Hard lockups under XP

[Krel]

I have an Asus A7V266-C motherboard and a 1900+ CPU, along with 512 MB of RAM, a 400 watt PSU, a Turtle Beach Montego sound card and a Geforce 4 MX440 video card. I'm getting some hard lockups. They are VERY occasional in Windows XP, but when I try to play Warcraft 3, it locks up almost immediately - around 2 minutes after it's started. By "Hard Lockup", I mean the computer receives no mouse or keyboard input, so I have to press the reset button.

Any ideas of what could be wrong? Since there are no error messages or anything, I'm clueless as to where to start looking. I've installed the latest video and sound card drivers.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[braddds]

Possible hardware/software conflicts? Have you ensured that you are running only XP compliant drivers and software? Have you visited the Game site to see if this a problem for anyone else or that you have the latest update?

If yes to all the above then you maybe experiencing a new game glitch or you can go to

http://www.tweakxp.com/tweakxp/

and check to see if there is something there that may help, all in all it can't hurt!

Braddds

 

[Krel]

I installed Motherboard Monitor 5, and the there is a temperature readout I'm concerned about - Sensor 2, which is just named Asus 2. Any way to figure out what this is? Anyway, the temperature readout during normal Windows is about 57 degrees celsius, which seems fairly hot to me. Could this be the problem?

 

[huffbr]

yeah, that's pretty hot, are all your fans working properly? If so, you may need to install more fans. But I really don't know if that is the problem.

 

[underpaid]

I would try disabling that monitoring software and see what you get. Monitoring software is known to cause wierd things to happen in some cases.

 

[Guest_imported]

I also experience the same problem with A7V-266 while running on Windows 2000. I think that this is a motherboard problem but ASUS just won't admit it. After some time for some unknown reason the operating system experience a hard lock up as mentioned above and the user is left with no other choice but to press the reset button. Also the temperature readings are way out of scale. At boot up it already says 50 degress and rising. Now i know why it was so cheap.

 

[paparazi]

If you have an idle of 57c, it is likely that your max temp could be 10-15c higher than this!
XP's get very flakey above the mid 60's so 70c plus is definately lockup territory.
Depending on your climate?? a mid 50's MAX is about average and stable for an XP1900+, this with a reasonable 2gig plus cooler and a couple of extra case fans, if you are struggling to get the temps this low then a more expensive copper based heatsink big fan may be required, but don't forget about case air flow!! which is just as important as a good cooler.
Check list* is your heatsink on the correct way around?? recess in base over socket "A" writing.
Have you removed the plastic tape covering the thermal pad?
Thermal pads are "use only once" so if it has been removed at all, clean off the pad and use a good quality paste.
Use a heatsink cooler rated higher than the CPU in use, one for a 2.1+ should do it!
Don't forget extra case fans, one front lower sucking IN cool air, one rear top exhausting OUT warm air.
Martin Please let members know if there advice has helped any.