[Chumara]

Hello everyone, I've been having a problem with some new parts and although I believe it might be an overheating issue, I was hoping to get some feedback before going further.

 

I have a ASUS M5A97 mobo with a AMD Phenom II X3 720 processor, and I've concluded that the issue has to do with one of these (or both) parts, because I've put them in 3 completely different configurations thus far and I keep having the same problem regardless.

 

The issue is that when I'm playing a game, watching Youtube, or running stuff with flash, randomly the sound will become static whitenoise, and the entire computer will slow to a halt over the course of 20 seconds or so, including my mouse and keyboard inputs slowing down until the computer essentially just freezes.

 

The reason I didn't default to assuming it was an overheating issue is because in the past when I've dealt with overheating computers, they've just immediately shut down instead of slowing to a crash.

 

Could the processor or mobo be faulty? They run fine if I'm not taxing the system graphically, but unfortunately if they are faulty then it's not going to be something I can fix as I got these a long time ago and just now got around to using them in a build. Should I try underclocking my processor to see if that helps?

 

Any thoughts and/or advice would be appreciated, thank you.

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Modern CPUs will slow down when they get hot in order to protect themselves so it may be what is happening.  What thermal paste are you using?

 

Try speedfan

http://www.filehippo...nload_speedfan/

 

Download, save and Install it (Win 7 or Vista right click and Run As Admin.) then run it.

 

It will tell you your temps and you can leave it running as an icon in your systray so you can watch it if you don't play in full screen.  (Or do something else CPU intensive like run an anti virus scan and/or watch a movie)

[RKinner]

Modern CPUs will slow down when they get hot in order to protect themselves so it may be what is happening.  What thermal paste are you using?

 

Try speedfan

http://www.filehippo...nload_speedfan/

 

Download, save and Install it (Win 7 or Vista right click and Run As Admin.) then run it.

 

It will tell you your temps and you can leave it running as an icon in your systray so you can watch it if you don't play in full screen.  (Or do something else CPU intensive like run an anti virus scan and/or watch a movie)

[Chumara]

Hello RKinner, thanks for the reply.

 

I'm currently using the stock paste, I've had issues with it in the past on other computers so I don't normally switch, but I have some Arctic Silver 5 laying around that I used once when I invested in a vacuum cleaner of a heatsink.

 

I found that ASUS has a program that monitors heat levels and stuff, if it doesn't work out I will try your link, thank you.

[RKinner]

 Arctic Silver 5 is the best in my experience.  Make sure you clean both surfaces with alcohol or the Arctic Silver cleaner.

[phillpower2]

Hope you don't mind the interjection folks 

 

Chumara in keeping with the guidance of RKinner please do the following;

 

Post your Speedfan and HWMonitor screenshots so that we can check your temps and voltages, can you also tell us the brand and model name or number of your PSU (power supply unit)  the same for any add on video card that you may have + the amount of optical and/or hard drives that you have.

 

Download Speedfan and install it.  Once it's installed, run the program and post here the information it shows.  The information I want you to post is the stuff that is circled in the example picture I have attached.

If you are running on a vista machine, please go to where you installed the program and run the program as administrator.

 

(this is a screenshot from a vista machine)

 

 Download then run HWMonitor and post a screenshot so that we have a comparison to the Speedfan results, details from here

 

 

To capture and post a screenshot;

 

Click on the ALT key + PRT SCR key..its on the top row..right hand side..now click on start...all programs...accessories...paint....left click in the white area ...press CTRL + V...click on file...click on save...save it to your desktop...name it something related to the screen your capturing... BE SURE TO SAVE IT AS A .JPG ...otherwise it may be to big to upload... then after typing in any response you have... click on browse...desktop...find the screenshot..select it and click on the upload button...then on the lower left...after it says upload successful...click on add reply like you normally would.

 

Screenshot instructions are provided to assist those that may read this topic but are not yet aware of the “how to”.