Solved Multiple games crashing regularly and weekly BSODs

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LLemonSS

LLemonSS

PCHF Member
Jan 5, 2021
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Hi all,

This is my first post, so apologies if I've done anything incorrectly, or if this is in the wrong place.

Firstly, here are my full system specs:

Board: Gigabyte B450M DS3H-CF (AM4)
CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2600X
GPU: Geforce GTX 1050
RAM: Corsair CMK16GX4M2B3200C16 Vengeance LPX (2 x 8 GB) DDR4 3200 MHz
HDD: Seagate Barracuda ST1000DM003 - 1TB
SSD: SanDisk SD8SBBU240G1122
PSU: OCZ Mod X Stream Pro 600W

On to the problems I've been having:

I've been having issues since about October now with games crashing and occasional BSODs. I replaced my RAM, M/board and CPU at the end of October as they were overdue for an upgrade anyway, and the crashes seem to have gotten worse within the last month or so, so I'm hoping someone can shed some light on what I might have missed.

Originally it was only a game called Guild Wars 2 that was crashing, and after sending numerous logs to ArenaNet's support site, none of their fixes have ultimately solved the problem. As of late I've been getting numerous silent crashes on Fallout: New Vegas, and my wife has been getting the same when she plays The Sims 4. Blue screens occur roughly once a week, but I didn't have dumps from before December unfortunately, so I don't have the full history to hand, only about the last month or so.

Things I've tried:

  • Upgrade of various older hardware components (in this case, m/board, RAM and CPU)
  • Clean install of latest card drivers
  • A clean install of windows 10 (done after replacing the m/board)
  • Ran a memory test on the new RAM, and checked my HDD for bad sectors, both came back with no issues found.
I haven't replaced either my graphics card or my PSU, but am wondering if one or both are part of the problem, as they are the only pieces of hardware (save for the HDD and SSD, which I've tested) that haven't been replaced.

I've uploaded the BSOD minidumps for the last few weeks (which is roughly once a week or so since December) onto OneDrive, as well as the text file export for msinfo32 so you can get a full picture of the hardware (and Windows version) if needed.


1drv.ms

Minidumps and ms32info.zip ​

Compressed (zipped) Folder
1drv.ms

I'm not particularly well versed in how to read system dmp files correctly, so apologies if there is something in them that was easy to spot. It looks as if there's no 1 cause of these crashes (either app or system), so was hoping that having a more full history of previous system crashes might narrow down the potential problem.

I've attempted to use driver verifier to force a blue screen in the hopes it would help me identify the problem, and all the blue screens have given me was the following fault code, without a driver being specified: DRIVER_VERIFIED_DETECTED_VIOLATION

I had to reboot in safe mood to turn driver verifier off, as it wouldn't boot at all once it had been enabled.

Any help anyone can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
 

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Hello LLemonSS,

First thing that I noticed was the age and quality of the PSU which should have been gotten rid of years ago tbh.

LLemonSS said:
A clean install of windows 10 (done after replacing the m/board)
Click to expand...

After clean installing Windows did you install the drivers for the MB and starting with the chipset drivers first.

Dmps more than two days are of no use I`m afraid so only the last one is any good, GPU drivers are implicated in that.

Download then run Speccy (free) and post the resultant url for us, details here, this will provide us with information about your computer hardware + any software that you have installed that may explain the present issue/s.

To publish a Speccy profile to the Web:

In Speccy, click File, and then click Publish Snapshot.

In the Publish Snapshot dialog box, click Yes to enable Speccy to proceed.

Speccy publishes the profile and displays a second Publish Snapshot. You can open the URL in your default browser, copy it to the clipboard, or close the dialog box.
 
Hi Phill,

Thanks for the helpful reply.

I'll get the speccy profile uploaded to the forums in a few hours or so once I've made it back from work.

I had wondered whether the PSU could've been part of the problem, as you said it's pretty old at this point.

I'll remember what you said about the crash dumps being more than 2 days old as well, and take that into consideration should I run into any further issues.

There is an outstanding BIOS update for my motherboard, I'll get my flash drive out ready and sort that this evening as well.

Will let you know how I get on and upload the speccy profile for you then.

Edit: I did do a clean install of the latest GPU drivers in safe mode with DDU after that latest crash dump, I haven't had another BSOD as of yet, but the game crashes and freezing is still ongoing. I wanted to add that in in case that helps you in some way.
 
Hello LLemonSS,

No rush on our behalf (y)

Sorry but you may have misread what was said about the drivers;

phillpower2 said:
After clean installing Windows did you install the drivers for the MB and starting with the chipset drivers first.
Click to expand...

