Persistent cold boot issues

Tews · 13 Nov 2010

Dom .. navigate to c:/windows/minidump and upload the latest .dmp files..

Night Hawk · 13 Nov 2010

domfjbrown said:

He he - yep, it's an Antec; I obviously didn't select the whole line from my eBuyer parts order screen :)

Right - it BSOD'd 3 times in a row this morrning, so I power cycled it and F8'd it and got error codes something like the following (my eyesight's not that good, so lost count on the number of zeros in the numbers - helpfully, not!):
PFN list corrupt
0x0000004e, 0x0000000000000007, 0x00118763, and then a couple with just all zeros.

I'm now about to try the theory of installing an older ATI graphics driver. Will be back soon! Have a good weekend in the meantime guys, and thanks for the help - majorly appreciated :)

It's definitely a driver issue! You may want to review the information for that particular error and proceed from there.

Bugchecks Explained: PFN_LIST_CORRUPT

domfjbrown · 22 Nov 2010

Tews said:

Dom .. navigate to c:/windows/minidump and upload the latest .dmp files..

Right - back on my PC finally again - these are the last ones I got (though been on the machine a few times since then, but with no changes to config).

domfjbrown · 22 Nov 2010

Sorry - partially sighted and missed the upload button. Duuuur - been a long day at work!

My plan - flash BIOS, remove ATI driver (also using driverclean or whatsitcalled) and then power down, and try again tomorrow!

domfjbrown · 22 Nov 2010

Flashed up to F8 BIOS now - that was fairly easy :)

domfjbrown · 22 Nov 2010

Oh yeah - meant to say on Catalyst 10.4 it was still cold booting - so I wonder what it's all about? Seriously thinking of buying a new graphics card as the one I have doesn't seem to be good enough for GTA IV anyway (though the reg key for that's not letting me reinstall a legit code now - grrrr!)

Night Hawk · 22 Nov 2010

Why is everyone always in a rush to flash the bios? The old saying of "don't fix what isn't broke to start with" seems to pass right by. Did you review the indormation on the page posted earlier on the actual cause?

How Should I Fix It?

How this is fixed varies depending on the reason of the bugcheck. Using Driver Verifier and the checked build of the O/S should allow you to pinpoint the driver that is either corrupting memory or mishandling MDLs. If the offending driver is not a driver that you have any control over, the only available option is disabling the driver until a fixed version is available.

domfjbrown · 25 Nov 2010

Well, that might be so, but at least now I know it's NOT the BIOS but this POS graphics card (presumably). When I've got some time (ie a day!) to look at this Driver Verifier thing I'll get to the bottom of it.

I mean, if it IS the graphics driver (and now on Catalyst 11) then I give up - if they can't get a driver fixed this late in the game I'll buy a graphics card from someone who knows what they're doing :)

Night Hawk · 25 Nov 2010

I would revert back to one of the earlier catalysts at least until 12 or 13 is found to work. I run a 5xxx series card here as well but only ended up with some OpenGL issues with any past the Cat. 4.

First you will to boot up in safe mode first however to see the Cat. and drivers uninstalled. I've into a few buggy Catalyst versions in the past and simply had to wait for the next one or following to watch everything run like it should.

Don't think for a moment NVidia hasn't seen problems with their updates at times either. When the 8800s first came people were having some issues there as well. AMD/ATI is simply running into some issues with a few new things they decided to add in.

domfjbrown · 29 Nov 2010

This is what I have from the earlier steps mentioned in this thread (abridged!):

C:\Windows\system32>sfc /scannow

Beginning system scan. This process will take some time.

Beginning verification phase of system scan.
Verification 100% complete.

Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations.
-----
From fcdetails:
2010-11-29 19:20:50, Info CSI 000003dd [SR] Repairing 0 components
2010-11-29 19:20:50, Info CSI 000003de [SR] Beginning Verify and Repair transaction
2010-11-29 19:20:50, Info CSI 000003e0 [SR] Repair complete

----

I've run Driver Verifier too (though can't seem to find the files it created though have a .dmp file from the right time - as it BSOD'd almost immediately on opening to the Windows desktop (so perhaps we're getting somewhere!). I've enclosed a zip file with this and the older .dmp files, and an XML file from the first BSOD incident.

Hopefully some amazing person here can make head or tail of said .zip file :)