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Home build gaming PC -screens of death + game crashes

2218 Views 21 Replies 3 Participants Last post by  Lalsa87
Sounds like my PC is totally non functioning but it is! I really need your help figuring out the problem.


I built it 3 years ago with Radeon HD 7970 GPU - always had problems with intermittent game crashes and browsers closing down when surfing the net etc. Thought it was the GPU, got in touch with ASUS followed all of their troubleshooting plus many others online but nothing worked. Came to the conclusion it was a defective GPU so upgraded to Sapphire RX 480 a few weeks ago but problems are ongoing making it unlikely to be the GPU. The crashes seem to be worse with high spec tasks like playing games (Witcher 3) - this may or may not be accurate - perhaps I'm more aware of it because it's so annoying being kicked out of the game multiple times in a row.


With the old GPU I used to get a "display driver error" pop up. With the new GPU games or the internet still close down but there is no display driver error.


The DELL U2515H monitor is also new - could that be responsible for the new black screens? They occur intermittently for 1-2 seconds and then the picture is back to normal and I can continue what I was doing.


I have tried the GPU in both available PCIe slots with no change

Memtest 10 passes 0 errors

I've uninstalled, reinstalled all the drivers/Windows 10 (this problem still occured on Windows 8 prior to upgrade)

I've made sure to disable multi-screen + internal graphics in BIOS. Running the build just with internal graphics seems to run smoothly but I'm unable to play games etc due to the spec.



Blue Screen of death errors:

PAGE FAULT IN NONPAGED AREA

NTFS.sys failed


DRIVER IRQL NOT LESS OR EQUAL

rtwlane_13.sys failed


BAD POOL CALLER


Spec:

Operating System

Windows 10 Home 64-bit

CPU

Intel Core i5 3570K @ 3.40GHz 34 °C

Ivy Bridge 22nm Technology

RAM

16.0GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 666MHz (9-9-9-24)

Motherboard

ASRock Z77 Extreme4 (CPUSocket) 36 °C

Graphics

DELL U2515H ([email protected])

4096MB ATI Radeon RX 480 Graphics (Sapphire/PCPartner) 48 °C

PSU

XFX 650W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply

Storage

238GB PLEXTOR PX-256M5S (SSD)

1863GB Western Digital WDC WD2003FYYS-02W0B1 (SATA)

894GB SanDisk Ultra II 960GB (SSD) 25 °C



Really appreciate your help
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Have you tested your temps and voltages? If not, do so. Post the following; cpu temp, system temp, 12V, 5V, and 3.3V values. Do this twice; once at idle and once under a 100% load ie while running prime95 or IBT.
I never build with asrock boards so I am not sure however I believe asrock has monitoring software on the support page for your mb. I [think] it is called extreme tune or something similar.
You have your answer; your system is overheating. You need better cooling or you have airflow problems, etc. Fix the cooling issue and your problems will most likely disappear.
Which logically fits with it being worse on high spec tasks... Why is it overheating if I have 3 fans and don't OC?

Thanks for your help.

Thanks
There are a number of reasons for overheating;
1 HSF not installed correctly [more of a problem with intels than amd; amd type coolers are almost idiot proof]
2 Thermal compound dried out
3 HSF or cooler fan not working
4 Poor airflow in the case
5 High ambient temp
6 System is inside a cabinet or desk and little or no airflow

Without having the system in front of me, it is hard to give you an answer as to why it overheats. You are going to have to investigate and fix the problem.

If you R&R the cooler, I always recommend pulling the motherboard on intel type coolers. AMDs can be done in the case however the intels can be difficult to get all four pushpins seated correctly while in the case.
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Ok thanks - It was the thermal paste I think. All dired out and also I was using built in CPU cooler. It was working but there are a lot of post saying they aren't adequate for high spec tasks.
Unfortunately my game/internet has still been crashing after installing a CPU cooler and extra fans. The game crash happened and CPU temp was 37 deg C. It goes up to about 65 deg C on Prime95 torture testing.

