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I have a PII 300 running Win98 on an AT system and am experiencing a
puzzling fault.
I get intermittant freezes during and post booting. If it does boot
then a freeze could still happen for a danger period of about an hour
but beyond this 60 minutes the system is as stable as Win98 can be.
This is strange to me as I know that freezes normally occur due to
overheating or dodgy connections(both cable and components) but in
this case it seems to be the opposite because the longer you go the
less chance of a freeze and it never happens after an hour.
So anyone got an idea what is going on?

"Rob Beattie" <rob@/remove/ghosh.co.uk> wrote in message
news:...
> I have a PII 300 running Win98 on an AT system and am experiencing a
> puzzling fault.
> I get intermittant freezes during and post booting. If it does boot
> then a freeze could still happen for a danger period of about an hour
> but beyond this 60 minutes the system is as stable as Win98 can be.
> This is strange to me as I know that freezes normally occur due to
> overheating or dodgy connections(both cable and components) but in
> this case it seems to be the opposite because the longer you go the
> less chance of a freeze and it never happens after an hour.
> So anyone got an idea what is going on?
I'd look for a fan that is slowing. Maybe after it stays on for an hour or
so it gets hot and runs more freely.
It sounds like something that will get worse as time goes along.
AG

Had a similar experience with a P1. The culprit turned out to be faulty
cache memory which worsened over time.

"AG" <> wrote in message
news:3fb793e6$0$25259$...
>
> "Rob Beattie" <rob@/remove/ghosh.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:...
> > I have a PII 300 running Win98 on an AT system and am experiencing a
> > puzzling fault.
> > I get intermittant freezes during and post booting. If it does boot
> > then a freeze could still happen for a danger period of about an hour
> > but beyond this 60 minutes the system is as stable as Win98 can be.
> > This is strange to me as I know that freezes normally occur due to
> > overheating or dodgy connections(both cable and components) but in
> > this case it seems to be the opposite because the longer you go the
> > less chance of a freeze and it never happens after an hour.
> > So anyone got an idea what is going on?
> I'd look for a fan that is slowing. Maybe after it stays on for an hour
or
> so it gets hot and runs more freely.
> It sounds like something that will get worse as time goes along.
> AG
>
>

AG & Navin's solution sounds standard for older systems. Like they said it
could be anything from bad power supply to faulty video connection.

Maybe the RAM has gone bad. Something that old has to give sooner or
later... right? Be patient and check out all the parts carefully.

Maybe you just added to many parts... I had this PIII 500MHz - 384 MB RAM +
Abit BH6 MB with DVD-ROM, CD Burner, 2 HDD, 4 PCI slot used, and 1 ISA slot
being used running on a 250Watt Power supply. The 250 Watt Power supply
couldn't handle the extra hardware. Replaced it with a 350Watt power supply
now works fine. The old 250watts power supply is still running strong on a
machine that has only 1 HDD , 1 CD-ROM, 1 floppy, 1 NIC, 1 video card...
very basic...



"Rob Beattie" <rob@/remove/ghosh.co.uk> wrote in message
news:...
> I have a PII 300 running Win98 on an AT system and am experiencing a
> puzzling fault.
> I get intermittant freezes during and post booting. If it does boot
> then a freeze could still happen for a danger period of about an hour
> but beyond this 60 minutes the system is as stable as Win98 can be.
> This is strange to me as I know that freezes normally occur due to
> overheating or dodgy connections(both cable and components) but in
> this case it seems to be the opposite because the longer you go the
> less chance of a freeze and it never happens after an hour.
> So anyone got an idea what is going on?

On Mon, 17 Nov 2003 17:20:51 -0500, "Kathy"
<> wrote:

>I was thinking the same thing as Navin was thinking. I would try to
>make sure that everything was getting good contact and make sure there
>are no loose connections.
>
>Kathy
>A+
>
>"Navin R. Johnson" <> wrote in message
>news:.. .
>> On Sun, 16 Nov 2003 12:39:08 GMT, rob@/remove/ghosh.co.uk (Rob
>Beattie)
>> wrote:
>>
>> This is simply the old reverse heat problem. And it is logical. Let
>me
>> explain.... You have a system that is cold. The video card isn't
>quite
>> seated properly. You power it on and get a blank screen. You try
>again
>> and again then after five minutes or so it finally boots up and
>works
>> fine.... until the next time you try it from a cold start. What's
>> happening is the video card isn't making good contact when it's
>cold.
>> As it heats up it expands a bit, which makes everything larger and
>good
>> contact is made until it cools off again. This is just one scenario.
>> I've had umpteen problems just like this over the years. Whenever I
>see
>> a system with a problem like this, I take it all apart and reseat
>> everything. That usually cures it. Good luck.
>>
>> NRJ
>>
>>
>> >I have a PII 300 running Win98 on an AT system and am experiencing
>a
>> >puzzling fault.
>> >I get intermittant freezes during and post booting. If it does boot
>> >then a freeze could still happen for a danger period of about an
>hour
>> >but beyond this 60 minutes the system is as stable as Win98 can be.
>> >This is strange to me as I know that freezes normally occur due to
>> >overheating or dodgy connections(both cable and components) but in
>> >this case it seems to be the opposite because the longer you go the
>> >less chance of a freeze and it never happens after an hour.
>> >So anyone got an idea what is going on?
>>
>
I decided to take the whole system apart and put it back together
again about a week ago. Since then there has been a dramatic
improvement with only 1 freeze in 6 days compared with several daily
previously.
I have a few cables resting on internal cards and the processor and it
could be that these are causing components to be dislodged slightly so
I may have to tidy them up a bit if I get any more freezes in the
future.