# [SOLVED] Crashing within a few minutes every time



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Hey guys, I created a thread in Windows 7 which you can look over here if you'd like.

Windows 7
· x64
· I built this computer
· Age of system hardware - 8 months to 3 years and up
· age of OS - 2 months
· CPU - AMD Phenom II X4 945 (3.0GHZ, 2MB L2 CACHE)
· GPU - nVidia 8800GTX
· Asus M4A79XTD EVO
· Rosewell 550 Watt PSU


In short, I had a ton of BSODs and crashes when watching TV through media center and playing WoW, we traced the BSODs to a failing hard drive. I just got my replacement hard drive and re-installed windows only to find that I'm still crashing. On the plus side, my computer is much quicker thanks to the caviar black HD.

If I launch wow + media center TV, I am pretty much guaranteed to crash within 5 minutes. I don't BSOD, it just goes black. Look at the videos to see what I mean. Any one have any ideas? This is driving me nuts... I'm starting to think it's a dying video card... But the video card doesn't fail when I run the EVGA OC stress test that they recommended I do (I've started a RMA with them).

YouTube - Computer Crash To see it crashing. But you can still hear the audio briefly after it dies... And as you can see, all temps are WELL within acceptable...

So i figured I'd try voltages, so I DLed ASUS's program to view voltages (because speedfan reads +12 as 5.7 volts...) and here's what I saw. This was a quick crash, literally crashed in less than 30 seconds.
YouTube - Crash2

Any ideas?


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## koala (Mar 27, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Check the voltages in BIOS. Speedfan is unreliable and the Asus system monitor is showing your +12V at 12.4V just before the computer crashes.

If anything is overclocked, go back to default clock speeds for now.

The Rosewell 550W is a low quality PSU with a less than 70% efficiency rating and barely enough +12V amps to power an 8800GTX. 2x18A is not enough (approx 25A taking efficiency and quality into account).

As the +12V line powers the graphics card and hard drives, the weak Rosswell could have been responsible for the drive failing and could also be causing problems with the graphics card. As the first step in fixing your problem, I would test the card in another computer with a more suitable PSU. If it works ok, replace the Rosewell with a good quality 550/650W that has over 40A/+12V.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Yeah, just tested video card with a separate power supply and it still crashes under load. I doubt that it's my power supply. Any other ideas?

I'm leaning towards video card dying.

Ok, so thinking over it. If my PSU were the cause, would it be normal to see it spike up to 12.4 rather than down to 11ish? I started thinking about when I noticed this, and it would be about the time I installed a TV tuner card into my computer... 

I have 5 fans, a quad core processor, a 8800GTX, 2 audio cards, 2 CD drives, 3 hard drive, Cathode Tubes, and LED lighting off of my 550 watt PSU. I've had this PSU for years and never had a problem, with this similarish setup (dual core CPU and no TV tuner).

I'll unplug all unnecessary components and try it again to see if it crashes. I can't just swap the GPU into another computer because my desktop has the biggest PSU. My roommate's dell has a 250 watt OEM psu...


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## hhnq04 (Mar 19, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Brand / model of PSU you used? I would agree that it seems likely to be the Rosewill PSU that is deteriorating and bringing down your system.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Damn... I just unplugged 2 hard drives, 2 CD drives, and all of my lighting and I STILL crash very quickly when watching TV + WoW. It will do either one PERFECTLY alone, just not together...

I was watching the voltages too and the extremes that I saw were 11.9 to 12.4. Do you know if there's a way I can see what voltage the video card is getting? Perhaps the video card is on a separate rail? In the software that is. And BIOS readings are pretty solid at 12v... But I can't see it under load that way

Can someone come up with a reason why my computer crashes when watching TV + WoW, but not if I double box in Wow? My friend just played for 3 hours without a crash, but as soon as the media center opens to a TV station (HD channels speed the crash up), screens go black and computer restarts... Just like in my earlier videos... So irritating.

I'm trying to find all ways to make sure it's not the video card, because the video card has a lifetime warranty, and I'd have to buy a new PSU, and being a college student, I'm strapped for cash atm... But in a week I'll have a little extra... I just want to be absolutely sure before I shell out $100 for a PSU... I just shelled out $120 for my hard drive 3 days ago and another $20 for shipping some headphones that died on me 2 days ago, and I just had to buy 4 new tires for my car after a nail penetrated the sidewall on Monday and the rest of my tires were worn. I'm sure having some ****** luck these past few days...

Hey guys. So I decided to just make damn sure it was my PSU and I went out and "rented" a 850 watt thermaltake from bestbuy (it's the only brand they had, I looked at the ratings and it has a 69A +12 rail that is wayyyy more than sufficient for my setup. I plugged it all in, and well... Same exact thing as usual. Crashes very quickly. Sigh. Nothing's overclocked...

How ever, this time it crashed and when it restarted, windows saved some info, but it's the usual 0x124 crash. I'll post the log with my desktop since I'm on my laptop now.

BTW, before you say it's my ram:









And just got a new HD, and re-performed a long DST on all of my 3 drives, to which all passed.

Here's the video of what it does, as you can see, happened within seconds of the game loading, seems to crash faster now :/
YouTube - Crashing with brand new 850 watt PSU

EDIT: Uploaded crash files. Opinions would be great because I'm really really starting to get frustrated now 

Anyone have any ideas? This is difficult  it crashed again but the video froze onscreen and became corrupted. It was weird red and blue. I'll post pictures

Here are the pictures of what i walked in on... Bizarre way to crash.

I'm thinking video card, anyone else? the guy i'm talking to trying to RMA it is trying to blame it on everything he possibly can.


You can see the closed captions from the TV i was watching on the left and the wow menu on the right monitor...


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

I never plugged the floppy back in so that's not the issue. I checked out the GPU clock speed in the BIOS, but didn't see anything for PCI-E bus speed (are they the same thing?). If so, how high should I be putting it? The allowable range was 150-2000, but it started at 500 so 2000 seems like a big jump.

Sorry again for the big gap in responses, college is starting again soon so I've been out of town a lot for the end of summer!

Anyways, my computer is still hanging. I don't think I can increase PCI-E bus speed in BIOS, at least I can't find it. I did increase the GPU clock speed a bit but it didn't seem to have any effect. Any other ideas? Thank you guys for all the help so far, this issue is driving me crazy.

