PC died......

[WebSlave]

Well, the frickin' thing died AGAIN!!!!

Would start up, then just do dead as a doornail. On a hunch I went into the BIOS settings and monitor the processor and motherboard values. I watched the processor temp climb rapidly to 248 degrees F. and then everything went kaput. Had this happen before with this system. The processor is liquid cooled, and apparently the coolant pump has failed again.

So back it goes to the factory. In case anyone is interested, the place who made this system is Velocity Micro out of Richmond, Virginia.

I talked to a tech at VM and told him that if they have any sort of lemon policy, I want to invoke it. I have NEVER had a system that was as unreliable as this POS is. He told me they will review the case when it gets in for evaluation and repair. I was remarkably calm talking to this guy, considering my frame of mind then (and now). I really wanted nothing more than to really chew someone's head clean off of their shoulders..

I swear, if the first computer I ever got had been as unreliable as this thing, I never would have purchased a second one....

 

[crotalusadamanteus]

Maybe you should just build your own? LOL

Dell has some reasonable dual core PC's that you could basically pick and choose most of your options. I've had no problems with mine, and I run all kinds of programs on it daily.

 

[WebSlave]

I'll have to see how Velocity Micro handles this. Quite honestly, if I could just get the money I originally paid for this system plus the upgrades done real recently, I would do it. Just give me back the 2tb hard drives and the Blu-Ray writer and trash that darn thing.

I'm going to check their website to see if I can send a message to the CEO of the company and give him a piece of my mind about this fiasco.

Now, I just hope my old system holds up on me. I think this thing must be going on 6 years old now. Seems to me I got my new system two years ago when the system I am using now was 4 years old. THAT is the way these things SHOULD run......

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Posted on 11/18: Oh well, wonder what will break next......

Posted on 11/25: Well, the frickin' thing died AGAIN!!!!

What's up, Bad Luck Sledrock?

Velocity Micro PCs ain't cheap and I'm sure you're fit to be tied. I would be too. Wow!

I went back & read this whole thread again trying to get an idea of what could be going on other than just bad luck or sporadic component failure. The heat you mentioned earlier could have, at least at one point or another, played a role in some component failures. Especially the RAM. Heat will kill memory sticks fast. It will also kill a hard drive fast. For your PC to be getting as hot internally as you described earlier something wasn't right.

A high-tech system like that should have some alarms set to notify the user in the event of high temps and/or particular component failures. If it does/did & you disabled them, don't admit here for VM to see.

Do a Google search of that model # and see if there are known problems with it. The company has a pretty good reputation but their tech support has reportedly been lacking some the last few years. I did find a few issues with at least one of their models just a few minutes ago by Googling: "Velocity Micro Reviews."

I've never been too keen on liquid cooling systems. Some people have had good results with them and others have had headache after headache. Personally, I've always considered it a marketing scheme on high-end gaming machines. Think about it; an overwhelming majority of the web servers are not liquid cooled.

I hope you're able to get out on a "lemon" policy. How long after purchasing did the first problem occur? That could be a factor, however, the latest series of problems could override that.

Hang in there!
Mike

 

[WebSlave]

I sent off an email to the pres of Velocity Micro, so maybe that will have some effect.

No, that computer was NOT cheap. I always try to buy top of the line so that it won't go obsolete as quickly as a lower rung system would these days.

As for the heat issue, the new motherboard/processor/memory seemed to be MUCH cooler than the older components was. I have to admit that the heat was welcome in the winter months, though. If I could have put in duct work, it probably would have heated up the entire house rather nicely.

No, I don't overclock the system or disable any alarms. When I was monitoring the processor temps, there didn't appear to be any alarm present there. Simply died after it reached 240 degrees, so I assume 250 degrees was the drop dead temp.

Honestly, I don't like the liquid cooling thing at all. VM says it is not a field replaceable unit, so the whole system has to go back. It appears that they only last about a year, so this could be a real PITA after the warranty is up. If I can get them to build me a new system, I will ask for one that is COMPLETELY field fixable. But heck, the system is just about new anyway now. So I'm not even sure that would gain me anything much.

Thanks for the tip on the reviews. It may be worthwhile mentioning that I have been reading them. The implication there being, of course, that I will be POSTING in those review sections as well based on what they offer to resolve this lemon issue. At the very least, I want them to throw in an extended warranty no matter what. Otherwise the first major failure I have after the warranty expires gives me a backstop to tape targets to on my shooting range.

