Help! I'm completely stumped here.

Hi, this is my first post. I've been browsing this place for some time now, and just signed up the other day to post this problem I've been having.

Back story: Less than a month ago, I foolishly opened my case while my computer was on (I wanted to see what revision my motherboard was because I reformatted that day and needed to update the drivers). I was updating the drivers because Bad Company 2 was crashing and I thought it might help.
I pushed an external sata mount out of the way and accidentally touched it to something in my motherboard. The system shut off immediately and I smelled a burning smell. After a few hours of troubleshooting, I took out my motherboard and saw that a small area on the bottom got fried. I ordered a different board (ASUS P5N-D) and reinstalled Windows.

The Problem: Since getting the new board, I've had constant freezing issues. Sometimes sound looped in Bad Company 2 when it froze, sometimes it didn't. It also freezes sometimes when I play Youtube videos, or stream Netflix videos. It's random. I can watch an hour long show sometimes and have no issues, or sometimes I can freeze within 2 minutes of starting a show. I got 2 or 3 BSOD early on, but lately all it does it freeze. It hasn't frozen any other time, just when playing Bad Company 2, watching videos (of any type), playing Minecraft (froze in like 40 seconds), and playing NES ROMS. It seems to be happening more and more often. I'm completely out of ideas.

Things I've tried:
- Erase and reinstall video drivers (including today when the newest 11.1 driver came out (still crashed in BC2) (Used driver cleaner pro in safe mode to remove old drivers)
- Ran Memtest86+ for 19 hours with 0 errors.
- Pushed CPU back to stock (I had it running at 3.6 GHz, but it didn't make a difference anyway, still freezes)
- Wiped and reinstalled sound drivers from my motherboard disc.
- Motherboard BIOS is already at the newest version
- Checked Event Viewer, didn't see anything of interest
- Tried using Driver Verifier and checking everything that wasn't a Microsoft driver. It had a BSOD saying something about "rtcore64.sys" and "A device driver attempting to corrupt the system has been caught" but that only happens when I did the Driver Verifier.
- Switched the GPU from PCIe x16 slot 1 to PCIe x16 slot 2. No change.
- Reapplied thermal paste to the GPU.
- Watched GPU temps while gaming. Never got about 50 degrees, and the RAM never got above 60.
- Watched CPU temps while gaming, never got above 52 degrees.
- Ran OCCD to test the video card for an hour. Had no issues.
- Downloaded every Windows Update including optional updates.
- Downloaded CCCP codec pack, but it didn't help with video issues.

I'm sure there are other things I can't think of. I'm thinking I could have damaged another component when I zapped my old motherboard. If not that, maybe the new motherboard is bad? Everything else seems alright though, just when I use the video card.

The BSOD that I got a few times before it started just freezing every time said something like "The video scheduler has encountered an unexpected fatal error" but googling that didn't bring up anything that helped me. Unfortunately I cleared out my minidump folder a few days ago, so I don't have any BSOD dumps, but I do have the stuff described in the sticky. I've attached it as directed.

I'm running the retail version of Windows 7 x64 Ultimate Edition. I installed it just 20 or so days ago. (when I got a new motherboard). I built the computer in Feb of 2009 and didn't have many issues until this point.

My complete specs should be in my profile.

I'll be sure to post any minidumps I get if I get a BSOD.

I really appreciate any help any of you can give me. I'm pulling my hair out by now lol

Well just looking from what is there, I see you have driver issues or are perhaps missing drivers completely.

It's not just your driver app (which I've yet to see one that works right) there are a lot of generic and pnp faults on the system.

Someone else will have to tell you what's really going on here. But you are faulting at a horrible rate no doubt.

...just a footnote, apparently photoshop is dying on you because of a problem with your ati driver.

There are no minidump files in the jcgriff folder.

   Note

If you wish others to assist with your Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) problem – please follow these steps...
- Navigate to C:\Windows\Minidump (C:\ indicates where Windows is installed)
- Copy all of the mini dump files to a temporary location (Desktop or an empty folder is recommended)
- Zip up the dumps into a .rar or .zip format
- Upload using the uploading (paper clip) attachment.
- Briefly describe your problem, your system specs, age of OS and scomputer; someone will analyze your dumps as soon as possible.

DeanP,

I cleared out my minidump folder a few days ago (not sure what I was thinking). You must not have seen that part of my original post :)

If I get another BSOD, I'll be sure to post my minidump. I figured I would make the topic now without a minidump with hopes that the other information I uploaded might have some useful data. Sorry if I should have waited until I had a dump. I didn't know :/

I've had a problem similar to this on my desktop, and was never able to very far, but a lot of people came up with some ideas (not sure how much this will help u, but I figured anything might help). First, my problem was usually when i played games, they would freeze with the sound loop you described. Rarely they would bluescreen out, but nothing would come of the blue screen codes. Some people swore it was the 4800 series of GPUs doing it (I had the 4850), and some would swear it was due to a realtek audio conflict that was suggested by the sound loop. Most people ended that it was in fact a heating issue or a hardware fault, and most decided that it was the 4800 GPU's overheating. It didn't happen on very many games (mine was on Modern Warfare, MW2, BC2, etc) those types of intensive GPU games would trigger it. TF2 would rarely do it (maybe twice), and RTS and racing games wouldn't. Any of this sound like your problem?

Tiggums said:

I've had a problem similar to this on my desktop, and was never able to very far, but a lot of people came up with some ideas (not sure how much this will help u, but I figured anything might help). First, my problem was usually when i played games, they would freeze with the sound loop you described. Rarely they would bluescreen out, but nothing would come of the blue screen codes. Some people swore it was the 4800 series of GPUs doing it (I had the 4850), and some would swear it was due to a realtek audio conflict that was suggested by the sound loop. Most people ended that it was in fact a heating issue or a hardware fault, and most decided that it was the 4800 GPU's overheating. It didn't happen on very many games (mine was on Modern Warfare, MW2, BC2, etc) those types of intensive GPU games would trigger it. TF2 would rarely do it (maybe twice), and RTS and racing games wouldn't. Any of this sound like your problem?

Hi! I too read the forums and saw a lot of the same discussions that you probably saw regarding realtek sound and things like that. I never had any issues before Bad Company 2, and the freezing in videos thing is also new. I assumed that was my issue at first, but it's gotten so bad, and extends out past gaming too much for me to believe that anymore. I also don't think heat is an issue. My GPU temps are good, especially compared to other 4870s I read about.

I did play the Amnesia demo and didn't have any issues, but it's not that graphically demanding (of course neither are videos and NES games) Not only that, but that could have been a fluke. There are times I play a long match or 2 of BC2 and then shut it down with no problems.

You say you never figured out the issue?

I'm pretty sure mine was due to the fact that my 4850 did not have an external vent. All that 80 Celsius heat was in my desktop (that didn't have adequate cooling anyway), but I honestly can't say for certain that even that is the issue. My temp fan started to beep on the more cpu demanding games (Napoleon Total War, and the like), but when the video and sound problem started it was never beeping. So I think it's a GPU overheat issue on my end. Sorry that I didn't add much to your solution, but wanted to check to make sure it wasn't the same. Youtube never froze for me, but high def playback did a couple of times. I'll look around and see if I can figure anything out.

That's alright, thanks for giving it a shot! Every program I use to monitor my GPU temps show them well under control, and I have lots of fans in my PC, so I really doubt heat is the issue. I'll see about bringing a heat sensor home from work tomorrow to point at it, just to verify.