Ok, I was working in a text editing program while watching a recorded TV show and it crashed with 0x124 again, under seemingly NO stress... when watching TV my CPU is at about 10-15% load. I downloaded this program and I'm trying to run it, it won't let me run the GPU and PSU test because it says my DirectX 9 is out of date... lol, I'm running Windows 7...

What ever, I'm downloading DX9 for 7 now and I'll give it another shot. I'd be super pissed if it were something as simple as out of date direct x? Shouldn't graphics drivers from nvidia include these updated directx libraries?

Also, sensor views pro is also inaccurate with my +12 and +3.3 rails. Terribly inaccurate, reads them at 5.05 and 0.03! So since the PSU has a single +12 rail, I'll just use a multimeter and read it under load.

Bah, it's kind of irritating that you can only edit your post for 15 minutes. 

Anyway, I downloaded and installed Directx9 for windows 7 and i'm running the PSU stress test as we speak. My temps/voltages were are folows for idling:
5v 5.05v
12v 12.09
CPU 32 c
GPU 62c
Sys 38c
Aux 37c


Now, I don't know if it's the program, for the fact that my GPU is using the bottom slot which has really bad air circulation, but I have never seen my GPU temps get so high ever, I may stop the test and install ntune so I can manually set my GPU fan speed to 100% and I might even relocate my GPU back to the better air-flowing spot. It's been running for 10 minutes now and it's at 90* c. That is retarded hot. I could nearly boil water. Funny thing is that it hasn't crashed at all yet. CPU temp has never gone above 44* C

Sys is at 49*c
and Aux is at 48*c

as for power supply, well at idle it was 12.09v, and all the way through load so far it's been a 100% steady 12.08 with no flucuations. This new PSU is boss.

It's been running for 15 minutes now and no crashes. I don't think this is hardware related :S or at least not what it's testing. all CPU cores at 100% for a period, then it goes to 25%. If my GPU and CPU are running at max temps with no problems for over 15 minutes when it normally dies within 2 minutes running simple games that don't stress it.

:/ Maybe direct X was the issue? My GPU just hit 91*, but went down. After 20 minutes I'm stopping the test because these temps are making me nervous. I'll relocate my video card and go again.

Wow.. Ok so i ran your test. No crashes.... Once I relocated my video card the max it got to was 81*, which is acceptable. Processor never went about 44*.

So I ran it for an hour, it made it with 0 crashes. So I was like, Ok, maybe it was a fluke? And I ran it AGAIn for another hour with no crashes.

So it's ran this program for 2 hours with no crashes, but it will crash with Windows media center and another program within 2 minutes. Hmmm...

I'm starting to suspect a driver issue between windows media center and my video capture card? What is weird though is that I crashed when I was watching a recorded file through media center and working in a text editor....

Guess I'll pull the capture card out and try it agian...

EDIT:
Spoke too soon. I took my capture card out, fired up windows media center and started watching a recorded HD video and fired up wow. I crashed within 30 seconds. god damn this is irritating!!!! 0x124 AGAIN...

lol, sorry for so many posts, it would be easier if I could just edit.

Something very weird just happened. I opened wow, and left it at the login screen while I opened the HD video in windows media player, it opened started playing and crashed within 2 seconds of playing. It was so strange. I'll try to record it

Please tell me this isn't accurate -_-

As that'd make it sound like my motherboard is the cause of this for some reason. Even though it ran your stress test for 2 hours without problems.

and to make things worse, I came across this http://forums.amd.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=383&threadid=130737.

Same problem, same motherboard -_-

EDIT: I should also mention that I've disabled on board audio, pulled out all of my expansion cards, all i have is my GPU in my PCIe slot, i've unplugged my CD drives from the motherboard, so the only things plugged into it are the bare minimums...

Also, When i was loading something, my screen went black for a moment, then came back with a message in the bottom saying
"Display driver stopped responding and has recovered
Display driver NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 258.96 stopped responding and has successfully recovered." if that means anything

bump, any thoughts? Still locking up pretty frequently.


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## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

your psu needs to be a quality unit of 650w 80+ or better

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005&Tpk=corsair+650w

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006&Tpk=corsair+750w


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## koala (Mar 27, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

The Thermaltake 850W (Toughpower range?) that you're now using is a big improvement over the Rosewell 550W. You say you've only rented it, but I would keep it rather than going back to the Rosewell.

It's possible that your graphics card has been damaged over time by the weak +12V amps from the Rosewell PSU, which are lower than the recommended minimum amps for PCIE cards, so your next step it to replace the graphics card with a known-good one and test it with the Thermaltake.



From http://www.sevenforums.com/crash-lockup-debug-how/35349-stop-0x124-what-means-what-try.html


> Generic "Stop 0x124" Troubleshooting Strategy:
> 
> 1) Ensure that none of the hardware components are overclocked. Hardware that is driven beyond its design specifications - by overclocking - can malfunction in unpredictable ways.
> 
> ...


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

When I say i'm renting the power supply, I could keep it, but it's $140, I'd rather spend $90 on newegg and get the 650 watt corsair and get the $30 update.... How ever I do really like the detachable cables for the Thermaltake's 850 watt PSU

BTW, EVGA decided to grant my RMA approval and they'll replace my card once they get it, so hopefully all this will fix these issues.

Do you think that the dying video card could be the cause of my 0x124 bsod?


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

several points of discussion; take them for what they are

A) a power supply will lose approx 15-20% of its rated capacity each YEAR of operation; when you say your rosewill is several years old; it makes me shiver to think of the degree the capicators have diminshed in that unit

B) when you ran memtest on your memory sticks; did you test each stick solo or did you test multiple sticks deployed? memtest works at its most through when only testing one stick at a time for two hours per stick. when a user tests multiple sticks errors can hide very easily as the cpu and memory are faster than memtest program can trip up defective sticks with mathmatical equations

C) when gaming on WOW and watching TV (not sure how you do that' but hey you must be a MUCH better multi tasker than me; LOL) did you check your cpu temps / system temps / system voltages etc 

I use this program (30 day free trial) to watch these items: record all temps after a fresh start when computer is idle for 20 minutes then play WOW and run movie or whatever that other resource stress point is you have and record temps again

http://stvsoft.com/


D) and the answer is YES, a PSU can also over volt when stressed instead of under volting; a dying unit can do just about anything it wants 

some good reading here

http://www.legionhardware.com/articles_pages/toughpower_grand_series,6.html



quote:

Therefore it is recommend you allow for at least 20% wattage that is required if the power supply is intended to be used for more than 1 year, and even more if you run the system 24/7. For almost all high-end gaming systems, this makes the 750 watt version a smarter choice.

one good thing is your video card is made by EVGA which has the best customer support in the video card biz; but I fear you will toast the new card if you return to using your old PSU


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## koala (Mar 27, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

The video card is one possible cause for the 0x24 BSOD. Let us know if EVGA get back to you with a diagnosis of the card.

