Smells like a bad SSD.

I would replace it with something else and see if the issue is still there. That is mostly what I do anymore to rule out things.

The only alternative (influenced by experience with failure rates) could be graphics card. I deem this unlikely as the graphics aren't working very hard just browsing around windows (at least not a VAIO GPU).

You would have other issues besides for what you are experiencing now. The only other things i can think of is bad ram. ?I have seen bad ram do all kinds of weird things so you better of just temp replacing things to rule out issues.

The microsoft memory test came out clear? Is that a reliable test?

Yes that works good. I had a SSD go out on me not long ago and it had issues like you are saying.

In linux, its easy to see to read the errors, windows i am not so sure on how.

I get 100 out of 100 on read and sectors.

SSDs are more temperamental then disk drives. Just a idea to replace it and see what happens.

Ya know, I plucked out the outer most of two RAM cards just to see if it worked. Been simultaneously playing Netflix and a string of youtubes (subject of my youtube search shall not be mentioned) and it's been running for an hour.

http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/...../#cid:45632806

How's Kuwait? I was just in Dubai on business last month. That is a looooong flight mister.

Do you have a USB stick? It's possible to install and boot Windows from a flash drive. You'll have other slowdown issues but that would let you rule out the HD if it still happens.

I'd put my money on it being the drive, especially if it's a fresh install.

That does sound like a drive problem to me.

Install Windows

What?

I'm dubious about it being the SSD, a performance issue wouldn't cause a spike in the kernel usage. Generally SSDs will work or they don't, there's no slow creep of death as with HDDs. Your brand of SSD likely has management software provided by the manufacturer that can check the drive and its SMART attributes, I'd suggest using that first. What model is your SSD and have you ever done a firmware update on it?

My money would be on a driver or OS file problem. If you've not done so, http://pcsupport.about.com/od/tools.....fc-scannow.htm If that finds nothing I'd nuke every single driver with Driver Fusion, the base software will do it for free.

The fastest way to tell if it is hardware vs software would be a genuine clean install though.

I said Recovery and format, thats a clean install.

Well, I apologize as I am not sure given the wording. I do beg to differ if you're using the drivers from the recovery partition. (I'm assuming OEM stuff, if you made the recovery partition and built it with updated drivers then that's something else). But if it's an old recovery partition (or OEM) then the drivers are going to be out of date and at risk of causing these issues.

In any case, since you are using the m4 this may be your problem http://www.anandtech.com/show/5424/.....the-bsod-issue

Crucial released a software tool for their drives after the m4s had been out awhile: http://www.crucial.com/usa/en/suppo.....rage-executive and it may be able to update your SSD for you as well.

This 5184 hour runtime issue was a very unique problem that only the m4's had, I'm not aware of any other manufacturer that experienced this kind of bug. It's a fast and simple (and permanent) fix with a firmware update, so I hope that's the issue with your system!

Dude... you just fixed my computer!

Awesome!! Had to be immensely frustrating crashing hourly, but I'm glad it is a simple, permanent fix to get everything back up to normal for ya!

Really was a bizarre edge case, but to be fair to Crucial every single SSD manufacturer has suffered from critical firmware bugs at some point over the last five years, that just one happened to be Crucials.

Whats scary is that if you had never found that, I never would have even thought to google for it. I never even thought a hard drive had firmware.. always thought of it like a processor (inherently works).

It's safe to say that we're all in the pioneering phase of SSD still. It's gonna be another 2 or 3 before we're even a decade into this - just think how long it took to get past dialup, lol. This SSD is really fast and roomy, and a good friend at MIT assured me that the devolution won't really hit for 8 - 10 years into its life. Someday we'll be like "remember when SSD's would just fuck up on you."

Ironically, I feel that HDDs have really arrived. I can't remember the last time Ive seen a head crash or gotten a bad click. It's like they've reached the HDD apogee.

Admittedly I'm a bit of a nerd when it comes to computer tech, and SSDs have been the best thing to come along for computers in quite a long time. I do a bit of writing on SSDs and have tested many of them in the past. I find it fun to discuss tech so please forgive the rambling!

Ah, well here's a scary/fascinating thought for ya then! An SSD is basically an entire self-contained computer. It has firmware (BIOS), DRAM cache (memory/RAM), NAND (storage), and a controller (2-4 core processor). The software required to mange and track the data is very complex due to so many indirect layers of abstraction. Maybe it's the complexity but every year another manufacturer has some major issue, currently the unfortunate one is Samsung and they are not handling it well.

SSDs are peculiar in that they do need firmware updates, often to fix performance related bugs that end users won't ever notice (unless they run benchmarking software), or more serious bugs like this one. But firmware updates also have proven very problematic or even been the cause of problems such as drive bricking in the past. It didn't help some models and brands used to require destructive (data wiping) of the drive during the firmware update process. And yet, unlike a UEFI BIOS, firmware updates were often needed. So while I generally do recommend for users to update their SSD firmware, it's loaded with caveats about the risk unless its a drive with an already older, established safe firmware.

