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Thread ID: 54374 2005-02-10 16:25:00 My Computer crashes and the way it happens is really weird... Static Caster (7260) Press F1
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323667 2005-02-10 16:25:00 Hi,

My PC crashes at least 5-10 times on a daily basis and it usually happens during memory intensive operations (although it has also happened while typing out a document in Microsoft Word).

What happens is that all of the characters on my screen (Icons, Open Text Documents, Application Menu Bar.........any and all text) suddenly looks like mashed up ASCII text. It's all simply screwed up. If there are a few desktop icons that still have normal text and I click on one of them (when my computer becomes possessed), the icon text also get's mashed up.

Please note that this only happens to the textual characters and whenever this occurs, my computer is simply BOUND to freeze up minutes after this occurs.

It's driving me crazy and I don't know what to do?
Could it be my Graphics card? The fan works fine and it doesn't overheat.
Here are my PC details.

Windows XP with SP2
Intel P4 1.8
768 MB Ram
30 GB Hard drive
ATI Radeon 8500 LE with 128 MB Ram


Any Ideas or Solution will be GREATLY appreciated. 		Static Caster (7260)
323668 2005-02-10 19:47:00 Have a look in control panel / admin tools / event viewer. See what errors / messages it shows here. I would also look under device manager. See if anything is conflicting. Speedy Gonzales (78)
323669 2005-02-10 19:49:00 Well you have suggested one possibility - the RAM.
I would suggest that its not your graphics card, as I think that wouldn't differentiate between text and graphics - it would all scramble if it were the graphics card, not just the text.

Could be a RAM problem, or possible CPU overheating (or perhaps even just an IO error on the motherboard somewhere). It may be hard to locate the exact problem without swapping out some of the hardware to see if you can stop the problem. If you can do that it might help... we'll see what other people have to offer here first though.

M. 		Midavalo (7253)
323670 2005-02-11 04:59:00 What exactly are you doing with "memory intensive operations" ? i,e, what app?

I'd firstly start by checking the memory (in my experience it is a very good place to start - Windows get blamed a lot when it is poor quality memory).

for that memtest86 (http://www.memtest86.com/)

Then check the hard drive with the makers diagnostic tools

A whole raft of tools are on the ultimate boot cd (http://ubcd.sourceforge.net)

Then take out parts you can and try without or a known good part (.e.g the video card in your case).

Also pays to check out the BIOS settings ..

Once you've pretty much ruled out the hardware side and still no luck then I move on to trying things such as Knoppix and see if that works ok.

If I had a current ghost image say of xp with sp2 then I'd slap than on after backing up current data first.

Spyware and virus checks are also all the "rage" these days :rolleyes:

Yep, it could take a while but some quick hardware tests can be done to rule out the simple causes. Bottom line is don't put up with crashes. 		gibler (49)
323671 2005-02-13 05:10:00 I've got a similar problem. Is there a programme which will check the temperature of the CPU? Oliver (3618)
323672 2005-02-13 05:16:00 Depending on what your mobo is there might be programs for your CPU.

ie: For ASUS there's Asus probe, or Ai Booster. 		Speedy Gonzales (78)
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