If you prefer PSUs with detachable cables and you want to go with Corsair instead of Thermaltake, Corsair has the modular HX Series. Same high quality, but more expensive than the non-modular TX Series.

Corsair 650W HX - $99 after rebate - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139012
Corsair 750W HX - $140 after rebate - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139010
Corsair 850W HX - $160 after rebate - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139011

The same PSUs in the TX Series are 650W-$60, 750W-$90, 850W-$120, so you're paying extra for the ability to remove some cables.


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I agree with Koala; the Corsair 750-tx is probably the best valued high end psu on the market for yet another year


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Alright guys, thanks for all the input.

Linderman, I don't actually play wow anymore. In my room, I use my computer as a TV and my roommate's computer is garbage so he would come into my room and play wow and I would lay on my bed and watch TV on the other monitor. WoW + TV is the only way to crash my computer, so I just turn em both on. If you see in the videos, I don't do anything in wow but look around and fly lol.

I did think of checking temps and voltages, but voltages reported by various programs vary greatly between programs, so I take it with a grain of salt, but they all have reported within spec voltages (+/-5%).

As for memtest, I ran it with both sticks in, but I ran the test 3 individual times with around 10 hours run time each, i got a 12 hour run in on another. All came back without errors. I can test each stick alone if it would really make a difference.

I guess I really do need to look into replacing the PSU... 550 watt and I've had it for several years, and my desktop runs 24/7 :S So every red flag you listed I do 

Maybe i should lean more for a 750 watt than a 650 since I keep it running all the time.


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

keep us posted; at least now I dont feel like such a dud! LOL

I thought i was headed for the city dump because I cant play WOW and watch TV at the same time LOL

hell I get pawned trying to play any game :laugh: forget the multi tasking


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## speedster123 (Oct 18, 2006)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

also study the caps on the board, check for any bulged or leaking units.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Yeah, I'm pretty confident that this issue stems from the video card. I put in a secondary video card I have and set it to the HD channel and opened WoW and logged in and left for class. 5 hours later it's still running just fine... I mailed my video card off to EVGA today so hopefully by next week. Looks like I'm going to be shopping for a new powersupply too, even though i really lack the money at the moment... >_<

Ok guys, So i got my new Corsair 650 TX PSU and a brand new GPU from EVGA and plugged it all in, only to find that I STILL crash.

Same ****, same way it crashes. I don't get any BSODs, it just dies like it always had, going straight to black. But what gets me is that when I was waiting for my replacement GPU, I was using one of my older ones, in the same slot, and could watch HDTV and play WoW, I turned them both on and walked away for HOURS and came back to a still running computer. But back to my 8800GTX replacement, same **** as before?! How is this possible with a brand new video card?

I tried leaving just 1 stick of ram in my computer. So I tried WoW + TV with 1 stick, crashed. Replaced stick with other one, crashed. Moved stick to other slot, crashed.

So I'm still pretty damn sure it's not my ram...

I tried moving my TV Tuner card (which was originally in my 2nd 16x PCIE slot) to a 1x PCIE slot, and I still crash.

I'm going to keep trying to crash it to see if I can figure something out.

Anyone have any ideas?

So far I've replaced (with brand fking new components)
1) Hard Drive
2) Power Supply
3) Video Card
4) Absolutely clean install of Windows 7 x64 and installing all my video drivers.

xxxxxxxxxx I've spent around $200 that I really didn't have to spend and I'm still getting the same fking problem.

Ideas?

90 nm process
It crashed again, this time windows said it has recovered from an unexpected shut down.

I could upload the minidump, but it doesn't seem there's a point because it through the same fking 0x124 code it has been from the very beginning.

WOW!

I removed the off color language and replaced it with x's. Please refrain from using that type of language. 
Thank You,
Tyree

Sorry, can't edit my post any more...

Here's what my minidump ended up in when I ran it through windbg


> Symbol search path is: srv*c:\symbols*http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols
> Executable search path is:
> Windows 7 Kernel Version 7600 MP (4 procs) Free x64
> Product: WinNt, suite: TerminalServer SingleUserTS Personal
> ...


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

try this

use driver sweeper (free) to remove all video card drivers use both nvidia and ati removal just to be sure

http://www.guru3d.com/category/driversweeper/


then perform a complete shut down not just a restart / then download the newest driver for your card


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

No go. I'll give it another shot with older drivers.

Why would it work perfectly with my older ATI PCIe video card but crash with a 8800GTX everytime when doing both things?

Driver issue?

EDIT:

nope.... still crashing.. Replacing the hard drive, PSU, and video card did nothing >_< I don't get why my old video card was just FINE THOUGH!!! irritating. all crashes that reported an error came back with a 0x124 though...

And I tried moving the video card to my other PCIe x16 slot. Nothing :/ Still crashes.

So it also seems it's not just wow that makes it crash. Seems any application using the video card heavily will.

I took my audio card out too because I heard that it can cause 0x124 sometimes. So the audio is going off of the integrated audio card now.

YouTube - More Crashing
If you listen to how it crashes, it sounds kinda scary. 

Anyone have a clue?


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## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

0x124: WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR and is described as "A fatal hardware error has occurred."

d/load and run the h/drive makers diagnostic utility on the h/drive

http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=287

if you don't know the brand run the hatachi one

if it comes up clear run

chkddsk /f

what does the bios list for your cpu temp,the sound is like a siren sound usually indicates overheating


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Thanks for the idea, but I've been down this road. It's what led me to buy a new hard drive.

Temperatures are all WELL within acceptable. I had a box fan blowing air onto the computer too just to make sure! CPU was at 36* C, GPU hovers around 60*C, and all other temps 30*-40*C. All those temps are while under load (watching HDTV and gaming). when idle it's much lower.

It's definately not heat related. I wish it were that simple 

No over clock, brand new GPU, PSU, and hard drive that I replaced because I was told these are probable causes.

I'll run the hard drive check utility again and let you know.

And I'll attach 5 mem dumps, perhaps the combination of them can point us somewhere? All errors are 0x124 though... 

