comp and redo the thermal paste yet?

you only need a grain of rice of thermal paste and spread to a very thin layer of your CPU then attach the heatsink

[tooya777]

i cleaned my mobo. i cant find a oxygen spray here and as for the cooling paste nobody sells but im trying to order the shops here have the paste but only apply it if you buy a new mobo or proc so yeah im in a tight predicament. but before i had the exact same mobo up until it got damaged due to a voltage spike in the local electric company in my area and that same mobo never hanged like this one. so im at a point where im considering replacing my mobo if i can save but im also worried what if its the proc that has a prob not my mobo