Computer screens randomly freezing, have to force shut down and reboot

Hi BelgianCat. Welcome to the TenForums @BelgianCat

Not sure what you mean when you say you cleaned out your PC. Is this physical cleaning? You opened up case and cleaned inside?

If so shut down device and go back in. Reseat all cards, memory and connectors. Check if any wires may be interfering with fan blades.

If you used compressed air to clean did you prevent fans from spinning when you hit them with the compress air. If not they can over spin which can lead to failure. You said you hear fans spinning up so I assume this has to do with heat.

Use a tool like HWMonitor to see temperatures. You can press your CPU by running Prime95. Watch your temperatures. They will go up but should level off.

Prime95 - Stress Test Your CPU

Might do this test twice, once with case open so you can see all fans, especial video card and once with case closed.

Do pay attention to cables. If there is just a large mess of them airflow could be restricted. Fans will spin but air just doesn't move efficiently.

How old is device? Thermal paste may need to be reapplied. You will get a better idea when you run Prime95, the system should be able to control CPU heat.


Ken

Hi Ken, thanks for the reply.

I did physically clean it with air before, and yesterday as well. Since the original post we decided to re-open the case and check for any anomalies but we didn't see any. I took out the GPU, opened it up and saw that the thermal paste was completely dried up, I've asked a friend and he said he might have some reserve paste laying around, so that is something I might look into further later.

I reassembled the PC after and oddly enough haven't had any crashes, but I feel like this might be a coincidence as I've had weeks where no crashes occurred and other weeks where I've had daily crashes.

I honestly have no idea if my GPU fan actually still works though, because as you mentioned if the fans overspin they might fail. I did clean it with air 2-ish months ago and didn't hold the fans at the time.
The crashes started to happen soon after.

It's kind of hard to check if the GPU fan actually spins because the fan faces downwards towards the floor and is slotted near the bottom of my case (I'll add a picture if what I just said makes no sense, sorry not too sure how else to explain it)
But I'll give that a try tomorrow (9PM for me right now)

Imgur: The magic of the Internet

As for the wires, there is quite a big mess of wires too (see same picture). I bought the PC Prebuild as I've never built a PC myself (bought the prebuild March 2016) so I'm uncertain how I should begin to properly relocate the wiring if that would be necessary.

TL;DR
Paste is completely dried up;
I'll do a stress test tomorrow while checking the temperatures, and also look if the fans actually spin.
Thanks for your advice! Once I've done what you mentioned I'll post an update.

- - - Updated - - -

Just before I do get started, I've read on that Prime95 site that there are 3 pre-set configurations. Which one should I run?
Also, should I test my GPU afterwards as well with Furmark?

I also just installed HWMonitor and can see that the GPU Fan is running (1000 RPM on idle) so that's good news already I guess, however I can't see any Fans for the CPU and Motherboard (sorry if that's normal, I'm not too keen on the technical side of computers)

Yes it is difficult. I use a little mirror for those hard to see places. You could also setup on desk so you can get lower and look up.

Prime95 won't stress GPU but other benchmark tools will. Not sure that is necessary, if paste is dead, it is dead. I would buy fresh paste. Old paste in the tube also dries out and won't spread properly making things worse.

As to wiring, just use common sense. It doesn't look like it is in the way of airflow, seems to enter at the lower front. That said I can't tell where front fan is from picture. If wire nest is in line of air flow cut wire tires and carefully relocate.

Looks like your case has a fan mount on the back, directly left of cpu cooler. I would use the largest fan possible in this position. I say large as large fans can rotate slower, quieter, and move the same air as a smaller fan turning faster, nosier. Back case fan should exhaust out.

If you could add fan to front, pulling air in, that would be ideal. Hopefully you have filters for intake air. If you exhaust to much air you create negative pressure in case and if air unfiltered you need to clean more often. Cleaning isn't the worse job in the world, just carried my unit outside last week.

Not sure in MB has fan headers, a lot do. Some you can control speed, some run flat out. Flat out on a high speed fan makes for lots of niose so you may want to consider how you will control fan speed before buying. You may just want to add fan controller so you can adjust speed based on usage. Myself I'm not a big fan on manual adjustment as it is easy to forget.

Quality fans cost more but are usually quieter.

As you can tell I hate noise.