EDIT: Thinking about what you said with overheating, is it possible either the north or southbridge heat sink isn't seated properly and causing it to overheat? I know the motherboard has a temp sensor, but I don't know what it's on. Perhaps I should dig the motherboard out and try checking it?

Thought I'd throw in that I ran 3 different HD tests and all my HDs passed :/
Guess I'll take a shot at checking heat sinks this weekend? Why would it only crash when both 3d game + TV are running and not any other circumstance?


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

ok; time to get real


download this freebie (OCCT)

http://www.ocbase.com/perestroika_en/index.php?Download

then give us a complete system report of ALL your system temps and voltages as reported by sensorsview pro with the computer at idle for 20 minutes

then run and WATCH the sensors view screen and the OCCT program readouts as OCCT (stress tester) is running 

record all your read outs after 20 minutes of OCCT running

"if" you can run OCCT for one hour without crashing your problem is not hardware

keep us posted


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Weird... I posted like 3-4 posts and they're all gone... ok then..

I ran your test, twice. for 2 hours each. No crashes. I ran the PSU test both times.+12 v rail was 12.09 at idle, and 12.08 under load, never flucuated at all, it was pretty nice.

All motherboard temps were sub 50*c, my CPU never reached 45* and my GPU maxxed at 81* (not bad). No crashes at all

So I fire up wow, and turn open up a tv show in windows media player, instant crash with a 0x124.

So I dug into the event log and came across this.

Woah, looks like my post was moved to http://www.techsupportforum.com/f15/frequent-hanging-stalling-even-after-reformat-508793.html


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: frequent hanging/stalling even after reformat*

Looks like my post above was merged with someone elses, as I didn't say the first 4 paragraphs of things lol

My stuff isn't overclocked.

But I've noticed that if I manually bump up the voltages for the HyperTransport, I don't crash nearly as quickly (if at all) when having WoW + TV. But if I open a 2nd video while watching TV + playing any 3d game, it's nearly an instant crash.


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## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: frequent hanging/stalling even after reformat*

jonofmac

please stay in your own thread for your own problems

the only time you post on someone else's thread is to offer a possible solution to their problem


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: frequent hanging/stalling even after reformat*

Yes I did check, all caps appeared to be in top shape. They're all solid caps too :S I didn't see anything bulging.

I read over the article about benching, but it looks like it won't prove too useful in my case since my computer starts up 100%, it's only when under load from TV files + 3D games that it crashes. I ran the OCCT stress test for 2 hours without problems too...

On another note, I tried bumping up my voltages for my HT/NB chip in BIOS and i haven't crashed yet. At least not within a few minutes like I normally do. But earlier when I tried this, If I opened another movie (2 TV shows playing + 3d game) It would crash nearly instantly. I'll see how that goes now that I"ve bumped voltages a bit higher, i'm also looking at temps and everything is well within check.

EDIT:
Spoke too soon. As soon as I opened the 2nd video, instant crash. My computer was able to return a code and of course 0x124. damn. It doesn't crash with just TV + 3d game anymore, seems like I have to load it up with 2 TV shows and then a game. While sure, I'll never do this, I shouldn't have to accept the fact that my computer will crash if I want to watch 2 videos lol


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: frequent hanging/stalling even after reformat*



dai said:


> jonofmac
> 
> please stay in your own thread for your own problems
> 
> the only time you post on someone else's thread is to offer a possible solution to their problem


I did, someone moved/merged my thread with this one. I don't know what happened....
My thread is missing tons of posts all of the sudden. Damn it... Is there a mod that can clean this up? I had posted all this into my thread, but somehow 3/4 of my posts in my last thread were merged into 1 post, and then merged with someone's post here in this thread.


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## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: frequent hanging/stalling even after reformat*

Did you say your video card is in the bottom slot?

It should be the x16 slot closest to the CPU.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: frequent hanging/stalling even after reformat*



wrench97 said:


> Did you say your video card is in the bottom slot?
> 
> It should be the x16 slot closest to the CPU.


It normally is in the closest slot to the CPU, but I thought that perhaps it went bad and put it into the other slot, to which it continued to crash, so it has since been put back into the closest 16x slot.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

So I decided to take everything out of my case and just make sure it isn't something shorting the motherboard out. Nope... Still crashes 

Temps are really cold now too. CPU idles at 21* C, motherboard temps around 30* and GPU around 55*.

I've got the bare minimum on the computer too. Just 1 HD, a GPU, an audio card.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

*sigh*

What can this be. I wanted to verify it wasn't hard drive. So i ran OCCT and went to bed. I ran the Power Supply test and went to bed. It ran for 11 hours with 0 crashes on PSU OCCT test...


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

are you using a sound card or network card?

also check this link and see if your hard drive settings are as described

http://www.vistax64.com/vista-hardware-devices/93467-solution-stop-0x00000124.html


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I'm using both actually. I have 2 audio cards, 1 integrated into the motherboard, 1 is a PCI card. I removed the PCI card and tried it with the integrated one, it still crashed, but the sounds it made when crashing are really long (the last video I posted used the integrated audio card), I then tried disabling the integrated audio card in bios, but problem was that Windows Media Center refuses to play anything because I can't find an audio card. So i ran the file in media player and it still crashed.

My network card is the Integrated NIC. Thing is, would a NIC cause me to crash even when I'm not using it? Watching media center TV and playing a steam game in Single Player shouldn't be using my NIC, perhaps a little. I can give that a shot I guess since it seems like we've ruled out hardware problems...

Another interesting note, when I bumped up voltages to HT/NB, crashes took longer to happen, which makes me think hardware again. Or maybe it's random.

I'll look through BIOS for a setting like that suggsted in the article.

Thanks for your help 

EDIT: 32-bit access mode is enabled on my hard drive. and i've only got 1 hard drive installed right now and it still will crash with TV + 3d game. Guess I'll try disabling my NIC altogether... It'll make it more difficult to test since almost all my games require an internet connection lol

EDIT2: Disabled the NIC and ran L4D2 + HD recording since Windows Media center kept erroring (wth?) and it crashed before L4D2 finished the intro to the campaign... lol.

Is disabling it not enough? Do I have to remove the drivers too to test it?


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

damn! Thought I was onto something, I have a WD1002FAEX, (1 TB hard drive, the 6 gb/sec model) and read something pertaining to speed. So I looked and my motherboard isn't 6.0 capable. So i put a jumper on the HD to limit it to 3.0gb/sec.

