PC randomly stops responding for a few seconds during use

My computer will randomly stop for a few seconds while doing these things:

• While browsing the internet on Chrome or Firefox (sites seem random).

• Using Steam and just browsing forums

• Playing Hearthstone, running Empyrion Server

Nothing crashes, just freezes for a few seconds and then I can continue again

• I did do a complete reinstall of windows 10 on an SSD, that did not solve it.

• I have run Memtest 86 and it didn't find any issues.

• I ran Crystal DiskMark and SSD seemed OK.

• I ran HotCPU Tester to check CPU, it didn't find anything.

• I run Speccy and temperatures never go above 80 C (they rarely hit that)

• I can play older games (like Warcraft 2) and it has never frozen on that.

I do have an internal HDD that was NOT wiped when I did reinstall on the SSD. The SSD is used for OS and couple games/programs that I want faster response speed for.

When building this computer, I did make a mistake when I had to swap motherboards and when I was taking CPU cooler off, it took the CPU with it due to Thermal paste holding it on. I do wonder if that caused damage to the CPU.

Computer Specs are as follows (no intentional overclocking, other than XMP):

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 2700X (stock cooler)
RAM: 16 GB
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080
Motherboard: X470 Aorus Ultra Gaming

I have done research and testing and can't figure it out. I would tend to think it is RAM or CPU related, but neither test found anything. If I need to, I will replace both (one at a time), but I would rather not (if it isn't the issue) as they are expensive.

I easily may have missed something obvious, since as I said, I am new to IT.

My mouse and keyboard still function fine during these freezes, but the PC will not respond to any clicks or typing during this time. It will then try to respond to the click or typing after the freeze.

As for event viewer, I finally found two events that coincide with a freeze.

"Reset to device, \Device\RaidPort0, was issued."

"The IO operation at logical block address 0x4a153a8 for Disk 0 (PDO name: \Device\00000037) was retried."

If I understand right, that would be related to the SSD that Win 10 is on, right?

According to the two event log entries, the problem is being caused by your "Disk 0" hard disk:

Reset to device, \Device\RaidPort0, was issued.

Note: This is logged in as event ID 129. The event source indicates the storage adapter's driver name that is responsible for the disk.

The IO operation at logical block address 0x4a153a8 for Disk 0 (PDO name: \Device\00000037) was retried.

In your case the problem is with physical disk 0. The reference to \Device\RaidPort0 doesn't always mean disk 0, but the reference to Disk 0 in the second event (ID 153?) does (which is nice since determining what RaidPort0 refers to involves several steps).

Identify the offending disk by opening Disk Manager (diskmgmt.msc) and noting which drive is listed as Disk 0.

Windows logs event ID 129 when the disk timeout timer has expired. This is almost always due to physical hardware problems due to faulty:

• Hard disk
• Cabling
• Disk controller

You should check/replace the data and power cables to the drive. You could also try another port. A test of the disk using the manufacturer diagnostics is also in order.

The author of this Microsoft Developer blog post says about event ID 129:

I have never seen software cause an Event ID 129 error. If you are seeing Event ID 129 errors in your event logs, then you should start investigating the [physical hardware].

My experience with this event confirms this conclusion. While not an actual exception to this, this TechNet blog post recounts a situation where changing the PCI Express Link State Power Management setting to Off in the system's power profile resolved event 129.

Anecdotally, in my experience disks triggering these errors are bad and need to be replaced, but you should do the above steps to rule out other causes first.