So problem persists - but obviously my system will be better off with the lower temps so thanks for helping me out with that. Any other suggestions?
What exact cooler did you install?
65C is still pretty hot; better than it was however it is still too hot. Just as an example, my heavily overclocked system will get to 55C when running prime95.
Coolmaster Hyper Evo 212
Those coolers are excellent however they are not the easiest things to install. A system that is not overclocked should not run that warm.
Some common errors when installing a coolermaster;
1 Cooler is not oriented correctly. The fan is blowing air back toward the center of the case rather than toward an exhaust fan
2 Bottom of the cooler or fan is contacting a ram chip or the north bridge heatsink and preventing the cooler from contacting the cpu heat spreader with sufficient force to transfer heat energy
3 There is an alignment pin that must be centered to insure proper alignment and contact
4 Using too much thermal compound. The compound that comes with the coolermaster is thicker than arctic silver and very often people use too much which acts as an insulator impeding the transfer of heat energy.
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I watched several videos and I think I installed it correctly (correct direction of fan/smaller vol thermal compound/central pin etc)... however! I will take your points on board and recheck. I don't think I cleaned the CPU properly either so I will sort that out and let you know. Thanks for quick response.
I use coffee filters with alcohol to clean parts. The coffee filters are abrasive and do a good job of cleaning. Do not use 70% alcohol that you find in the supermarket; it contains lanolin and will leave a residue. I use either 99% or 91% alcohol to clean stuff.
Great - thanks I have coffee filters. Was looking at buying something. Save me some cash - already bought a new GPU and CPU fan. Will end up with an entire system upgrade by the time I've figured this out.

I ran Prime95 again and it came up with an error message - does that give any more info? It's 29.10.19 doc
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-VK-pfBB9zGcHNrTUNKQXotTXc
Your link is for memtest, not prime95. The link shows memtest passed without errors. Did you receive an error in memtest or prime95?
If you received an error in either one, yes it is important. There should be no errors in cpu tests or ram test.
Sorry - I meant to send the whole file link not the Memtest screenshot
Prime95 stress test 29.10.16 showed:

[Main thread Oct 29 22:05] Mersenne number primality test program version 28.9

[Main thread Oct 29 22:05] Optimizing for CPU architecture: Core i3/i5/i7, L2 cache size: 256 KB, L3

cache size: 6 MB

[Main thread Oct 29 22:05] Starting workers.

[Main thread Oct 29 22:11] Execution halted.

[Oct 29 22:05] Worker starting

[Oct 29 22:05] Setting affinity to run worker on logical CPU #1

[Oct 29 22:05] Beginning a continuous self-test on your computer.

[Oct 29 22:05] Please read stress.txt. Choose Test/Stop to end this test.

[Oct 29 22:05] Test 1, 44000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M7471105 using AVX FFT length 384K,

Pass1=384, Pass2=1K.

[Oct 29 22:08] Self-test 384K passed!

[Oct 29 22:08] Test 1, 3200000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M172031 using AVX FFT length 8K,

Pass1=128, Pass2=64.

[Oct 29 22:10] FATAL ERROR: Rounding was 0.5, expected less than 0.4

[Oct 29 22:10] Hardware failure detected, consult stress.txt file.

[Oct 29 22:10] Torture Test completed 1 tests in 5 minutes - 1 errors, 0 warnings.

[Oct 29 22:10] Worker stopped.

[Oct 29 22:05] Worker starting

[Oct 29 22:05] Setting affinity to run worker on logical CPU #2

[Oct 29 22:05] Beginning a continuous self-test on your computer.

[Oct 29 22:05] Please read stress.txt. Choose Test/Stop to end this test.

[Oct 29 22:05] Test 1, 44000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M7471105 using AVX FFT length 384K,

Pass1=384, Pass2=1K.

[Oct 29 22:08] Self-test 384K passed!

[Oct 29 22:08] Test 1, 3200000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M172031 using AVX FFT length 8K,

Pass1=128, Pass2=64.

[Oct 29 22:10] FATAL ERROR: Rounding was 0.5, expected less than 0.4

[Oct 29 22:10] Hardware failure detected, consult stress.txt file.