Sadly, this didn't fix it either.... fuuuuuuuuuuudge this is getting really really irritating.

EDIT: I can run OCCT for 11 hours with no crashes, but if I run OCCT + HD video, i crash very quickly. Ideas?


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

I am strongly in the camp of "driver conflict" I would try removing the added PCI slot sound card AND remove the drivers for it

perhaps even a windows repair install which would remove all drivers allowing you a fresh start at troubleshooting / the repair install wont touch your programs or files but does remove ALL drivers from the system; after performing the repair install you would need to have your current drivers ready at hand (like on a USB stick or burned to a CD)

BTW: have you loaded the motherboard chipset drivers ?

have you tried using the newest bios revison for your motherboard ?


also I strongly suggest you try installing the newest chipset drivers for your motherboard before you try anything else

do yo have all windows updates installed ?


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Haha, lots of ideas there. Basically Yes to everything. I have tried installing newest chipset drivers. I've updated bios to most recent revision.

And I'm trying the driver conflict thing now. I'm uninstalling all of my audio card drivers and removing them from the system and disabling onboard audio in bios.

Also, I put my old X850XL into my computer and ran L4D2 and HDTV recording (which crashes my 8800gtx within seconds) but it ran fine for 20 mintues, just low fps because the card is old. I'm pretty sure it's not a graphics card issue at this point since it's been replaced with a brand new one and my graphics card ran OCCT for 11 hours without an issue. Perhaps the old card is too slow and preventing what ever is happening to crash?

If I still crash, I'm going to throw my graphics card and audio card and hard drive into my older computer to see if it crashes with that motherboard.


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I would leave the onboard sound "enabled" and remove the drivers for the add-on pci slot sound card then using your 8800gtx see if you still crash

I am very confident you dont have a hardware problem / otherwise you would not be able to run OCCT for very long


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

That's what I'm thinking too. 11 hours with OCCT with no problems, but less than 30 seconds of HD video + 3d game. I'm going to do a clean install of Windows 7, because I'm sure this one has been messed up with so many different drivers anyway, even though it's a week old installation. That's one of the joys of having 4 hard drives i guess. lol I'll do a fresh install and install 1 driver at a time and test.

As for leaving onboard enabled, I did. Majority of the crashes I recorded were with onboard audio and the PCI card removed. But I didn't have the audio drivers uninstalled, and there a little glitched (CMI8768 chipset in a Diamond Audio card (lol, I know, it was cheap though and onboard audio has always been pretty bad for me).

And I tried plugging the hard drive + video card + PSU into the other motherboard, it actually ran just fine the first time, widnows 7 installed all the drivers it needed, but then it restarted and now the USB controller drivers aren't working so I can't do anything. Time for a re-install either way 

Thanks for sticking with this and helping me.
Any possibility it's windows 7? I have my XP cds, but XP pro doesn't have media center, which is basically what I need to be able to crash. Plus I've read that this motherboard does not like XP.


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

stick with win 7


you have the right idea

A) clean install of win 7

B) install mobo chipset drivers

C) install all windows updates

D) install other hardware drivers as needed when looking at device manager

E) install video card drivers last !

F) dont install the add-on sound card or the drivers until you have checked to see if the crash occurs with the onboard sound 


keep us posted with your observations


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*



linderman said:


> stick with win 7
> 
> 
> you have the right idea
> ...


Any particular reason to install the video card drivers last? Doesn't Win 7 install it's own drivers for it too? Plus I'll need some sort of hardware acceleration to play a game.
Are you wanting me to just use the driver windows installs for my video card and see if I crash? And *after a (hopefully non-existant) crash* install the video card drivers?

I haven't had any time to play with my desktop recently. This week I had my first batch of exams in College. Calculus 3 exam tomorrow kept me busy studying all day (10 hours >_<), hopefully I'll have some time tomorrow after my exams.


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Install the video drivers after doing the motherboard drivers and all the windows updates, windows will install a video driver but not necessarily the latest update, installing the video driver after the windows updates eliminates the chance of an update mucking it up, then play the game.


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*



wrench97 said:


> install the video drivers after doing the motherboard drivers and all the windows updates, windows will install a video driver but not necessarily the latest update, installing the video driver after the windows updates eliminates the chance of an update mucking it up, then play the game.




exactly


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

WOWWWW...

So i go and re-install windows 7, but I noticed that during bios, it was doing something weird, the graphics were messed up, but I didn't think anything of it.

Installed windows 7 updates, all of them, and noticed that my resolution would never be set correctly. So I go into device manager, and it says I have the driver installed, but it says "Windows has stopped this device because it has reported problems (Code 43)".

A quick google shows that people that get that also had weird looking POST screens like me. I'll post a pic below. Looks like i'm RMAing this new video card.... >: ( I took card out, checked connectors, blew on slot, put back in, used other slot, all still have issues. I plug in my old ATI, and the post screen is fine.... oh my god. that's going to be $40+ i'm spending to ship my video card?!


EDIT: can't upload pics through the forum. So


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Which brand video card?

You could use USPS priority mail program the box that'll fit the card is $10.95.


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

yup thats a sick video card for SURE / I would send in a digital pic of that also with the card so the RMA dept wont blow you off


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Already did.... It's EVGA, the RMA department appologized and they're paying for the shipping back , so it won't cost me a dime this time.

Too bad I have to wait AGAIN lol. Weird that it just started doing this now? It only does the artifacts thing in the POST and BIOS screens. Once it starts up to windows, the artifacts disappear, but windows says it reports a problem and it uses a basic VGA driver it seems.

Perhaps the card was the culprit the whole time? (Even the replacement card too?)
I still find it weird that I was able to run OCCT for 11 hours with no artifacts. Oh well, when I get the card back, I've got a fresh version of windows 7 waiting for it...

Ok, so I've just got my replacement card back today, and physically, it looks fine. Plugged it into the computer and everything fired up. Windows starts up with no problems and I've started copying files back over to my main hard drive. While I don't have any HD video to watch, I have standard definition video, which normally would take a bit longer to crash. So far it's been about 25 minutes and no crash with SDTV + WoW, which is a good sign.

I'll keep playing and if it doesn't crash, then I'll start installing card and drivers for them and test one at a time 

Hopefully this is it. Which would mean it was just the video card from the start  Oh well, Guess I got a good PSU and new HD out of it

Think I've spoken too soon. Well...