I completely agree with you, SSDs are still in the pioneering phase. Common SSDs are capable of maxing out roughly a dozen storage interface types, some that were even explicitly designed for them no less. With the possible exception of the GPU (with gamers), change any system component in a computer and none will have the impact on system responsiveness that an SSD offers, they are a must have for systems even with the occasional problem they still run into. I'm probably already preaching to the choir, but yeah xD That said, the "untamed wild west" feel of the market is diminishing quickly. Controllers used to come in all kinds of different design approaches, today there's only a few core names and many of them use Marvel controllers or ARM cores in the controller. SSDs are slowly becoming standardized, and the industry move to PCIe drives that use NVM Express (instead of AHCI) will only help with that.

Since you bring it up, HDD reliability is an interesting topic in its own right. I agree in that they have the potential to last incredibly long under the right conditions. The issue is that there are an incredible number of factors that affect them, even something as simple as the user changing the spin-down timer (I disable mine) can let a drive last a decade. And yet, on the flipside warranty lengths on consumer HDDs are the lowest they have ever been. It's unfortunate as well that there used to be over a hundred HDD manufacturers at one point, today there are only Western Digital, Seagate, and Toshiba. Any other brands are directly owned subsidiaries.

I used to have the Velociraptor. Oh man.. only thing I've seen goes faster than an SSD. It made this weird roaring noise and made you feel futuristic.

Those things were just nuts. Access latency was still a couple orders of magnitude higher than any SSD though!

HDD: ~8ms
Velociraptor: 4ms
SSD: 0.04ms

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ.....82E16820148443

disk-checks are not always correct, same as ram check
my OEM hdd of my old laptop had issues with the reader head and it started making clicking noises[i had to force disable docking of the head, which meant constant writing and reading] and the check came up perfectly fine
if the sectors are faulty, you're most likely going to get errors from software and bad sectors will come up in the check
if there are issues with the ram, most of the time you're going to see a blue screen of death
if there are issues with the videocard[dedicated], windows would either force use your integrated, or if -that's- faulty, your computer would not run at all

some more detailed information would clear it up though~

Ya know, I did get a blue screen upon the reinstall of my OS. The OS seems intact after bypassing a fowled setup process (using a generic username).

did you do a full format or you used the recovery partition?
ram failure is very rare unless you're using a desktop or in cases of laptops, putting new ram in that doesn't match the same type that's being dual-channeled

once you get your old HDD back, put it back in and do a ramtest from the BIOS [and let it run on powersaver mode for an hour if it's a laptop], if it still occurs, it's most likely your ram, if it doesn't, it's the ssd
ssds as far as i know, don't make clicking noises during bad docking[which is among the most common issues with old drives], so you want to back up everything asap
another way to check if it's a docking issue is to move large files back and forth keeping the drive busy and see if it still occurs during that[that's how i saved one of the HDDs back then until i could back it up before i started using an SSD]

another common bsod is bad videocard drives and old videocards overheating[only really occurs in desktops, since they have their own fans and a lot of them as far as i know can't shut down the PC via bios to prevent heating damage, so they just shut down themselves]

Your avatar is just perfect for talking computer trouble.

Have you tried turning it off and on again?

*heads desk*

Like Kougar said, it might not be the SSD. Some brief googling return links suggesting it might be a driver issue. It fits if you just did a fresh install. The light might just be that the driver is straight up reading/writing to the drive and consuming cycles. This might help: http://helpdeskgeek.com/windows-7/f.....-in-windows-7/

I'm not a Windows user, so I can't really test any of this, unfortunately :/

A freshly installed set of drivers from a recovery partition?

hmm...unless it decided to auto-update to a bad version then you're right. It might be the SSD failing if you keep a lot on it and constantly write but I'm not sure if that explains the CPU usage. Even a failing SSD should (as far as I can guess) only use the healthy blocks when doing wear-leveling and prevent it from losing anything. If it's seeming to be in working order except for the light and usage then it might eliminate the SSD and leave an OS/Kernel/driver problem.

While not entirely related, I know that my friend had issues with her USBs and I think she tried running recoveries and reformats but it took a reinstall of the drivers to fix it. It might be the same case here where the driver/Kernel have been failing and are only now showing symptoms.

Swapping to the HDD could also either fix or help find the issue.

Plucked out one of the RAM chips and it has been running netflix Columbo episodes and youtube porn for an hour without issues.

Huh...That's rather unexpected. Hopefully it holds.

And just as I say that it crashes again. Trying the other (of 2). It seems that task switching is the real trip up on it.

NT Kernel & System handles all the switching, so that part makes sense. I'd still say that updating/checking drivers might help or running some virus scans, and something like CCleaner (check http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showth.....d.php?t=283048 , it seems to be a similar problem). A spec list with ages and some of the major programs you are running and antivirus tools might also help.

It's all fresh. Recovered.

Unfortunately we've hit the bottom of my Windows knowledge well. Your best bet might be the HDD if you can get it and hope that it works.

The last option is to manually backup your data, do a complete reinstall and reconfigure everything manually. Not the best option but if it's a software issue a clean slate should fix everything and if it's hardware then it'll have to be done anyway.

