That search came up with many good tips. One here suggests what many have suggested running memtest86 also. This guy gives a very good detailed explanation and to load it up from Hiren's Boot CD http://www.wcreplays.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2629751&postcount=2
Another suggestion from me: I'm not sure if you run the PC with internet ON and PC froze...if that case then I suggest you to run the PC WITHOUT Internet.... Based on my exp, internet can freeze your PC too, as happen to my computer, frozen and blackout display due to my previous ISP, I changed ISP then now Ok. Good Luck
Hopefully you have a secondary rig to run for day-to-day while you do the diags on your main. I think that is the virtue of Build-Your-Own - you can put together another standby as a reasonably-priced budget-build and just move your monitor connections if you have to. If you want to emphatically rule out the OS/driver issue, burn a bootable CD from an Ubuntu iso image and run it instead for a while (probably not your trading software though, unless you want to run browser-based stuff). If your computer doesn't freeze, you may have a driver issue (or a Microsoft update that screwed you while they were "improving" Windows).
limau2, I am mainly using a laptop for intenet although time from time I will open firefox for finance stuff or some ET reading. I like to dedicate to trading on the desktop. I did years ago run some other apps but eliminated all of that through the years and keep clean as I can run. Good point to bring up.
I used to boot Ubuntu from a usb. http://www.pendriveapps.com/ I didn't even think of that approach here. This is great advice and I can easily do to continue to diagnose and rule out another area. I have a couple of laptops that I use for backups so I am fine, just not too much fun when these problems arise on the main that I rely on to do the majority of work.
More suggestions : 3) Also try to run PC your LOCAL operating sytem Windows 7 etc with all monitors WITHOUT Networking programs such as a charting program to make sure your charting program is not the cause 4) make sure your LOCAL PC time is standardize/Synchro (with help of atomic time server ) with your chart SERVER time.. or just use SERVER time to avoid glitches issues...I use Sierra chart which has this option to be checked.
I just had two monitors go black and they no longer show up in the display settings. Only four show up out of the six in total, four are present and working so I will swap around the cards and see if the MB , video card itself , or even the ps is also experiencing a problem. This is new to everything going on. Maybe a power supply is the problem as different issues are popping up constant now. The main constant intermittent one the freezing, second blue screen, now displays.
I am building a new rig and have posted it here http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=222974&perpage=6&pagenumber=2 I will continue to work on the current computer to resolve the issue , until then I need a work machine besides the laptops and made the purchase this evening.
It was most likely something else, "internet" as such is only a stream of packets. The only explanation could've been that you made someone angry and got DoS attacked.
You can also run the machine in safe mode (with networking) for an extended period of time and see if you can run all your usual programs. If you can, you have ruled out software issues - from experience services running on your PC can crash it. You can view all the services by typing "msconfig" into the run dialog.