I'm getting my crashes again. Crashed within seconds of loading up l4d2 and HD TV. I'll try removing and uninstalling my capture card drivers and give it another go now that i've got some HD video recorded, but damn it this is so irritating...
1 hard drive, 1 psu, and 3 video cards later I'm still getting crashes

EDIT:

Nope, still crashes :/ ***FFfffffffffffffff


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Did you also remove the capture card?


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Yup, removed it. But the drivers were still in the system because I can't uninstall them, they don't have an uninstaller. The crashes have always been quicker to happen when I use HD video vs SDvideo. I guess I'll try a re-install number 3 and save the HD video so I never have to install the card.

But if the card weren't installed, how would drivers make it crash? I'd be playing from a file so it wouldn't use a capture card (even though it was physically removed from the system)

damn it.....

I re-installed Windows 7 and only installed basic drivers that are needed, all windows updates, did it just like recommended, didn't even touch my capture card and I still get crashes when doing L4D2 + HDTV recording at the same time. Looks like I'm going to be mailing my motherboard off to Asus in desperation... 

I don't understand how this can be such a problem.

My computer only has the BARE minimum needed right now.
Motherboard, CPU, GPU, Ram, 2 hard drives (both passed all hard drive tests), 1 CD Drive, and it's not even in a case!

In terms of software it has ONLY windows 7, all windows updates, northbridge/chipset driver, and latest graphics driver. 
Only 3rd party software installed is Steam so I can play L4D2 as that seems to cause crashes faster than WoW (I guess because it's a bit more intensive on the graphics).

 Why can't I just have a functioning computer...


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Are you getting BSOD's and minidumps?


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Sadly no, I'm getting the exact kind of crashes I've always got. Same as in the youtube videos on the first page.

It doesn't even take any longer to crash, it's as if I've changed nothing from day 1. Still crashes by having the screen go black, the audio still continues for a few seconds, or will do that strange demented-sounding repeating thing, and I haven't seen windows create any minidumps. But when i first had this, every single minidump i managed to get (maybe every 1 out of 7 crashes) would result in a 0x124. So they've proven to be almost completely worthless.

I'm running memtest on my ram again, 1 stick at a time for extended periods each. if I come back from school tomorrow and it comes back clean, I'm probably just going to mail the motherboard off to Asus if you guys aren't sure what more I can test. I feel like I've hit a wall and there really isn't more to go at... At this point it's like there's either a fundamental software flaw in using a video decoder and 3d games at the same time, or I have a piece of hardware that's just fked.

and with a sort of relevent piece of information. I don't understand why, but when i slap my older X850XL onto the mobo, I get no crashes at all... Just extremely low frame rates compared to the 8800gtx. What could be the reason for this? Is the video card being a bottleneck and preventing the system from crashing somehow because it won't "stress" it enough?

Which goes back to me being able to run OCCT power supply test for 11 hours with no problems at all, but don't even think about watching TV and playing l4d2 for even 10 seconds! (literally, sometimes it takes about 2 seconds)


----------



## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

the symptoms indicate power what psu do you have in it now

causes

power
faulty ram on card
corrupted drivers

post the mini dumps and we can get someone to check them they may be able to pinpoint something

http://www.techsupportforum.com/f217/blue-screen-of-death-bsod-posting-instructions-452654.html


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I just purchased a new PSU, the 650 watt Corsair that you all recommend. And even before that, I had "rented" an 850 Thermaltake Tough power and still had the problems of the PSU before that. It's not PSU, at least not the new one. Someone has mentioned that it's possible I fried my motherboard using my old 550 watt rosewill PSU, I'm going to go give that a shot. If not, then I'll get my motherboard back in 2 weeks? lol

My video card has been replaced under warranty twice now, so I've had 3 different 8800GTX cards, I can try requesting another, but I'm not sure how EVGA will like that.

Corrupted drivers for what component? I'm using the most up to date, and only the official drivers in the most basic/clean installation of windows (I've reinstalled 3 times and tried).

I'd post the minidumps if I still had them, that was 3 windows installs back and they're long gone now, I posted what I got when I ran one of them through the windbg on page 2, just said 0x124 though.

So far my first stick of ram did 25 passes with no errors, I'm now trying my 2nd stick of ram. Even though I thought I eliminated ram earlier, figured I'd try again.

For what it's worth too, I tried OCCT and watching HD video and it crashed a while back, but OCCT by itself is fine. It's the same with games, l4d2 by itself is fine, but throw in any combo of HDTV video + game and my computer is done. If that helps any?


----------



## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

searching came up with

update the chipset drivers

BSOD code 124 is a lack of VCORE or CPU VTT


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Chipset drivers are the latest.

lack of vcore? Perhaps, I remember I bumped up a few voltages and it helped, but didn't stop things. I have Cool n' quiet enabled, and I know it cuts speed and voltage to save power. I honestly don't care about that, but do you know the safe max voltages for my SB/NB, CPU, etc? I don't want to risk burning something up when it wasn't that. I tried looking up on my Phenom II X4 945, but I get vague and shadey answers. It's worth a shot. My 2nd stick of ram hasn't faild yet and it's on 9 passes so far.



dai said:


> searching came up with
> 
> update the chipset drivers
> 
> BSOD code 124 is a lack of VCORE or CPU VTT


I bumped all voltages up to just below when they started turning red. Still instantly crash. I think i'm just going to send the motherboard back... I don't seem to be getting anywhere

Finally... I don't get BSODs, i just get screens going black, but if I'm lucky, windows will restart itself and tell me it recovered from an error and give me a minidump. This is the first one I've recieved. Feel free to dig through it.

I've got almost all voltages bumped up to just below red levels, and onboard audio disabled. I'm trying to get steam to run in offline mode so i can disable my NIC, but everytime I try, it says it can't connect to steam when I tell it to start in offline mode (how stupid is that?!).


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Same, it comes back to the 0x124 WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff557321(VS.85).aspx


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

GRAWRWRWRARWRARWRARWRARWR!!!!

Were any of the parameters useful in any shape/way/form?

I was lookin at my motherboard's DVD disk and it says it's XP compatible, so I think i'm going to reformat again, but this time try XP and see how that goes. I'm running out of ideas!

And what i've noticed with my replacement card is that I can actually hear it when it's underload. Not the fan, I can hear the circuits vibrating  I don't remember my old card doing it, but oh well

Ok guys, so things get a bit more interesting.