Damn it... I've got all kinds of emails and crap on that system that are now on hold till it gets back.

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Thanks for the tip on the reviews. It may be worthwhile mentioning that I have been reading them. The implication there being, of course, that I will be POSTING in those review sections as well based on what they offer to resolve this lemon issue.

You just might have to play hardball and let 'em know that you intend to post reviews in several places, including one of your very own frequently-visited forums. I had to do that with KDS about a lemon monitor I got from 'em years ago. One that I still have to bang every now & then to get it to straighten up. The dang thing went out 1 month after the 1yr warranty. They finally replaced it after I had to pay shipping to them, but the 2nd one I got was bad out of the box. I'm still beatin' on the 3rd one.

Otherwise the first major failure I have after the warranty expires gives me a backstop to tape targets to on my shooting range.

Vengeance. It does a mind some good sometimes. Ha! Ha! Dare I even mention how many times I've thought about unloading my pistol here in my office on this CRT monitor?

Later!
Mike

 

[WebSlave]

Yeah, I'm sure a YouTube video of their brand name box being shot full of holes would raise some eyebrows in their corporate board room....

 

[crotalusadamanteus]

Yeah, but it would make a really nice video anyway.

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Rich,
Any updates on your PC with 9 lives? That thing's been revived more times than Dr. Phibes so I was curious what was going on with it.

My computer hicupped the other day and made me think of your situation and wonder how things were going in your case.

Later!
Mike

 

[WebSlave]

It's on the way back to me now. I had them rip out that liquid cooling crap and put in regular air cooling. This "can only be serviced at the factory" crap is for the birds. I've had that pump fail TWICE now, so I don't want that happening when it will be my dime to buy a new one after the warranty expires.

I also had them replace the processor since it had gotten heat stressed several times because of the faulty cooling. And they also replaced the power supply. So for all intents and purposes, I pretty much have a brand new system now. Only the drive C raided hard drives are original. And I convinced them to extend my warranty for an additional year for free.

I just checked the UPS tracking number but I guess they stopped putting the date of expected delivery on the info. It arrived in Jacksonville at 10am this morning, so it's possible I may get it back home on Thursday. Friday at the latest.

As a comparison, this computer I am using now is 5 years old and the only failure I have had with it is a power supply that died a couple of years ago. The case is actually even cool to the touch. With this cooler nights, I'm kind of missing my hotrock computer system....

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Good deal!

I think you made excellent decisions on relpacing the CPU, PSU and cooling system. And got a free extended warranty on top of all that.

Hopefully you'll be rockin' & rollin' soon, for several uninterupted years to come.

With this cooler nights, I'm kind of missing my hotrock computer system....

Ha! Ha! I imagine. But space heaters are soooo much cheaper and less of a hassle.

Best wishes!
Mike

 

[WebSlave]

Actually, I'm thinking about running ductwork from my den so I can heat the rest of the house with that thing. I have an outside wall right where the back of the computer lives, so I can probably put some sort of valve arrangement there to pipe the excess heat outside during the summer months.

Hmm, I WAS joking about this but now that I think about it, that might not be a half bad idea. At least the outside venting, anyway.... But I would have to put screen in the vent or I would have REAL bugs in the computer. Maybe field mice as well.

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Actually, I'm thinking about running ductwork...

...Hmm, I WAS joking about this but now that I think about it,...

And this is how so many ingenious inventions began.......
Dang, I love to tinker. Spend hours upon hours creating a simple gadget, only to find out that Ronco already has one for $3 - plus S & H. But if you'll order now, they'll double your order. Been there, done that. Ooohhhh so many times.

I'm not pickin' at your idea or thoughts, Rich, I'm pickin' at tinkerers, like myself, doing things like I mentioned. Needless to say, I had to toss your idea around a few times because I liked it. A dryer vent kit comes to mind. However, there's usually not enough airflow in a PC to force the dryer vent flap open.

You might want to consider rebooting your refurbished PC once in awhile for the first few days so you can go into CMOS setup and check the CPU temps. I'd check it after running the PC for the first few minutes, and then an hour or so later.

