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Reference: When I use the words pause, lock or stop I refer to a stage where a process seems to be in a never-ending-loop with no timeout.

I have built a brand new pc, except for the hard drives. The Motherboard, CPU, RAM, Graphics Card is all new.

  • 16 GB DDR3
  • Intel Core i7-2600K
  • NVIDIA Geforce GTX 580

The operating system runs on a Corsair SSD F120 Force Series (120 GB). Attached as well is a 750GB Samsung Hard Drive (Used for storage) and another Samsung Hard Drive 40GB (used for cache and temp)

The motherboard is a Asus P8Z68-V Pro (link), with the new B3 chipset that resolves Intel's design error known as Cougar Point. (link)

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I've got LucidLogix Virtu enabled to support three monitors, two on graphics card and one on motherboards integrated port.

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I first had some trouble with the SSD connected to the marvell controller. Which I "resolved" by disabling the controller. (link).

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The OS is a fresh install of Windows 7 x64 Professional with all (pretty sure) drivers and firmwares up-to-date (2011-11-30). I updated the SSD firmware yesterday. However the issue does not seem to be related to the SSD, but I will no rule it out just yet (actually I will not rule anything out)

The problem I'm having now is that my computer seem to lock, but not freeze the mouse, keyboard or browsing etc.

So far, the issue seems to be related to some times, but not all times, when I try to access the 750GB hard drive. Either from Explorer or CMD using dir.

The CMD window is (once dir has been started) not possible to end by closing it or killing it from Task Manager.

Explorer however can be closed, but I believe its still open as a operation in the background.

I've runned chkdsk /r /f for the hard drive several times with no errors.

S.M.A.R.T is not telling me anything either.

Event Viewer is not giving me any hints.

I have no unrecognized hardware or exclamation marks in Device Manager.

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Some times when this has happened, the monitor connected to the internal graphics card with LucidLogix Virtu enabled will go black and can only be restored by rebooting. I have tested without that monitor enabled from Display settings but the issue will still arise. Edit 3: I have also tested disabling LucidLogix Virtu from BIOS (iGPU Multi-Monitor).

When trying to shutdown Windows it will simply "lock/pause/stop" at the log off screen saying:

Operations are in progress. Please wait. The machine will be turned off automatically after the operations are complete.

The only solution at that point is hard reset. I have waited for it complete for more than 24 hours.

EDIT 2: Could it be related to Acronis True Image Home? Even though I haven't actively used it or done a backup with it. link

EDIT:

In Safe Mode, this does not occur, at least not for 2 hours of active hard drive read activity. I wrote a script that ran dir s: /s in a loop. And it seemed stable during that time.

However, in normal boot mode it can take from 2 hours - 48 hours until the issue occurs.

But since the hard drive from every tests I've done seems healthy, except some minor things in S.M.A.R.T, specifically Spin Retry Count, Value=100, Threshold=51 (link) I'm quite sure the issue isn't related to the health of the hard drive. I'm thinking its possibly more due to a software/driver issue.

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If, by any (small) chance, anyone recognizes this issue, or has an idea of how to continue - then I would be very grateful.

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  • Does it do this while in Safe Mode? Dec 1, 2011 at 13:53
  • Doh! I will try that. Don't know why I haven't done that yet. Dec 1, 2011 at 13:56
  • I updated the question with my recent tests. Please have a look and advice. Dec 1, 2011 at 20:01

1 Answer 1

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I've seemed to have solved the case now. After testing various uninstallations and reinstallations of drivers and software I decided to unplug hardware one by one and leave the computer under high CPU, memory and GPU usage for 24 hours for each test.

The funny thing here, which I can't seem to understand why, is that when I unplugged the 750GB hard drive, Windows was finally working as it should.

The hard drive only reports a small issue with Spin Retry Count which directly doesn't explain the weird behaviors I've been getting. I'm happy for an explanation as to why it occurred though. The drive was never accessed during the times that Windows decided to act weird.

Cheers /Niklas

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