I re-installed my OS. but this time, I installed 32-bit XP Pro. It doesn't have media center, and windows media player can't play the .wtv files that 7 recorded in, so I had to install my capture card and use the software that came with it. While it has different hardware decoder options, I was able to play l4d2 and watch TV without problems for about 30 minutes now. Sooooo... what the hell is going on?

A windows 7 bug? a windows 7 compatibility issue? Perhaps something to do with the codec windows 7 uses? I just don't get why I'm having no problems in windows XP, but massive problems in 7. lol?


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I wonder if the capture card is having a issue with the 64bit os, seems like it worked on Win7 64 before you installed the card and drivers, then crashed correct?
Uninstalling the drivers may not have removed all the files for them.


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Well, win 7 never crashed before because I never watched any recordings or TV on windows while gaming. But the last 2 installs of windows 7, I had a HD recording of a show stored on my hard drive that I was using as a test. So I would simply watch a recording so I would never have to install my capture card or any of it's drivers, everything was from windows 7. I don't know if it's an underlying flaw? I just don't understand...

I'm installing Windows 7 again and am going to test the usual windows media player playing HD video file while playing L4D2 and it'll probably crash. Windows 7 will crash without ever seeing the capture card...

Check this out!

I just installed windows 7 x64 and fired up my HDTV recording (Oprah, we pay for basic cable, poor college students ). I guess my computer really hates oprah, it crashed, but this time it did it a bit different, the screen didn't go black. It did this! and then stayed there until I reset. I'm going to try installing Windows 7 x86 to see if that helps at all :/









Strange, because l4d2 was on my main screen, not oprah, but l4d2 i guess kinda closed and did that?

sigh. Windows 7 Ultimate x86 crashes the exact same.... Play for 5-10 seconds, then black screen.

0x124...

Again, I only have the most basics installed.
Hardware: Ram, mobo, CPU, GPU, 2 hard drives, 1 CD drive.
Software: Windows 7 Ultimate x86 with all windows updates, chipset drivers, graphics drivers installed.
Third party software: Steam, so I can play l4d2 and crash

Ok... something weird is going on.... If I watch the videos using VLC I don't crash, but as soon as I use any form of window's media player/center to watch a video, instant crash. what the hell??


----------



## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

try these codecs

http://www.windows7codecs.com/


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

Ok, once my Windows 7 x64 installs (lol, this is the 9th OS install in the past 3 days), I'll install the codecs and give it a shot.

If it still fails, I'm starting to think this could just be a flaw in the drivers. I'll go swing by best buy and "rent" an ATI video card that actually has the power to do multitask (my older video cards lack the power to decode HD video and play L4D2, and I'm guessing thats why I never crash)

New update. Turns out that if I play any video in windows media player/center while gaming it crashes. I tried it with .wtv, .mp4, and .wmv all resulted in crashes. How ever, no crashes when I watch the same videos in VLC.

Can someone think of something? I'm about to give the codec pack a try for WMP/C and see how it goes.

I'm guessing it has something to do with how VLC handles decoding?

Also, with mp4 videos on VLC, the video will pause but the audio continues when l4d2 or any game is full screen on the other monitor. Any ideas?

well. I went to best buy and "rented" a XFX HD 5750, which is supposed to be slightly better than my 8800GTX according to benchmarks. Slapped it in. Opened the oprah and l4d2, garbage fps in l4d2. So I killed the HDTV and tried l4d2 by itself and got nice, stable fps. Apparently this new card can't handle l4d2 and HDTV recordings at the same time (where as my 8800 could, why is this?). It ran a bit smoother when I tried playing the .mp4 video file that made my 8800 crash, and managed to play through an entire campaign without crashes.

So this is all leading me to think that something is fundamentally wrong with my motherboard and graphics card, and for some reason they don't want to get along. A driver issue of some sort, not a motherboard problem.

Anyone else agree with me? This is kind of irritating, I guess I could try email EVGA again? But maybe convince them to let me step up? I don't want to spend another $300 on a video card (nor do i have the money to), when my current one is physically fine, but it's a driver issue.

sorry for so many replies, no edit.

I threw my 8800GTX back in, and sure enough, crash after crash after crash.

What are the chances that the 3rd card is broken? I mean, it's got to be something else


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

The HD5750 is a lower card then the 8800, albeit newer but not meant to be as powerful, for a single monitor it should be pretty close, but gaming while watching HD I would expect it to struggle. Also I feel the ATI cards do a better job of HD then the older Nvidia cards.

I would definitely contact EVGA and tell them all you have tried, hard to believe the 3rd card is defective but there are too many win7 pc's using the current drivers for this issue not have come up previously.


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*



wrench97 said:


> The HD5750 is a lower card then the 8800, albeit newer but not meant to be as powerful, for a single monitor it should be pretty close, but gaming while watching HD I would expect it to struggle. Also I feel the ATI cards do a better job of HD then the older Nvidia cards.
> 
> I would definitely contact EVGA and tell them all you have tried, hard to believe the 3rd card is defective but there are too many win7 pc's using the current drivers for this issue not have come up previously.



Yeah, the card definitely struggled to multitask. Handled each task individually without a problem, and in the benchmarks it scored higher than my 8800 (I benchmarked both cards with 3dmark vantage)

Would you have any insight as to why I don't crash when I watch the videos through VLC instead media player? I almost think it has something to do with how windows media player handles hardware decoding.


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

No I don't play with HD video that often.


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Just got an email from EVGA,



> With reloading Windows, checking the RAM, and the HD5750 working fine it may be an issue with the replacement card. I see the first card passed testing but the second card failed. For thoroughness if you have another system to test the card in to completely eliminate the hardware as an issue try it in that system.


So apparently my first card was never broken? This 3rd one acts like the first one.

I do have a 2nd system I could "bench" test it in... But I feel like the specs of that system are so low that it wouldn't work.

It's a Single Core S939 Athlon 64 running at 2.4 ghz with 2 gb of DDR400 ram. on a DFI lanparty motherboard... I can give it a shot, but I'll have to re-install windows 7... AGAIN! lol

I do have another motherboard with better specs. Gigabyte AM2 with a dual core at 2.6 ghz, 2gb ddr2 800. Problem with that is that the motherboard's USB has died completely :/

Is it possible it's just a compatibility issue? He didn't mention is ever being an issue they've heard about before


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

No I've never seen a compatibility issue between the nvida cards and AMD chipsets.


