BSOD after installing Graphics Drivers

Hi,

The problem I'm having right now is the fact that last night my computer decided to just shut itself down randomly after me starting up World of Warcraft. Afterwards it would only give me BSOD's with BCCode 116. As it had been some time since a fresh install (over a year probably) I figured this would be a good opportunity to go for one now.
After reinstalling Windows 7 Ultimate (64 bits) I moved on to install all my drivers/virus scanner/etc. and everything seemed to be back to normal. After turning my computer back on the next morning it still booted up fine and without any issues allowed me to send a few e-mails. After this I decided to play some Dark Souls 2. Before even getting into the game my computer gave me a BSOD and did nothing other than that.

I moved on as follows: I reinstalled Windows again because, when in doubt reinstall (as it's the easiest and least time consuming). Afterwards I installed my graphics driver. As BCCode 116 has something to do with the graphics card or the graphics drivers (according to my googling skills) I assumed I'd save time by installing those first.

This unfortunately did not help. When running with ANY kind of official Nvidia GeForce drivers my computer just keeps throwing BSOD's at me with the same 116 code in it.

I've tried installing older drivers, newer drivers, I've even tried installing the same drivers I've been using for the past 2-3 months but none seem to work.


In one of the posts I found it was mentioned that this problem could also be memory related. I just finished running "Memtest86 v4.3.6" for about 1,5 hours and it came back with no errors at all. I've also wanted to rule out my hard drive so I ran a check disk scan on it (I think that's what it's called these days?). This also came back with no errors/bad sectors/etc.



Thinking it might be dust inside the computer I cleaned the thing up thoroughly yet it had no effect.


The thing that has me sort of stumped is the fact that I have been using this computer in the same setup for some time and have never had any problems with it (up until last night). Sure I've had a BSOD before but it was nothing a reboot or reinstall couldn't fix...

Another this is that when I'm using the standard drivers which are installed by Windows upon discovering the graphics card I have no problems booting up my PC. Yet the BSOD's come right back with any kind of Nvidia Drivers.


Unfortunately this is sort of where my expertise ends when it comes to BSOD's so I hope any of you can help me out (any and all help would be much appreciated). I have attached the required documentation to this post, should you require more I will be happy to provide you with it.

Well the latest versions of Nvidia graphics drivers appear to be quite unstable in a lot of cases.
Can you remove your graphics drivers and install the version 314.22.



Here's some instructions to help you out.

NVIDIA Drivers - Avoid Problems

Code:

fffff880`0327e000 fffff880`03ed6000   nvlddmkm T (no symbols)           
    Loaded symbol image file: nvlddmkm.sys
    Image path: \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\nvlddmkm.sys
    Image name: nvlddmkm.sys
    Timestamp:        Tue Mar 04 11:07:52 2014 (5315B408)
    CheckSum:         00C20523
    ImageSize:        00C58000
    Translations:     0000.04b0 0000.04e4 0409.04b0 0409.04e4

I also recommend running a hardware test on your GPU.


Stress test your graphics card with Furmark

I recommend running it for around 30 minutes

   Warning

Furmark will increase the temperature of your GPU rapidly so keep and eye on your temperatures

Post back the results.

Thanks for the speedy reply doc!

I've tried installing the drivers you recommended (314.22) with only the options enabled which were addressed in the post you linked. After installing and rebooting my PC it just leaves a black screen now (right before I can actually log in). I've waited for about 10 minutes for it to continue but it does not seem to want to do that. There are no more BSOD's though.

Is running the benchmark for my GPU useful even with those standard drivers Windows installs?

I also read in a different post that the Memtest86 should run for at least 7-8 passes. The 1,5 hours that I've run it allowed for 1 full pass. Am I correct in assuming I should run that longer to completely rule out a memory problem?

Well that would help.
Run it for around 8 hours.

Yes please run Furmark, it will lets us see if it's a hardware issue or not.

As I didn't want to just sit there and do nothing I decided to run SeaTools to test my hard drives, just to rule those out. I ran all the basic tests and they all passed them. So I guess all there's left to test is my motherboard and graphics card.

I'm still running into that OpenGL 2.0 error with Furmark though. I still have an old GeForce 8800 GTS laying around somewhere, would it help rule out a graphics problem if I switched that out with my current 480 GTX and then tried installing drivers?

Yes that would rule out a GPU hardware issue.

I just switched out my 480 GTX graphics card with the 8800 GTS one and already it looks a lot better than 2 minutes ago. Windows installed some standard drivers but it still views the card as an 8800 GTS and it automatically set my resolution to 1920x1080.

I suppose I should download the official Nvidia drivers for it before running Furmark. Would you recommend I download the latest one or should I go for the 314.22 one here just to be on the safe side?

Well 314.22 drivers are the last known driver that is stable so that would be the best version.

Right, so I installed the 314.22 drivers and ran Furmark for a little over 30 minutes. The temperatures stayed at around 82 degrees and there were no crashes/BSOD's and/or other weird things... I suppose it's safe to say my GTX 480 has bitten the dust?