• PC freezing completely shortly after startup.
    10 replies, posted
Backstory this time is that about two days ago my PC began randomly freezing and BSOD'ing, only to then attempt to reboot and be unable to detect my HD and OS, etc. A restart fixed this and allowed me to boot, but now the PC starts up fine, and then immediately freezes completely, indefinitely. I can't think of anything new on my PC that would cause this but I did notice about a day before this happened that AVG was disabled for some reason, so maybe a virus is to blame. In addition, when launching in safe mode, the PC runs fine. I'll try safe mode w/ networking in a moment as well. So, what steps should I try after testing networking on safe mode? Here are my basic system specs, ask anything else you might need. Dell XPS 410 Windows 7 64-bit 5 GB RAM (2 x 2 GB, 1 x 1 GB) Radeon 4870
Update, starting the PC now just tells me that Windows has damaged files and that a startup repair can attempt to fix them. Running the startup repair goes to the default Win7 background screen and freezes up. Running windows normally instead of the repair just reboots the PC to where it gives me the same option. Upon trying to do a complete reformat by booting from my Win7 disk, I get to the install window, and when I press install now it freezes at "Opening setup." When attempting to "Repair my computer" from an option on the install window, it just goes to the default Win7 background and freezes as well. I don't know where to go from here, I can't even start in safe mode anymore to test stuff out. Any ideas?
It's hard to tell. It could be a failing HDD since you seem to be able to boot from a CD. If you have a spare HDD, try it out. [editline]13th March 2011[/editline] Oh and remove that 1 GB stick, RAM running in dual channel is much faster.
I don't have a spare, unfortunately. Any other way to test if that's the problem?
SMART data, do you have any Linux distro liveCD around?
Does it just go black, have some graphics artefacting, or freeze what was last on it until you shut down?
Freezes on what it last was on. For example, when attempting to run startup repair it freezes on the basic background as if it's about to load. Same thing happens when attempting to reinstall the OS. Freezes at "Loading setup." No graphics artifacts or anything, and screen stays exactly how it was for hours. Left it on for a couple hours once to test.
OC'd at all? Could be a bad stick of RAM. Try removing each one and starting the PC to see if it works, if it does, then the stick out is bad. Also try resetting your BIOS to defaults.
Ram could be a problem, try and maybe get some new ones, or do what Shadaez said.
Have been running some tests that come on the utility partition on all Dell computers. Seems to consistently fail hard drive tests, usually on reading sections, I believe. Haven't specifically tested writing yet, but a long S.M.A.R.T. test and some individual tests all failed on reading, I believe. Still a symptom of RAM malfunctioning?
I doubt RAM malfunctioning would cause reading errors on the HDD :v: Still, just try it out, remove all but one stick and boot up. If it doesn't work, try another stick (3 in your case, even though I'd suggest removing the 1 GB stick :argh:)
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.