What's causing the CTD/Bluescreens

EagleOC · 18 Apr 2006 at 14:27

...or perhaps not....

I changed the voltage to 2.7 (the only increment the BIOS would allow) and I was able to play for 10 mins before it rebooted. Hmm. Rebooted - that's not happened before...

It was also on a continual reboot too. It would get just past the Welcome screen and into Windows then reboot continuously. So the voltage is now back down to 2.6...

Grrrr.

EagleOC · 18 Apr 2006 at 14:57

I did - see results above.

EagleOC · 18 Apr 2006 at 20:42

Dutch Guy said:
1 pass of Memtest86+ is not conclusive, you need to test longer.

And that mobo should have no problem running higher memory voltage, I ran my old Twinmoss memory for months at 3.06V real without problems.

Perhaps it is caused by an overlooked component like a harddisk or a failing northbridge fan

I'll run memtest overnight tonight.

I've updated the bios so I'll now try the games again...

EagleOC · 18 Apr 2006 at 23:13

Bugger. After the BIOS update, system crashes during gaming and reboots.

But, I finally get some sense out of Microsoft:

=========================
Error caused by a video device driver :shock: :shock: :shock:

Thank you for sending an error report to Microsoft.

Error report summary

Error type Windows stop error (A message appears on a blue screen with error code information)

Solution available? Yes

What does this error mean? You received this message because a device driver installed on your computer caused the Windows operating system to stop unexpectedly. This type of error is referred to as a "stop error." A stop error requires you to restart your computer.

Cause A video adapter device driver

Computer symptoms A message appears on a blue screen with error code information:

STOP 0x000000EA THREAD_STUCK_IN_DEVICE_DRIVER
- or -
STOP: 0x100000EA THREAD_STUCK_IN_DEVICE_DRIVER_M

Action for you to take

We have analyzed your error report and there are two solutions for this problem for you to choose between.

+ Solution 1: Install the most current driver for your video card

yadda yadda...

+ Solution 2: Manually decrease Hardware Acceleration for your video adapter

This procedure prevents the display driver from programming the hardware incorrectly, but you may lose some display functionality and performance. Although you can increase the hardware acceleration settings higher than None to regain functionality and performance, these settings increase the chance that the issue will occur again. For maximum stability, leave hardware acceleration turned off.

Note: This procedure prevents the display driver from programming the hardware incorrectly, but you may lose some display functionality and performance. Although you can increase the hardware acceleration settings higher than None to regain functionality and performance, these settings increase the chance that the issue will occur again. For maximum stability, leave hardware acceleration off.

Article ID : 11
Last Review : February 28, 2006
Revision : 1.0

Additional Technical Information

Error Message: STOP 0x000000EA THREAD_STUCK_IN_DEVICE_DRIVER (Q293078)

===================

Errr.... :shock:

+ Solution 1: Install the most current driver for your video card

I've already done that...

So which driver out of the millions available shall I go with?...

EagleOC · 19 Apr 2006 at 00:32

acharris said:
Hi, have you checked in device manager to see if there are any yellow exclamation marks by any devices to indicate a conflict between 2 or more devices in the system.

None.

...are you plugging in the extra power adaptors for the cards

Yup.

By the way have you tried to revert back to an older set of drivers for the nForce 2 chipset like the ones that come with the mobo on the CD, as maybe some versions are incompatible.

Worth trying I guess and it's now on my (now huge) list of things to try.

Also check the event viewer under Administrative Tools in control panel to see if any errors are showing up there at around the time of the crashes.

Nothing scary there...

Failing that, the only other alternatives are either faulty graphic card(s), unlikely

Unlikely indeed as the previous card (9800 Pro) was 'involved' with the same problem too!

...or the motherboard has a damaged graphic card slot

Oh please - don't say things like that!

It's not the expense - it's the hassle!

check the hard drives out

I'd do that but I can't find a utility to do that in Wiindows (can't seem to burn a CD with PowerMax either... )

Cheers.

EagleOC · 19 Apr 2006 at 00:33

Can anyone recommend a known good/stable Omega driver?

EagleOC · 19 Apr 2006 at 03:46

*
Sorry to bang-on about this but I'm sure you appreciate - this is mind-bendingly frustrating...

I've now tried running one stick in slot one (again) and it crashed - this time within a few minutes. Therefore, I'm now inclined to think that it could be something to do with a background event. Some prog or something trying to do something that's pulling the rug from under the CPU and/or memory. Just generally being annoying in a Windows stylee... :roll:

Here's what I have running when gaming:

Red indicates what I can successfully shut down/stop before starting a game. The ones left alone are those that either I can't shut down or won't because I don't know whether I should...