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

you must realize gaming and HD video are two of the most demanding tasks a user can do; to find a card that can do both at the same time puts you in the upper most tier of cards; like the ATI 5870

I have always found ATI cards to be far superior when handling video or auto cad rendering / nvidia cards are more suited for gaming than video, photoshop or auto cad

The other systems you have (S939 and the AM2 dual core are both going to bottleneck at the cpu level) so I would not even waste my time in that direction 

by any chance; have you tried watching the resource meter (task manager) and watch the cpu usuage just before and during the start of the multi tasking / it would be very interesting to see how much cpu is left when you try this work load ?

you definetly have it pinned down to a driver issue IMHO; I am not much of a windows media lover myself; I think there are far better third party software choices than WMC

at this point I would be inclined to "rent" an ATI 5870


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Yes I had, when I would do it with WoW and HDTV CPU usage was around 30%.

With L4D2, I never thought to look, but when I would play just L4D2 it'd put it around 40% and another 15-20 for hd would put it around maybe 60%? My CPU never had a problem doing any of that.

The EVGA guy is asking for me to test in another system, but I don't have a system with a powerful enough processor to test it :/


----------



## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

at this point I would be inclined to "rent" an ATI 5870


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

haha, Ok, I'll have to find somewhere else to "rent" it from. Best buy is going to start catching on soon. I've "rented" many things from them in the past month trying to figure this out. $140 PSU, USB card, graphics card. Surely they'll catch on if I continue this.

I gotta figure out where I can "rent" these cards lol


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Check the locations here> http://www.microcenter.com


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

thought I'd update you guys.

So the EVGA tech support reconmended I update to the beta drivers, so I did, and it didn't help anything. Yesterday I was playing a game and started getting artifacts, but then they went away. then shortly after I crashed with a 0x116 (i think it was). Then I tried playing another game and my computer black screened, restarted, and came back with default VGA drivers, went into system device manager and had the code 43 crap. So I turned computer off, reseated card, tried turning it back on, the computer would not post, or the monitors wouldn't show anything. I'm not sure which one it was because I don't have the little speaker. Popped my x850XL back in and it started up fine, no problems.

Defective card #3?

I've started talking with EVGA again and I'm going back to houston today and will be looking to "rent" a 4870 for a week.



linderman said:


> at this point I would be inclined to "rent" an ATI 5870


Well, I am in Houston and went to the store to 'rent' a new card.

They didn't have a 4870, and the step up they had for $480! So i "rented" a GTX 470 instead. The benchmarks show it isnt too much below the 5870. Think i'm wasting my time with it? I go back to Collegee Station tomorrow and will test it then, i figured that I could try my luck with a newer nvidia card.


On another note, EVGA said they *might* consider letting me step up my card.


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I don't know it'll still be the same drivers, since you have it might as well test it.


----------



## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Well, just got home and I put the card in and fired it up. The GTX470 is a BEAST! I thought my 8800GTX was fast (well, it was when I bought it, when it came out), but damn. Using the exact same drivers as my 8800GTX, I played the same HD video clip, and played L4D2 on max settings through an entire campaign without a twitch. 

So this seems to be either a driver problem with my older 8800GTX (even though they're using the SAME drivers) or some weird hardware problem with every 8800 I've received. 

I also brought back some parts to get my older AM2 motherboard going again, even though it has no working USB, with my PS/2 Keyboard I can navigate bios, and once windows boots, the PCI card takes over and all is well. As I type, it's installing windows 7 and I'm going to see if I can get the 8800GTX to work on that computer and see what happens. Should be interesting.

So it appears I've narrowed this down to a definite hardware issue concerning every 8800GTX I've tried, which seems really really strange. What do you guys think?


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## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Definitely strange I would think if it was a inherent problem with the 8800GTX it would be pretty widely known there are quite a few still around. If any thing I think the newer drivers are exploiting a glitch in the card that was not apparent with the original drivers.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Indeed.

On a positive note, I contacted EVGA via phone and they are upgrading me to a GTX260 free of charge, while I get to keep my lifetime warranty 

8800GTX -> GTX 260 for free a decent upgrade? Think it'll handle the multitasking? I hope so :S


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## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Yep that's a decent upgrade.


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

YES the GTX260 is a very good card; this is why we speak so highly of EVGA video cards on this forum; they go the extra mile other manuf's wont even begin!


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

I can agree. We'll see how things go when I get the actual card, but I can say that I feel EVGA has really gone above and beyond to help me. They didn't simply discredit my issues as problems with other hardware (well, beyond normal circumstances) and they are upgrading me for FREE and letting me keep my lifetime warranty!

I will never buy anything BUT EVGA  And my old 8800 wasn't really dead to begin with, some driver glitch or something exploiting some error with the card. Hopefully we can finally mark this thread as solved once I get the 260, it's been long overdue  And we've been at it long and hard


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

reward is within the struggle


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## grimx133 (Jan 15, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Only problem with evga is that it seems, to me anyway, that more of their cards don't have the lifetime warranty, have to watch that when you get one. As long as the model ends in AR, it's lifetime, lately been noticing a lot of TR cards, two years on those methinks.
Great cards though, I RMA'd a couple of them this year. Emailed their support, 15 minutes later they replied and said they were submitting an rma, without further testing required, I was sort of detailed in description of issues and testing already done. Couple hours later the rma was approved. Sent it out the next day, got it back in 13 days, from northern ontario to california and back, that's an incredibly fast turn around time.


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Well I got my replacement card, a GTX260. Didn't cost me anything, and it's faster than my 8800GTX..

Put 'er in and turned it on and went through my usual tests to crash it. No problems 

Looks like this one is solved!

Although I had over clocked it slightly and ran benchmarks and had a random 0x124 error, but i'm running windows with drivers for 20 different video cards (never uninstalled), I'm missing drivers for my audio and video capture cards, so I'm not looking into it. it only did it once, and it was asking me to restart because it had installed some driver for the new card. So i'll ignore it.

 EVGA FTW!


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## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Good to hear


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## jonofmac (Sep 7, 2010)

*Re: Crashing within a few minutes every time*

Yeah! Thanks for all your help guys. This sure was a strange issue.

I've never heard of a specific model of video card doing this over and over.

But the GTX260 is so much faster than my 8800GTX was  Especially when you OC it a bit, but that was just to see what it could do, it's plenty fast at stock clocks, compared to what I was used too anyway.


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