Strange computer problem freezing up

markr6

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Jul 16, 2012
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This happened a few times last week, so I decided it was time to do a factory restore anyway. I checked all 3 harddrives and everything seemed OK. Completed the restore and ran Windows updates.

It happened a few times on another forum, but I can't say it was that for sure, or even Internet Explorer. That just happened to be what I was doing every time.

I can't even do a CTL+ALT+DEL. I have to power it down manually and turn back on.

Here's a few details on my system and a video of the crash. Maybe a video card problem?



Dell XPS 435T
Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit SP1
ATI Radeon HD 5450

Nothing else suspect installed or ran since the factory update

Any ideas?
 

ACruceSalus

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When I try to run your video I get the message "This video is private." instead of the video.
 

ACruceSalus

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The video only shows a distorted screen. What happens as it is being booted up from a powered down state? Can you take a video of it and post it? When you say you can't do a "CTR+ALT+DEL" is that because you can't see what happens on the screen due to the screen being distorted? My initial thinking is that it looks like the video card is going bad. Can you connect it to another monitor and does it work properly on that monitor?
 

Lynx_Arc

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If it runs fine for awhile then locks up then you could have a heat problem for sure maybe a bad fan on the CPU or video card or a case fan even a power supply fan.
 

markr6

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It works fine and just out of nowhere it will freeze up and show these colors moving around the screen as shown in the video. I'm pretty sure the computer itself is locked up because when I hit a shortcut key on the keyboard to load Photoshop, I don't hear anything. Usually that would cause the hard drive to click away for at least 5 seconds while it loads. I did check the fans while I had it open the other day; they appear to be running fine.
 

Siriuslite

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I've seen a few capacitors go bad on Dell machines. Check the motherboard to see if you see any black goo leaking from any of them.
 

StarHalo

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Dec 4, 2007
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My Dell had bulging caps but lived a tortured life, a gaming machine with a "quiet"/fanless video card; the temp sensor on that card would cruise at an infernal 90 degrees C in play, never bothered the card but the poor mobo was not made for that..
 

mvyrmnd

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I'd bet a slab of beer that it's not blown caps. Unless the system is from 2006, it's not very likely (Dell got burned big time in those days and buy much better quality parts these days) (I'm a Dell certified engineer - I know an appeal to authority is a bad logical fallacy, but I did have to sit a bunch of exams!)

If your mobo has a built-in video driver on it, you can pull your video card out and see if it runs without crashing that way.

Best advice offered so far.
 

Julian Holtz

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Nov 4, 2005
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343
Location
Germany
Also, unplug and reassemble every electrical connection, (every card, every cable, everything) to make sure oxidized contacts will be fine afterwards.
 
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