locking up

[gorgon117]

my system sometimes locks up with the following symptoms;,
Hard drive lights comes on and stays on,no mouse or keyboard response the only thing i can do is press the reset button.
I've checked the power management settings and switched them all off.It does not happen when any specific software is being used its purely at random.



system:-
Tyan tiger mother board
two athlon xp1500 processors
256MB pc2100 reg.ram
40GB maxtor HD
Gainward Geforce3 64MB
HP cdrw9100
50x cd rom
400w psu
Turtle beach Santa Cruz sound card
external modem

 

[Henyman]

have u cheaked all conections? are u doing something specific such as on the net/playin games?

 

[gorgon117]

Originally posted by henyman
have u cheaked all conections? are u doing something specific such as on the net/playin games?

Hi, yes I've checked all connections, and it mostly locks up when my better half is playing spider solitare, although its happened to me two or three times on the net.I am begining to think there is a problem with the hard drive itself, after I heard a slight noise that seemed to come from that area.

 

[Henyman]

hmmm u tried looking @ what process is using the most mem @ the time? also have u installled new drivers/software/hardware recently?

 

[gorgon117]

Originally posted by henyman
hmmm u tried looking @ what process is using the most mem @ the time? also have u installled new drivers/software/hardware recently?

Hi, not tried looking at what process is using what at the time because it doesn't happen all the time , if I turn my comp; on lets say 10 times , it MIGHT! lock up three times.. The drivers are the origanal ones from installation but I have installed a fair amount of software since then. It didn't lock up to start with and I can't really remember at what point the trouble started, which mahes it hard to pinpoint a particular piece of software.

 

[ByteHauler]

Hey gorgon117, I too have an Athlon processor, and have experienced random crashes and lock-ups since shortly after upgrading to Windows XP Pro. Try this: go to control Panel, Add/Remove programs, and see if the Microsoft update "Windows XP Hotfix" "Q317277" is installed. If so, uninstall it, and ignore the warnings regarding "programs might not work". Evidently, this "Hotfix" interferes with the operation of Athlon processors. For more information on the "Hotfix"go to the URL: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q317277. I uninstalled this update, and have been crash free for several days now, whereas before, my computer would crash several times a day. I don't know if the Windows automatic updates will try to reinstall this Hotfix the next time it tries to update. If uninstalling the hot fix does interfere with, or disable some of your programs, you can always reinstall it from the Microsoft URL above. Good Luck..............ByteHauler