Vista - Random hangs and freezes

Hi Everybody,

I just put together a new pc. I'm trying to get Vista x86 going, but have run into some serious problems...

Gigabyte ga-m59sli-s5 motherboard F8 bios (latest)
4 GB (4x1GB) sticks of corsair pc800
Maxtor 1 TB hdd sata 300
PNY Xlr8 geforce 9800 gt 1 GB pci-x video card
pc power and cooling silencer 750 power supply

I had the F7 bios, had to update to the F8 because the bios reports the wrong size on 1 TB hard drives. Flashed the bios from the Qbios utility right out of the bios setup screen and all was well. Vista Ultimate set up fine. No errors or problems. As expected Vista is only reporting 3.5 GB of ram. The first thing I did was install the chipset drivers that I downloaded from gigabyte. Halfway through the install vista started random hangs and froze during the install. Had to kill the power. Used lkg to get back in. Reinstalled the chipset drivers with no trouble. It's been hang up and freeze randomly ever since.

Maybe it's the ram issue? Maybe the chipset drivers? Gonna try removing some ram tonight until I can get some windows updates. If I don't do anything the system is fine. I can even browse the web. It seems to act up when I try to install drivers or updates.

Any Ideas? Nothing is OC'd and temps are nice and cool.

nForce Driver is a newer nforce package than the one on Gigabyte site so may be try that. 50mb from September 08 vs. 21mb from December 06. I wonder if you should untick some featues

Im thinking about "Network Management Tools" which means Firewall among other things? Nvidia hardware firewall on NF4 chipset is one of the worst hardware/software creations ever. Guess improved on 590. You will have to untick if you dont want it. Can probably be disabled in bios even.

Some people have reported problems when installing Vista/SP1 with 4 GB memory but succeeded when removing 2 of them. Strange, but so it seems. Then they could add them back afterwards.

Speaking of unticking: Nvidia Away mode (you can disable/enable in bios Im sure)

Away Mode is an OS feature originally introduced with Update Rollup 2 for Microsoft
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. Away Mode was conceived as a new power management usage model for media PCs that allows the computer to appear off to the user while the system continues to perform tasks that do not require user input, such as recording television and viewing Media Center Extender sessions.

If no need disable.

I would really check out if NAM, Network management is worth it. Basically use as little as possible/you know you want. I doubt even SATA driver is needed unless you go RAID. Im looking at this Bjorn3d.com - NVIDIA nForce 590 MCP, Reviews 'n news for the beast within us! thinking yeah, yeah

Thanks guys, I'll try those suggestions tonight and let you know. I'm not going to rest until it's resolved.

One thing to note... In task manager I looked at the performance tab and processor core 1 looks like a freaking seismograph during an earthquake. I checked the processes and nothing is showing up as eating cpu time.

I'll definitely try the new chipset drivers tonight. Troubles didn't show up until I installed them.

Hi billybob, don't install drivers from window updates. Don't update your chipset drivers if not necessary. Try minimal components and reinstall them until everything work smoothly. While you at it, check the SATA cable and connections. Replace the with with aftermarket ones if you haven't done so. Post back.

If you now use 2006 Nvidia drivers, I would guess especially for storage controller, they might not work that well with Vista SP1. Spiking cpu usage could be one way of showing it. Dont know and cant seem to find changelog for that package. But bugs with Nvidia chipset drivers is definitely not something new. Unless told otherwise I would use latest and greatest.

Problem seems to be solved. The updated (2008) nforce chipset drivers did the trick. I had a hell of a time getting them installed, but once I did, everything smoothed right out. Thanks everybody.

Glad you have things sorted out for you. Enjoy!