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I've asked a question here before, in December 2013, about a hard drive I wasn't sure whether it was bad. Turns out it was just a side effect from a bigger problem. Symptom: It started with Windows 7 freezing from time to time. This is a different kind of freeze: you can move the mouse and some buttons respond, but things don't open or do what they should. After some time, everything you clicked all respond at once and it goes back to normal. After a few minutes, the process repeats.

Also, the HD's performance starts to degrade. HD Tune, running on the HD, shows a very bad graph. If I leave the computer off for a few minutes, and then run HD Tune from a live CD, the graph looks quite normal. If I insist on using Windows, the performance will continue to degrade up to the point where the HD will no longer be recognized. If I mess around a bit, it will be recognized again. If I immediately reinstall Windows, everything will work normally again, for about two weeks. This happened on several reinstalls. Recently, it started to take about a week, and then less, for the problem to appear.

First, because of some error messages, I suspected the GPU. Removed it, reinstalled Windows, and the problem came back two weeks later. I checked the RAM: nothing. Because the most impacted was the HD (which was the new one I had to buy, because the old one was dead for good), I switched the cables and the ports: nothing. I updated the BIOS and reinstalled Windows: nothing. I checked the temperatures and the voltages, and all seems ok. CMOS battery ok. Visual inspection of the motherboard doesn't reveal anything bad. I clean off the dust every six months (it gets quite dusty in that time).

My specs:

So, which one do I have to replace? The CPU, the mobo, or the PSU?

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  • Just out of general experience, the processor is probably the least likely candidate. The symptoms you describe make it sound like an HDD or controller problem. Since you've replaced the HDD, I'd guess the issue is the controller, hence, the motherboard. Unfortunately it isn't a cheap/easy thing to replace for testing much of the time.
    – MaQleod
    Commented Feb 3, 2014 at 23:50
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    "If I immediately reinstall Windows, everything will work normally again, for about two weeks" -- If you really had a hardware issue, then reinstalling the OS should not fix or mask that HW issue. The problem, if it was actually caused by faulty hardware, should have reappeared immediately after reinstall. So replacing any HW is not likely to help at all. If the problem is bad HDD sectors, then you should obtain a S.M.A.R.T. summary of the drive.
    – sawdust
    Commented Feb 3, 2014 at 23:59
  • Most likely controller driver issues, a corrupt filesystem or remote drives with bad connections (they tend to freeze all IO operations).
    – Johannes H.
    Commented Feb 4, 2014 at 0:01
  • @sawdust If the problem is not HW, I can't understand how it can be SW. Forgot to say: S.M.A.R.T. shows two yellowed items, but overall health is ok. HDAT2 shows no bad sectors.
    – GuiRitter
    Commented Feb 4, 2014 at 14:18
  • @Johannes H. If by remote drive you mean my secondary drive, which I use for data only, I don't think that's the problem. I also got it checked and all tests shows no problems, and it never misbehaved as well.
    – GuiRitter
    Commented Feb 4, 2014 at 14:20

2 Answers 2

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If your voltages are normal and you replaced your hard drive then its the motherboard. In addition, Biostar doesn't have a good reputation. All the Biostar motherboard I have had the misfortune of helping other people with are crap. Get an ASUS motherboard then you will have a rock solid board from a leading company.

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  • It was the motherboard. February 5th I bought a new mobo and left the old one for testing. Today I went to the same shop to buy a headset and the owner told me the old mobo was showing all sorts of failures, to the point of bricking a processor! He said it's the first damaged processor of its generation that he had seen. He sent it to warranty and hopefully he'll get a new one for free.
    – GuiRitter
    Commented Feb 22, 2014 at 13:32
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Some testing/troubleshooting suggestions:

  1. PSU - Get a PSU tester. Or if you have a multimeter, perform a manual test. If performing a manual test, I would read this guide before attempting.
  2. CPU/Mobo/RAM: Get a live CD such as Inquisitor to stress-test your computer. If nothing is found, then it becomes harder to troubleshoot issues such as this. You mentioned you tested RAM, but not the methodology. I prefer using something like Memtest86+ and letting at least 2 tests complete. But Inquisitor has you covered on this one too.
  3. HDD - For simple tests, download the HDD manufacturer's testing tool. But it looks as if Inquisitor has a built-in test.

Hope some of this helps.

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  • I've ran two passes on Memtest and all is ok. I've booted Inquisitor 3.0 x64 and, after selecting "Hardware Check", the screen went blank (monitor still receiving video signal), the CD doesn't seem to be spinning and the HD led is dimly lit. According to screenshots, It shouldn't do nothing before another input from me, so I'll reboot and try to make this live CD work.
    – GuiRitter
    Commented Feb 4, 2014 at 15:57
  • Performed a manual test with a multimeter. I wanted to do this before, but it took a while to realize I can reach the pins from the back side of the connector. The −12 V pin was reading −11,3 V. Seems to be within tolerance. I also managed to run Inquisitor 3.1 x86. I ran the non-destructive loop, but I couldn't understand the test results properly. At least I didn't find any mention of errors.
    – GuiRitter
    Commented Feb 5, 2014 at 13:32

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