The GPU drivers are secondary, the chipset drivers are what enables the hardware to communicate with the chipset and the chipset effectively controls the whole system, storage drivers are installed next and then the drivers for any add on GPU

Updating the BIOS is always a last resort when troubleshooting.
 
So there's been a development.

I ran multiple instances of MemTest after returning from work (in order to test as much RAM as possible), and one of the concurrent tests returned an error after 40% coverage.

Is it possible that another component could have caused the memory error rather than one of the RAM modules themselves being faulty, ie a fault with the power supply or the motherboard I'm using, or is it almost certainly an issue with one of the RAM modules? I only ask given that the RAM is one of the few things I changed after the issue first arose, and it would be incredibly bad luck on my part for the RAM to be the cause of the issue both times (not that I'm ruling out the possibility fate just doesn't like me ;) )

I do have a spare PC in lockup which I'm planning on digging out over the weekend to eventually give to my wife, so I can do some thorough hardware testing with my spare parts if it comes to that.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.
 
We will provide the steps for you to properly test the RAM should it be required.

Couple of things of note in Speccy;

RAM
16.0GB Dual-Channel Unknown @ 1596MHz

Your RAM is being OCd past what is recommended for the CPU, see specs here you need to go into the BIOS and manually set the RAM speed to a maximum of 2933MHz.

Power Profile
Active power scheme: High performance

Change the Windows Power Plan to Balanced, Ultra and High Performance are a form of overclocking that is known to cause stability and overheating issues and the setting should only be used for gaming type notebooks that have a discrete GPU that needs the extra power.

Not Installed
09/12/2020 2020-12 Cumulative Update for Windows 10 Version 20H2 for x64-based Systems (KB4592438)
Installation Status: In Progress

Can you check what the last Windows 10 updates to get installed were and what the actual installation dates are, Speccy is showing multiple updates to have either failed or to still be in progress.
 
My wife's sent me over screenshots of the recent windows update history, one for each type of update, which I've attached here. Hopefully they'll be of some use to you.

Microsoft OneDrive

1drv.ms 1drv.ms

I'll alter the power profile and lower the RAM speed once I'm home.
 
Thanks, you are fully up to date so that`s one to to tick off the check list.
 
Great, thanks for checking that.

Should I just monitor it for the next day or 2 once I've lowered the RAM speed and altered the power profile, and then come back to you if it's still persisting?
 
Make the changes and then use the computer as you normally would and see how things go, any BSOD upload the dmps for us, any problems with games closing or black screens etc can you post a full description of what happened and what game was involved etc, the explanation below will outline why an accurate description is important.

Software such as Windows can crash and when it does crash you get a BSOD and when enabled a crash dmp is generated.

Hardware failure such as a weak power supply and/or overheating are not software related and when a computer freezes, restarts, suddenly turns off or the screen goes black or jumbled the behaviour should be described as the "computer shut down unexpectedly" etc and not as having crashed as the latter implies a software issue as opposed to an obvious hardware issue when described properly.

Having the correct info means that helpers will not be looking for a software issue when the problem is clearly hardware related.
 
Hi Phill,

I've amended my power profile, but wanted to check something regarding the clock speed for my RAM in the BIOS.

When I checked, extreme memory profile (XMP) was enabled under advanced memory settings, and when I disabled it my clock speed was lowered to 2133Mhz, I didn't have an option to set a speed manually to 2933Mhz.

Is that going to be a problem at 2133Mhz, or am I missing something?
 
Hello LLemonSS,

No harm in trying as is but for best performance the CPU really needs 2933MHz RAM, when this build was put together DDR4 3000MHz capable RAM should have been used and not 3600MHz which is now causing you complications.

For manually changing the RAM settings it should be under the M.I.T. tab in the BIOS, see page 21 of your MBs user manual for this, download from here please take the time to read and fully understand the information before making any changes, any problems at all just go back and select the Load Optimized Defaults option in the BIOS.
 
Thanks Phill,

That'll teach me to be a bit more thorough when it comes to purchasing hardware components down the line :)

There were no game crashes yesterday or any strange behaviour of any kind, and my wife had been playing The Sims 4 for most of the night, so here's hoping.

Will do this later this evening and let you know how I get on.
 
If you are happy with things running as they are you could as mentioned leave as is but the Load Optimized Defaults settings are there should you need them, using them will restore the settings that you have atm.

You are welcome btw :)
 
Hi Phill,

I think I'm going to be cautiously optimistic at this point and say that my issue has been resolved.

If it turns out not to be, I'll have a better idea of what to provide for next time I post.

Thank you so much for all your help :)
 
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