McSheild and CTHELPER definitely won't stop.

EagleOC · 19 Apr 2006 at 19:02

Thanks once again for your thoughts. Unfortunately, I'm not in a position to afford much time stripping/assembling various components/configurations.

Jumpers are correct on the HDs and set to M/S correctly too.

So, I'll have to plug away with my ever-growing list of things to try:

1. PowerMax tests (still unable to boot from CD (all the settings are correct in BIOS) system refuses to see the .iso file and loads straight into Windows. My systemn was able to see the memtest.iso file so no idea what's happening here...

2. Remove all USB connections

3. Use single HD

4. Relax the RAM timings (not sure to what to yet...)

5. Lower sound acceleration in DXDIAG from Full to Standard (will that affect sound quality much?)

WHICH bluescreen (message as well as numbers), WHAT was the PC doing when the bluescreen occured.

Only rarely do I see messages - it either freezes with a sound loop, crashes to desktop or reboots.

Onwards and upwards!

EagleOC · 19 Apr 2006 at 21:16

Ok, managed to get it burned and it recognised the sofware - but then says (in DOS):

No swap space!
A:\
A:\

EagleOC · 20 Apr 2006 at 00:41

Dutch Guy said:
Try lowering sound acceleration in DXDIAG from Full to Standard

Now that's made a significant difference! Only got one reboot in over three hours of gameplay.

What happens if I reduce it further?...

EagleOC · 20 Apr 2006 at 18:17

Cheers.

I'm not overly concerned about audio quality on games and I didn't notice any difference when lowering the setting. I'll be trying it later with acceleration off altogether. I don't think it'll make any difference to actual quality - it's just an 'effects'/EAX thing!

EagleOC · 21 Apr 2006 at 20:00

caister said:
Have you been on creatives website and done the online update?

Yes, done that.

http://forums.creative.com/creative...essage.id=21230&view=by_date_ascending&page=1 :rolleyes:

*

EagleOC · 21 Apr 2006 at 20:01

Looks like I'll be ripping out the Creative cards for good and using onboard sound instead.

EagleOC · 22 Apr 2006 at 01:16

And here's the result:

Tomb Raider: Legend usually crashed within 45-60 seconds (every time without fail). Now I can get at least an hour+ out of it. Next Gen graphics are great!

Yes, it does still crash but in a different way now (black screen but with sound and game engine still apparently running) which I'm confident this time will be a graphics card driver issue (currently running 84.43s). I'll try to get the error report next time.

Sound hardware acceleration is still at full tilt with the onboard sound so I've yet to explore that option.

Oh, and I've yet to patch it.

We're getting there.

And ** World will be getting a returned POS sound card tomorrow. :mad:

I'll keep yuz up to date with progress - cheers!

EagleOC · 22 Apr 2006 at 03:29

A 2 hours sesh later and Tomb Raider: Legend is running fine with all settings maxxed-out.

...all is well with not a crash in sight!

We got there in the end - thanks for everyones help!

EagleOC · 22 Apr 2006 at 11:37

Cheers.

The problem is actually well documented: http://forums.creative.com/creative...essage.id=21230&view=by_date_ascending&page=1

EagleOC · 22 Apr 2006 at 23:19

caister said:
Well i bet none of us saw that coming with it being the sound card thats causing the problems!! Glad you got there in the end mate.

Spoke too soon - the problem is back with a vengeance...

Latest things I've tried:

ADSL Modem off
Turned off fast writes
PCI Latency 64
AGP Latency to 64
x4 AGP
RAM CAS Latency to 2.5
Disabled Serial Ports in BIOS
Changed Mouse from PS2 to USB Connection
Tried a myriad Video drivers

I think there's little else I can do now but replace the mobo... or the PSU.

Anyone agree?

EagleOC · 23 Apr 2006 at 00:56

Thanks. I'm beginning to think it's the mobo myself too.

I'm looking for a replacement NF7-S v2.0 (new if poss) - any ideas?

I'd love to test the HD but I just can't burn the PowerMax.iso to CD and make it bootable.

See above...

Ok, managed to get it burned and it recognised the sofware - but then says (in DOS):

No swap space!
A:\
A:\

EagleOC · 23 Apr 2006 at 14:47

Yeah, I have (somewhere) now that I think of it.

I'll do that later just as a matter of course.

Well, this is the latest: I tried some games with the rheostat cranked up on the CPU cooler and, so far, no crashes. I'm unsure why there appears to be both a sound issue and, possibly, an overheating issue but maybe the CPU just needs a hand to push through all the modern day high-end processes...

... to be continued...