That's what I was going to suggest too, if he has an OS disc a complete reinstall would fix everything as long as it's not a hardware problem. I used to do it once a year on my old Vista PC

I'll usually do that when Linux starts to act up. Most of my data is on another partition (I just have a laptop at the moment) so I just have to backup around 50Gb and then reinstall. In under 2 hours I can have it back looking and running almost like new. It's not always the easiest depending on how many programs you use but I find it's a great method of housekeeping.

Yeah, my current Asus desktop with windows 7 didn't come with an OS disc and I lost the recovery discs so i'm stuck with some registry errors now. it's not too bad, I just have trouble installing certain programs like Skype. I keep getting this "cannot write to key hkey" something or other. I have an external HDD to backup all my pics and stuff. I'm planning on building my next PC.

Try this or this and maybe this to get the product key. I use YUMI for making my own boot-disks but haven't tried it to make a Windows installer. Downloads of the ISO are legal and and should be found here or elsewhere. You just have to boot to it through your BIOS and you might be able to fix some issues. I have 2 boot-disks on me at all times just in case I need it but again, cannot vouch for the Windows installer.

I have tried to do a system recover from the microsoft website but it tells me I need to contact Asus. I'll try some of those other things you suggested. Thanks!

A friend of mine uses a SSD for the OS and programs etc and a conventional drive for storage. the idea is to cut down on writing to the SSD because I know they have a limited amount of times you can write to them before they start messing up. The advantage of that setup is the OS and everything runs a lot faster.

While true, the amount of writes you can do before the drives start to suffer from significant write amplification is much higher than most users will ever do. At writing multiple GB's per day, consumer SSD's can handle, on average, 500TB+ or writes.

This is an excellent test of popular consumer drives write capabilities: http://techreport.com/review/26523/.....-to-a-petabyte

Overall I've been disappointed with SSD's in my experience.

Lame you've had a bad experience, but I love all of mine. I've got 4, two in my laptop (Samsung and Crucial) and two in my desktop (Crucial and Mushkin), haven't had any issues yet.

I'd have to agree, Sucks to have a bad experience, but having dual Intel 240gb (one 520 Series, the other 530 series), and a Samsung 840 Evo 1TB, man, my entire steam collection is on SSD, Windows is on one of my Intels, then the other Intel is just for random stuff where I need high read/write speed.

Used to have a first gen i7, so was capped at Sata 2 speeds, 250mb/sec read/write... But after building a brand new i7 4790k this past winter, happy to see 450+MB/sec read and write (and 550MB/sec read/write from my Samsung), games load way quicker, as do any and all applications. Photoshop, under 3 seconds, as opposed to 7-9 seconds back when I had it on my regular drive.

Had a bad SSD experience myself with my first gen i7 920 system about 4 years ago, think it was a Corsair Force SSD, worked amazing, windows started fast, apps loaded fast, then I started getting 'the stutter' and occasional complete system lockups, and upon doing a hard reset, the drive wasn't detected by the motherboard, so at that time, I was put off from using SSD's from that point on until they were more reliable, up until I got my first Intel SSD back in 2013, due to being one of the best brands with the highest reliability rate.

The hard drive usage on my initial Intel 240gb, is sitting at 13.41 TB of data written, which I suppose is approximately 60 full re-writes of the drive, out of the estimated 3000-4000, and that's in just over 2.5 years.

Anyway, that's my story!

Had a drive light on and very very slow response. CPU one of the cores was in full usage. nothing seemed to stop it other then a reset. However after the reboots in a few mins it would start again so left it like that, suddenly about 40 mins later it stopped , light went out other then a brief pulse from time to time[normal] and it never happened again. Was a new driver but found once triggered it would set somthing off in the drive and would happen if any driver updated on the drive. [ie driver for the drive] may not be your prob but this what happened to me

So many Timons working at the same computer!

No worries, we can fix it! :D

I KNOW!

I'd be curious to know what a GNU/Linux live distro says about any hardware problems. Because it's very good at finding them, it's just harder to find solutions or understand what some of the errors mean exactly.
I mean Linux is a kernel that actually works well enough and tells you log information through dmesg/syslog (or, at least on boot-up I guess journald, depending on if systemd is installed.)

In any case, try it. Or look at the Event Viewer for windows for errors. That's another really handy tool. There's also ways you can take a core kernel dump when your system gets a BSOD, but since I have only used Windows up to 7 and not 8 or 8.1, I have no idea if the functionality still exists. Yeah, I don't even use Windows anymore.

Best of luck if you haven't solved it already~ It's probably hardware related, and the software doesn't know how to handle the problems, hence a freeze-up. Even my laptop reboots when the bottom gets too hot, so I use a metal caddy thing under it to distribute heat. I suspect the BIOS is doing it, and I gotta try to apply more thermal paste, but I don't feel like opening up my T410. It's kind of my main PC right now.

Anyway, you might also want to note the age of the RAM, and even if it's new, especially if it's new, try running Memtest, just to make sure that's not the problem. Bad RAM often causes not only bad hangups, but it could even damage your system files and data, even with modern-day ECC memory, so check 'em!

It just wanted a Byte for a Bit, you should have a Word with it.