[Oct 29 22:10] Torture Test completed 1 tests in 5 minutes - 1 errors, 0 warnings.

[Oct 29 22:10] Worker stopped.

[Oct 29 22:05] Worker starting

[Oct 29 22:05] Setting affinity to run worker on logical CPU #3

[Oct 29 22:05] Beginning a continuous self-test on your computer.

[Oct 29 22:05] Please read stress.txt. Choose Test/Stop to end this test.

[Oct 29 22:05] Test 1, 44000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M7471105 using AVX FFT length 384K,

Pass1=384, Pass2=1K.

[Oct 29 22:08] Self-test 384K passed!

[Oct 29 22:08] Test 1, 3200000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M172031 using AVX FFT length 8K,

Pass1=128, Pass2=64.

[Oct 29 22:10] FATAL ERROR: Rounding was 0.46875, expected less than 0.4

[Oct 29 22:10] Hardware failure detected, consult stress.txt file.

[Oct 29 22:10] Torture Test completed 1 tests in 5 minutes - 1 errors, 0 warnings.

[Oct 29 22:10] Worker stopped.

[Oct 29 22:05] Worker starting

[Oct 29 22:05] Setting affinity to run worker on logical CPU #4

[Oct 29 22:05] Beginning a continuous self-test on your computer.

[Oct 29 22:05] Please read stress.txt. Choose Test/Stop to end this test.

[Oct 29 22:05] Test 1, 44000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M7471105 using AVX FFT length 384K,

Pass1=384, Pass2=1K.

[Oct 29 22:08] Test 2, 44000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M7471103 using AVX FFT length 384K,

Pass1=384, Pass2=1K.

[Oct 29 22:10] Self-test 384K passed!

[Oct 29 22:10] Test 1, 3200000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M172031 using AVX FFT length 8K,

Pass1=128, Pass2=64.

[Oct 29 22:11] FATAL ERROR: Rounding was 0.4921875, expected less than 0.4

[Oct 29 22:11] Hardware failure detected, consult stress.txt file.

[Oct 29 22:11] Torture Test completed 2 tests in 5 minutes - 1 errors, 0 warnings.

[Oct 29 22:11] Worker stopped.
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You are definitely receiving cpu errors. This can be caused by a number of reasons;
1 CPU damaged by overheating and or overvolting
2 Motherboard problem/failure
3 Voltage drop under load
4 Overclocking can give errors however I think you said the system is not overclocked

Here is what I would do. First pull your cooler off and reseat the cpu in the socket. Use contact cleaner to clean the pins in the board and the pads on the cpu. Do not use alcohol or rub socket in any way. Contact cleaner can be purchased at any electrical supply store or most real auto parts stores [not autozone or other chain] will have it. Use alcohol to clean the heat spreader of the cpu ie the side against the cooler.
Just spray it on and let it sit until dry. Contact cleaner will dry very quickly so there is almost no wait time. Replace the cpu and install the cooler with new compound. Repeat the test. I [think] asrock has monitoring software on the support page for your mb. I never build with asrock so I am not sure. I believe it is the tuning utility. Install that and run the test again. Watch your voltages ie 12V, 5V, and 3.3V values along with vcore or cpu voltage. Vcore should be constant under a 100% load. If you see it dropping while running prime95, it can be a failing voltage regulator on the mb OR a failing pw supply. If the 12V rail drops under load, that points at a failing pw supply. If the 12V remains constant and the vcore drops, that points at a failing VR [voltage regulator] on the board.
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Ok thanks for your help - will probably take a few days to get back to you and sort all that out.
Is there any way it could be the RAM and not CPU/PSU?
BTW contact cleaner is not cheap. The last can I purchased was around $10 or so.
It could be a lot of things however your screenshot showed memtest passed without errors. I doubt it is the ram however I have seen parts pass tests and still be the cause of problems. You could try the system with just one ram chip installed and see if by chance you have a bad one. Again I doubt ram is causing your problem [since it passes memtest] however it costs nothing to pull out a ram chip and run some tests.
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