*urgent* need computer help!!

[Fragle]

hey guys,

so, i've been on vacation and festivals etc for the last few weeks, so i haven't used my studio pc (obviously).

today i fired it up, and i noticed that it didn't boot just right. it showed me the desktop just as usual, but i couldn't open any files and it won't react to any commands.
after restarting it with the reset knob it worked just fine.
so i opened reaper, and fuck me sideways, my audio performance is totally fucked up. i'm getting lots of pops and glitches unless i'm setting the fireface buffer way fucking high.
for example, i have a songwriting template that has only SSD and 2 ampsim tracks running, nothing fancy at all. usually i can run this at 64samples buffer size without any issues at all. today i had to go up all the way to 768 samples to stop the playback dropouts. this is without recording anything mind you! i also get glitches when scolling up and down while playing back a (small!) project, while opening the mixer of fx windows etc.

both the task manager and reapers performance display don't show anything out of the ordinary cpu wise. it's totally fine.

playing back music etc works just as usual.

so first thing i thought (i already forgot about the startup issue) i updated reaper to the newest version, as i thought it might be some issue with reaper.
after that it got slightly better, but the performance is still fucked up.

so, next thing = reboot. bam, once again it doesn't boot as it should, exactly like the very first boot process i described above. actually, at one time when i hit the windows key (iirc) to open the startup bar it didn't react but the pc gave me a weird beeping sound. this happened only once though, i couldn't get it to do it again to figure out a correlation.

once again, reset, and then i shut it off completely and haven't touched it since. i'm just too afraid to loose any previously unsaved data (yes, i'm an idiot...gonna grab an external drive first thing tomorrow and try to pull all data of the harddrive).



any ideas what might be wrong with it?????
i'm not even sure if it's an interface or pc thing, but since i'm getting stupid stuff while booting the pc i'm guessing the pc is on it's way out.


any of the tech savy guys around here have an idea????
this is fucked up, i have a band scheduled for next week so i absolutely HAVE to work this out in the next few days.

thanks in advance!!

 

[guitarguru777]

#1. unplug your interface and reboot, does the bootup issue still happen?
If yes, download latest drivers for interface
If no, Plug interface back in

#2 How much hard drive space do you have left?
If if less then 10% total HD size start cleaning up any unused files and move them to CD / DVD or an external
If more then 10% run check disk, after check disk reboot. Does it sill happen?

#3 Run anti virus and anti malware
If system is clean go on to step 4.
If system is dirty, remove viruses & malware and reboot, still happening?

#4 Unplug each device plugged into your PC 1 by one and Reboot, start with USB / Firewire devices, then move on to PCI cards. have an old video card laying around? try that too. Once you find the culprit update the drivers

#5 repair your windows install
Still happening? If so then consider that your PC is fucked and its a MOBO issue.

Till then dont think your PC is going out on you.

 

[Fragle]

#1. unplug your interface and reboot, does the bootup issue still happen?
If yes, download latest drivers for interface
If no, Plug interface back in

#2 How much hard drive space do you have left?
If if less then 10% total HD size start cleaning up any unused files and move them to CD / DVD or an external
If more then 10% run check disk, after check disk reboot. Does it sill happen?

#3 Run anti virus and anti malware
If system is clean go on to step 4.
If system is dirty, remove viruses & malware and reboot, still happening?

#4 Unplug each device plugged into your PC 1 by one and Reboot, start with USB / Firewire devices, then move on to PCI cards. have an old video card laying around? try that too. Once you find the culprit update the drivers

#5 repair your windows install
Still happening? If so then consider that your PC is fucked and its a MOBO issue.

Till then dont think your PC is going out on you.

thanks, that was fast!

#1) gonna try that right now, stay tuned

#2) loads of free space, will run checkdisk anyways

#3) the pc isn't connected with the internet and is strictly used for audio ONLY. nothing touches that pc aside from reaper updates, plugin installs, and session data. i doubt there's some virus stuff going on

#4) will try that next if #1 fails

thanks!

