Lockups and BSODs during games - Win 7 x64

Good day,

I've been having problems with my PC lately, and I can't seem to solve it.

When I'm running applications, just having it run idle on the desktop or web browsing, there is no issue. However, when playing games, the computer will occasionally and randomly lock up. In some games the ambient sounds or music will keep playing, in others it just loops the sound.

Then after a minute or two, it either resumes like nothing ever happen, or it crashes to a BSOD. Contents of the BSOD seem to differ between STOP or IRQL_LESS_OR_EQUAL, I think depending on which driver is installed. Sometimes I can play for hours, sometimes it locks every 5 minutes.

I'm running MSDN Windows 7 Ultimate N x64 with Service Pack 1. I've tried removing the Soundblaster addon card and using the onboard sound. I've tried upgrading sound/video/lan/bios/motherboard drivers. I've tried running on 2 memory sticks (switching which pair). I've tried running memtest86, which found no errors. I've tried reinstalling Windows. All to no avail.

Overheating isn't a problem, and I've never had any issues on this machine when it still ran XP.

If anyone can help me, that would be much appreciated, as I've run out of ideas to try. I've attached the crashdump, a picture of the last BSOD and a System Health Report. The Health Report says it cannot find an Anti-Virus program, which seems weird as Secury Essentials is installed and running.

Redemption said:

Good day,

I've been having problems with my PC lately, and I can't seem to solve it.

When I'm running applications, just having it run idle on the desktop or web browsing, there is no issue. However, when playing games, the computer will occasionally and randomly lock up. In some games the ambient sounds or music will keep playing, in others it just loops the sound.

Then after a minute or two, it either resumes like nothing ever happen, or it crashes to a BSOD. Contents of the BSOD seem to differ between STOP or IRQL_LESS_OR_EQUAL, I think depending on which driver is installed. Sometimes I can play for hours, sometimes it locks every 5 minutes.

I'm running MSDN Windows 7 Ultimate N x64 with Service Pack 1. I've tried removing the Soundblaster addon card and using the onboard sound. I've tried upgrading sound/video/lan/bios/motherboard drivers. I've tried running on 2 memory sticks (switching which pair). I've tried running memtest86, which found no errors. I've tried reinstalling Windows. All to no avail.

Overheating isn't a problem, and I've never had any issues on this machine when it still ran XP.

If anyone can help me, that would be much appreciated, as I've run out of ideas to try. I've attached the crashdump, a picture of the last BSOD and a System Health Report. The Health Report says it cannot find an Anti-Virus program, which seems weird as Secury Essentials is installed and running.

Love to help but no DMP files in the upload try this method.




To enable us to assist you with your computer's BSOD symptoms, upload the contents of your "\Windows\Minidump" folder.

The procedure:

* Copy the contents of \Windows\Minidump to another (temporary) location somewhere on your machine.
* Zip up the copy.
* Attach the ZIP archive to your post using the "paperclip" (file attachments) button.



To ensure minidumps are enabled:

Go to Start, in the Search Box type: sysdm.cpl, press Enter.
Under the Advanced tab, click on the Startup and Recovery Settings... button.
Ensure that Automatically restart is unchecked.
Under the Write Debugging Information header select Small memory dump (256 kB) in the dropdown box (the 256kb varies).
Ensure that the Small Dump Directory is listed as %systemroot%\Minidump.
OK your way out.
Reboot if changes have been made.

Thanks for looking into my issue. I've used the settings you've suggested, but even after trying 3 times, no minidump is created. When the BSOD appears, it just hangs at the 'Initializing disk for crash dump...' line each time. I've let it run for a minute or 10, but nothing seems to happen.

Any suggestions? I've attached screenshots of the sysdm.cpl settings screen and the latest BSOD.

I hate to bump the thread, but I still haven't found a solution and I'm at a loss for ideas.