If I get time or happen to think about it I'll try to find a good, free, PC health monitor program that will show you temp readings in your toolbar/task manager. A good, but older & probably outdated one was MBM 5 (Mother Board Monitor 5). You can probably still get it to work with your motherboard to at least display CPU temps.

Catch ya later!
Mike

 

[WebSlave]

Got my wayward PC back yesterday and set it up late last night. Right off the bat, the system couldn't find a video driver so I had to install one I had in my downloads folder. It was an older one, but it worked. Then went to nVidia's site and downloaded the latest one and installed that. Installed some newer nVidia tools. Then noticed that all of the garbage I had weeded out of the startup menu was back, so I went in and disabled a bunch of them. Things were looking good. Until I rebooted the system. Splash screen loaded fine, icons on the screen were loaded fine, and when it loaded about three or four program icons in the lower right hand corner of the screen, the screen just went BLACK and died. I fiddled around with it until about 3:30 am and figured I was at the stage where I was just going to make things worse by making dumb decisions, so I went to bed.

Same thing this morning. Went into safe mode thinking I could just load a restore point, but the restore screen was completely blank. Time to call Velocity Micro for help. The guy I talked to walked me through a utility he knew of to clean drivers called "dcpro" or something like that. Ran it to clean up the nVidia drivers, reloaded the latest driver, and it appears to be running OK now. I'm about worn out with this computer crap.............

Oh, the system is running a LOT cooler with the air cooled processor setup. I believe the liquid cooling pump was actually making more heat then it was pulling out of the system. Lesson learned, I guess....... Plus the system is a LOT quieter now as well. Go figure.........

Yeah, a monitor of the processor temp would be cool, as long as it doesn't have a big memory footprint. Seems like everything you install these days wants to install some sort of crap on startup to check versions or send you a nag-o-gram, so I'm trying to weed those out as much as possible. They start to take a toll on performance eventually.

Oh well, maybe the new PC will stay stable for a few years. Got to got some stuff off of this old one to put onto the new one again before I get back to using it 100 percent....

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Remind me not let you near my computer. Ha! Ha!

I don't even want to know what words were coming out of your mouth or what thoughts were runnin' through your head at 3 o'clock this mornin'. Mind if I just call you "Lucky?"

From a lil' bit of research I see that two monitoring programs that I used a few years ago are still pretty much main contenders. "Speedfan" appears to be the most popular. You can read about it & download it from here: http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

The one I mentioned earlier, "MBM 5" (Motherboard Monitor) seems to still be hanging tough, even though it hasn't been updated in a year or more. You'll have to download/install the older version first and then download/install the update.
Older Version Download: http://majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=311
Update Download: http://majorgeeks.com/Motherboard_Monitor_5.3.7.0_Update_2_d5261.html


MBM was my favorite but with more recent updates applied to Speedfan. Speedfan may be slightly better today. They're both freeware - no spyware, shareware or anything sneaky. They both use very little resources, too. At least, they used to.

Download 'em both and give 'em a try. You might be able to only run one at a time but you can at least get the feel for which one you like best.

Have a good one!
Mike

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Seems like everything you install these days wants to install some sort of crap on startup to check versions or send you a nag-o-gram, so I'm trying to weed those out as much as possible. They start to take a toll on performance eventually.

Talk about a naggin' headache! Most of my repair calls are from inexperienced PC users download anything/everything that catches their fancy. And everything sets itself to start at Startup.

Customer: "My computer is soooo slow. Why?"

Me: "Well,....... let's take a look & see. For one thing, your PC came with only 256MB of RAM and you're runnin' Windows XP. 2nd of all, 98 running processes is a lil' too much."

Mine is running 31. I keep it trimmed. You HAVE to stay on top of it, don't ya? Anyone is doing great if they've got 38 or less running processes. in the 40's or low 50's is pretty typical. 98 is the most I've ever seen. It took that PC 5 minutes to load to usability.

Later!
Mike

 

[crotalusadamanteus]

Glad to hear you're up and running now. Hopefully any more problems will be minor ones.

98 is the most I've ever seen. It took that PC 5 minutes to load to usability.

Later!
Mike

Mine goes back and forth from 98-99. I just ain't that keen on what I can turn off in there. I don't have a slow load problem though. It don't take very long to start up and run.