 

[guitarguru777]

Not to say that you do this, but if you have ever used ANY hacked / cracked / I didnt purchase this / H20 try before you buy .... you are probably infected. The internet isn't the ONLY source for viruses. Could have been a friend with a USB stick / CD that had some impulses / samples that was infected

 

[bryan_kilco]

Defrag?

 

[ahjteam]

take backups, nao.

 

[Ladyklau]

 

[Fragle]

ok, update.

unplugging the interface has no effect.

i noticed that if i start getting audio glitches while playback, zooming in and out once temporarily solves the problem.

i managed to backup all the critical session data, so i'm safe as far as that goes....

maybe the problem could be the graphic card? after all the audio glitches go away when changing perspective in the project.

edit: also ran checkdisk and defrag, no effect.

 

[Let it burn...]

 

[Jackal_Strain]

Real helpful there

I'd download the latest drivers for your graphicscard and see if that solves the problem. If not, try to borrow another card or if you have a spare yourself, install that and see if it changes anything.

 

[Fragle]

will do, thanks.

it's strange that it came out of the blue, though.....i haven't changed anything on that system since i first installed all my studio software when the pc was new.

 

[guitarguru777]

 

[Jind]

Random startup issues are a pain in the ass to troubleshoot, I've had one for the past several weeks on one of my PCs, thankfully not my DAW however. Things that I'd be checking out would be first and foremost Power Supply - random crappy performance and startup issues can be signs that you have a power supply starting to shit the bed. As it goes it stops providing clean stable current and it will have impact all across your system. I'd also start pulling out memory and trying it with less or in different slots (if you can as it's going to depend on the amount of bars you have and/or their configuration). For me it was my power supply - I was having poor audio performance, random reboots, the unstable power was even causing my CD/DVD burner to fail when attempting to burn DVDs or CDs - it would just stop part of the way through a burn or rip. I went out and bought a replacement PSU and it cured all the problems I was having.

 

[Fragle]

actually, that's an interesting thought. we had a large power dropout shortly before the pc incident. as i said, i didn't have a chance to fire it up before that happened, but maybe there was some power spike involved that fucked up my power supply.
but then again, all my other electronic gear in the house, including other pcs, are just fine.....

 

[guitarguru777]

Got another PS you can test it with?

 

[Jackal_Strain]

Yes, the importance of a stable and reliable power supply cannot be overstated!

 

[dani]

a power supply isn't likely to show problems like that.

download memtest86, burn it to a disk and run it for an hour, if you get even 1 error, replace your ram asap.

back up your shit now, your PC might not boot again at some point.

if memtest comes back ok, and you've backed everything up, i'd recommend a re-install of windows. it shouldn't take too long, but setting everything up will.

by the way, the beeping noise you heard when you pushed the start menu button was probably the keyboard buffer filling up.

weird non-consistent errors like this are quite often RAM related.

thanks,

 

[Fragle]

thanks!

i just did a 2 hour memtest, zero errors.

guess i got to reinstall windows....

btw, i'm on XP right now. i'm thinking about switching to win7 home premium 64bit. my dad bought it but didn't get along with the user interface (old people... ;-) ) and went back to XP, so i have it lying around unused.
do you guys think i should switch over to win7, or just go by the old saying "don't touch a running system" and stick with win XP?

 

[SimonTaddio_Qc]

System Restore to the day you left for vacation, maybe?

 

[guitarguru777]

thanks!

i just did a 2 hour memtest, zero errors.

guess i got to reinstall windows....

btw, i'm on XP right now. i'm thinking about switching to win7 home premium 64bit. my dad bought it but didn't get along with the user interface (old people... ;-) ) and went back to XP, so i have it lying around unused.
do you guys think i should switch over to win7, or just go by the old saying "don't touch a running system" and stick with win XP?

The performance increase on MY pc was great moving to 7. Not sure what gear you are running, so i cant really say yay or nay, but in general 7 runs awesome!