Solved CPU Red Led, DRAM Orange Led, Freeze Randomly happening on boot.

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lethm

PCHF Member
Nov 1, 2023
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The following lines explain the issue I faced a few months ago, it is very important for the context of the issue I'm facing now :

|||||||||||||||| MARCH 2 2023 ||||||||||||||||

I have had this PC for almost 2 years now everything was working perfectly fine :
CPU : Intel I7-11700k
GPU : Zotac RTX 3070ti

RAM : 2x8G 3600Mhz to whom I added another exact same 2x8G 3600Mhz a month ago
MoBo : MSI Z590 Plus
SSD(OS : Win10) : Samsung 980 Pro 1Tb M.2 nvMe
HDD : Seagate Barracuda 7200rpm 1Tb
SSD : Crucial MX500 250Gb
PSU : Corsair CX750M

One day I pushed my power button expecting windows to boot, and nothing happened, instead I had the Windows Boot screen (the loading dots thing) frozen, I thought it was weird, so I tried troubleshooting, so I restarted and entered bios to access to the troubleshooting reboot menu of windows, there I verified the OS files, tried a few things, safely ofc, and when it rebooted, it worked.

I thought I had fixed it, but 2 days after I got the same thing happening, so I thought I'd do the same thing, but this time after I forced shut down and turned the pc back on, there was nothing.
The GPU was on, fans were running, aaaand that CPU Red Led (attached file) was lit too.

So I googled it, and tried those steps :
CMOS Reset
- PC booted once after that, but after I went into the bios to get my old settings back (resize bar and xmp merely), the issue came back

CMOS battery replacement
- PC booted after again, 2 times, then after putting BIOS settings back, cpu red light came back again.

Cleaned the whole PC (physically), changed thermal paste, checked if there was anything wrong with the CPU's Socket, or if there was any pin that was broken, everything was clear and clean, did a CMOS reset as I was cleaning everything.
This time I did NOT tweak BIOS to check if it was the source if my problems.
It booted, once, then I restarted it to test it, annnd it didn't boot, but this time, IT WAS THE DRAM ORANGE LED. So removed all the ram I had except one, and put it on the first slot, dram led was still on, so I tried with another RAM stick, still on the same slot, and it booted.

Expecting it to fail again, I made a save of all the files that were on the nvMe on my HDD just in case, then performed a clean reinstall (Win10), (the windows installer froze 2 times and I had to restart it, worked on third try), everything worked fine so I put the RAM back in, it worked again, so I kept updating drivers and had to restart a few times for that, and as expected, it failed after 2 or 3 restarts as I was updating everything. CPU Red Led again.

I honestly don't know what to do anymore, so I have several questions, but the two main ones are these :
- What is possibly going on ?
- How can I fix that, if I can ?

Anybody can help me with that please ?

||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

I tested the RAM, it doesn't seem to be faulty.


2 months after that, in June 2023, I had the i7-11700k replaced with a new (same) one, and the motherboard changed to a MSI MAG Z590 TOMAHAWK WIFI.

Everything worked fine since then... until this morning November 1 2023.
I had the motherboard displaying the CPU Red led once, DRAM Orange led once, and it froze on BIOS instruction screen during boot once.
It booted after a few tries, and I am currently saving my files, I expect my PC to start failing again. Of all sources I checked, I haven't seen anyone that managed to fix that issue. It appears to happen on Z590 chipset motherboards mostly, but seeing how it disappeared for a long time after changing the CPU, it might come from it too, I don't know.

Can anybody tell me where that issue comes from, and/or how to fix it please ?
 
Hello

Just to clarify did you install the chipset drivers on the new mobo ?

@PeterOz
 
Last edited:
CPU : Intel I7-11700k

RAM : 2x8G 3600Mhz to whom I added another exact same 2x8G 3600Mhz a month ago

CMOS Reset
- PC booted once after that, but after I went into the bios to get my old settings back (resize bar and xmp merely), the issue came back

Bit of a clue there;

The RAM is not appropriate for your CPU, Intel state here up to 3200MHz and if you have XMP enabled the RAM will get auto OCd past what the CPU can handle and the PC will become unstable.

In addition to the above, a Bronze efficiency rated PSU should not be used anywhere near a gaming rig, Corsair make some good PSUs but they must be used for what Corsair recommend and they don't recommend yours be for gaming builds,

CX Series Modular power supply units are an excellent choice for basic system builds and desktop PC computer upgrades, offering high reliability, low noise, and the flexibility of modular cabling.
 
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Being that the OP revisited the forum but left no reply this thread will be marked and closed.
 
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