 

[WebSlave]

What's the latest word on Vista these days? Has it become useable yet? I like the idea that I could populate up to 8 gig of RAM on the motherboard with Vista. But doing a fresh install instead of an upgrade would be a real PITA. I'm a software junkie, so reloading all that stuff would take me weeks or better. Not only locating the original install disks, but who knows how many patches and upgrades here and there. I've got enough headaches as it is...........

 

[John E Dove]

My wife is an IT Tech/Web Master at our local community college and they installed it on some of their units. She says it is garbage and had to replace the computer she installed it on in her office. She says everything was just too slow.

 

[HappyHillbilly]

Mine goes back and forth from 98-99. I just ain't that keen on what I can turn off in there. I don't have a slow load problem though. It don't take very long to start up and run.

As long you have a fair amount memory and a decent size CPU it won't take forty forevers to load. However, you will most likely see a noticeable speed/performance difference if you were to trim your Startups down.

The system I mentioned with 98 processes only had the bare minimum of required memory (256MB) to run XP, much less other programs. Plus, the processor was a lowly 1.(something) GB.

Like Rich said, everything sets itself up to load at Startup, and very few programs need to. Printer software is my biggest pet peeve. Most people think that if the program doesn't load at startup that it won't work at all. Not true. It takes some time to fine tune Startup but the benefits are usually worthwhile. Most people are amazed and tickled to death to have their PCs running like it did when it was brand new.

Look at it this way - Let's say you have 98 different vehicles. Every morning you crank all 98 of 'em and let 'em idle just in case you decide to drive one. You'd be wasting resources. Gas, engine wear, cranking time, etc... It's the same way with running process/Startup programs. The big difference between the car/programs analogy is the computer programs are all running on one engine (CPU) and one fuel line (RAM).

About the only program that really needs to load at Startup is your antivirus and/or some other security type program. The best way to stop programs from loading at Startup is to open each program and look for "Preferrences" or some other category that should have an option to "run at Startup" and uncheck that option.

Not all programs will give you that option, that's when you resort to going into the "Startup" folder (Start/All Programs/Startup in XP) and simply delete the program's folder. That won't delete the program from your PC, just from the Startup folder.

And of course there's always a few nagging programs/processes that Rich can tell you about that have to be stopped by altering the Startup configuration by using the System Configuration Utility (in XP and earlier versions you can easily access this by: Start/Run/ and type in msconfig and hit Enter or click OK). In System Configuration Utility click the Startup tab on the far right option and uncheck the process you want to disable. This is where you need to know what each task and/or program is.

You won't delete anything from your PC by disabling it in the System Configuration Utility and the program will still work just fine when you open it by clicking on it's link on your desktop or in the Start/All Programs list.

The best way to find out what a program or process is is to Google the name of it. Quick & simple. There are some sites that have Running Tasks/Processes libraries that you can use, too. Here's one that gives a good explanation on them: http://www.liutilities.com/products/wintaskspro/whitepapers/paper8/

Here's a link directly to that site's processes library: http://www.liutilities.com/products/wintaskspro/processlibrary/

Here's a link to that site's .dll library: http://www.liutilities.com/products/wintaskspro/dlllibrary/

Those library links, and more can be found on that first web page, down in the lower-righthand part of the page. I cannot vouch for any of the downloads or products that site offers, I've never tried any of them. I trust the site, though. It's not a hacker site or shady site. Here is another one that I trust: http://www.processlibrary.com/

What's the latest word on Vista these days? Has it become useable yet?

I call it - AstalaVista. (See you later!)

John's wife's experience and opinion is the norm still among most people that are at least somewhat familiar with PCs. The only people I've heard say that they thought it was OK were people who have never used another OS and Best Buy computer department employees.

Personally, I think it's another ME (Millenium Edition). It's garbage and Microsoft is scrambling to replace it, not fix it. I would be real surprised if it they try to keep it & improve it. I would wait at least another year before I even thought about getting it. Heck, I bought W98SE even though XP had been out for almost a year and a half. I'm glad I did, too. I avoided most of the headaches. I still use W98SE on a system and I still like it better than XP for most applications.

I like the idea that I could populate up to 8 gig of RAM on the motherboard with Vista.

You'd just about have to.

Asta la vista, Vista!!!

But then again, to be fair - I am a recovering addict & alcoholic and you know how us addicts/alcoholics hate change. Hahaha!!!

Ya'll have a great day!
Mike