System hard freezes when moved

Community Support
#1

Hey all,

Just got a chassis off of someone on here for my standalone that I already had set up. Everything was working great last night when I got it all set up, but sadly that is no longer the case.

It would appear that when I move my laptop while it’s on, the system will lock up entirely and the only way to fix it is to force a shutdown. Sometimes the display would go black with just my mouse cursor, but then when I move it around a bit more, it would all come back, but stay unresponsive.

The system in standalone mode seemed to work just fine previously, but I never really moved it around while it was on and in use, since it was, well, a standalone system, not a laptop.

After coming across this issue, I obviously decided to take it apart again and see if I simply didn’t quite insert some of the connectors, only to find that I did in fact insert all of them correctly, and from what I gather there are no bent pins or obstructions such as particles, hair or dust.

I did try reseating the RAM as well, as well as running with only one stick (which worked for a bit but then moving the laptop still caused a freeze).

Any tips?

Mainboard: i5-1135G7
RAM: SK Hynix 1x8 @ 3200MHz (x2)
SSD: WD SN730 512GB NVMe SSD
Chassis: Refurbished DIY

Update: I believe that I know the cause. Thanks everyone for the help! (SODIMM slot 0, aka the one on the right side, is not holding the stick in place well enough and causes the system to go haywire when moved.

#2

Maybe a bit more detail. What OS are you using as is it a Gen 11 etc.

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#3

My apologies. I am running Windows 11. (I think it’s the 22H2 revision?)

Should also mention that the system does not BSOD when freezing up. Simply becomes entirely unresponsive, and so I cannot provide error codes in that form.

#4

Gen 11 with the latest 3.17 updates ?

#5

I think the one I had is BIOS 3.10. I’ll try this beta one out now.

#6

I had hope for a second there, but no, same issue. I move it for a bit, and it’s gone.

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#7

This may sound silly but do you have a battery in the chassis or are you just running offf AC? Also examine the nvme mount location closely and see if it is fully soldered/attached.

#8

This may sound silly but do you have a battery in the chassis or are you just running offf AC?

Not a very dumb question to me lol.
Battery is in and seems to be working as expected. Also running AC.

Also examine the nvme mount location closely and see if it is fully soldered/attached

Looks like it’s in there to me, but I am not educated in soldering jobs and whether they are good or not. All I know is that it doesn’t move, and it generally works.

#9

Does the issue happen both on battery and when connected to AC power?

double check to make sure that none of the gold of the pins on the nvme drive are exposed when you have the drive fully seated. if you see any gold you need to unscrew it and push the drive into the slot a little bit more.

if none of these options work, it might be worth it to send a message to support to see if they have any ideas for troubleshooting. Hopefully you didn’t get a faulty chassis (although if you’re willing to put it back into the 3d printed case and try moving that around, it would tell us if the problem is the mainboard or the chassis…)

#10

Sorry for the late reply.

Does the issue happen both on battery and when connected to AC power?

Yes, it does not matter which it’s on, it freezes either way.

As for the NVMe, I do know for sure that the NVMe is in. I build desktops as a hobby and can confirm that it is fully socketed, as is the RAM and NIC, so I would argue that it is likely not those, although I don’t know for sure.

if you’re willing to put it back into the 3d printed case and try moving that around

I can certainly try that and let you know of the results.

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#11

Got it. It was a problem with SODIMM slot 0! I was shaking it around rather violently and it did not freeze, so I decided to give it a few light taps to see what it would do. I tapped on the RAM sticks and boom, that was the problem right there. SODIMM slot 0 (the one on the right) is loose and does not properly hold the stick of RAM in place. I tried tapping it a few more times after the freeze, and wouldn’t you know it, every time I moved it up and down the screen flickered. This inability to hold it correctly causes physical instability. I’ll pass that along to customer support and see what they can do for me.

Edit 1: added more details to the diagnosis.

Edit 2: Found a bent pin in that specific socket of the board! Wonder how long that’s been there.

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