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This is a whining thread because I am officially tired of this shit. I need to fucking vent somewhere.

Ever tried troubleshooting hardware when you have no replacement components to figure out what's wrong? Ever had a problem where every answer you reached just raised a host of further questions?

Yeah, that's me.

It started sometime in late August (I've lived on the netbook since). Okay, I had had some computer oddities before that, such as if I didn't reboot my computer once immediately after powering it on if it had been completely powered down for some actual period of time that wasn't "turn it off and on again", it would eventually freeze, require a hard reset and then be fine. I had the occasional random bluescreen. All of this I could live with.

Then the desktop froze one day. This wasn't the first time it had happened, but after I gave it the hard reset, it froze again. While starting up Windows.

There was no way that could be good.

And so it continued. The computer was dead. Any time I'd power it up, it'd freeze shortly after startup. I confirmed it to 100% be a hardware problem, as it would freeze even when I was in BIOS.

I consulted my contacts, and reached a reasonable consensus that it was the motherboard that had died, albeit with a nonzero chance that it was the PSU. I tried three out of four of my RAM sticks individually, same freeze happened, so I was pretty sure it wasn't the RAM, which some people said was a common faulty component too.

So, I ordered a new motherboard and CPU, since it seemed stupid to replace a four year old motherboard without also upgrading the CPU. So I spent longer than I should have getting everything screwed out and back in and connected. And I started the computer.

It booted up, started saying my Windows was fucked... and froze.

Yep.

The hardware problem was still there. I decided that well, was maybe about time to upgrade the computer anyway. So I ordered a new PSU, because that was the second thing on the list. Got it, connected it, started computer.

It froze.

At this point, I had no fucking clue what was going on. The boot device LED on the motherboard was lit, but I had found why it did and it wasn't the cause of the problem anyway, and I could confirm it wasn't the problem, as I did a test with only the video card, two RAM sticks and the CPU connected. Still freeze!

The conclusion that was drawn was the somber one that I had received a dead on arrival motherboard. I sent an e-mail to the store I had ordered from, and received a return slip. But before it was time to pack it down and send it off, I decided it was time to do a test with the lowest possible amount of components, just to eliminate all other possiilities. So, I yanked the video card, eventually managed to remove one of the two remaining RAM sticks and plugged the screen into the onboard DVI port. Booted the computer. Entered BIOS.

And it was perfectly fine.

I left it running. I needed to do an extended test. It wasn't quite 24 hours, but when it was still running fine even after I had left it on overnight, I thought I had finally found the real culprit of my hardware mystery.

It wasn't the motherboard. It wasn't the CPU. It wasn't the PSU. It wasn't the RAM.

It was the fucking video card.

Out of all components, it was one I found to be one of the least likely to cause the kind of freezes that I had been experiencing. But I had finally found the solution, right? Right?

I wish.

Because that meant it was time for more testing, so I put all the RAM back in and connected the primary HDD as well. Booted the computer.

And... nothing.

Literally nothing as in I didn't even seem to get a video signal... and for the first time, the LED on the motherboard indicating a problem with the memory was lit up.

 This is the point I'm at now. Every time I thought I had figured the whole thing out, my computer told me making me .

I hate computers.

sounds like you're already halfway to building an entirely new computer so probably just do that imo

Yeah at this point you should just build an entirely new computer. The HDD is fine, Motherboard is fine as far as I can tell. Your problem is probably the video card from what I can see in the posts. I don't believe it's the ram or anything else at this point.


Just my two cents on the problem. IMO just get a new rig built and move on with your life.

Well, that's essentially what's happening here bit by bit. The motherboard and CPU is new, and that's practically a new computer as it is. The sound and wireless network cards are fine so I have no reason to replace those, there's of course nothing wrong with the tower itself, nor the disc drive, or memory card reader...

If only the video card was the problem, then it'd be alright by now. I can live with onboard graphics until I can invest in a new video card. But since apparently SOMETHING is weird with the RAM as otherwise my last test would have run properly and the memory LED wouldn't have been lit, it's not quite that simple...

Going to yank my two old RAM sticks and try again. Luckily RAM is cheap so another 4 GB won't set me back a lot.

Apparently I have software issues too but I can't solve my software issues until my hardware actually lets me. I really hope I can get the Windows installation repaired, or at least access my C: before a reinstall, because there's some not backed up shit in My Documents I want to save. Back up your shit, kids.