Crash on startup, did not see error before reboot to system restore

I have been having some issues lately on my pc as this is the second thread I have started in less than 2 months. My initial BSOD woes has seemed to have been resolved thanks to the help of the last expert that guided me on my way a few weeks ago, but it seems the problems persist. When I first booted my pc today, I was not able to see my screen (monitor was turned off) when the error message appeared and the system rebooted to system restore before I turned my screen on. so unfortunately I have no knowledge of what kind of error occurred or any messages that would have appeared upon crash. I ran the restore option and the pc booted fine. Again, I am pretty ignorant when it comes to this kind of troubleshooting so any help that someone can give me to understand what is going on and any remedies will be much appreciated. Cheers!

Hi CWhit,

You still seem to be getting bugchecks triggered by the same assembly instruction in AppleCharger.sys:

Code:

4: kd> vertarget
Windows 7 Kernel Version 7601 (Service Pack 1) MP (8 procs) Free x64
Product: WinNt, suite: TerminalServer SingleUserTS
Built by: 7601.24024.amd64fre.win7sp1_ldr.180112-0600
Machine Name:
Kernel base = 0xfffff800`02e61000 PsLoadedModuleList = 0xfffff800`030a0a90
Debug session time: Thu Jan  3 23:49:07.586 2019 (UTC - 8:00)
System Uptime: 0 days 0:00:15.445
...
FAULTING_IP: 
AppleCharger+2bb4
fffff880`059f8bb4 498b14de        mov     rdx,qword ptr [r14+rbx*8]

So that driver is still loading and being called. Perhaps it got reinstalled as part of the system restore.

However, that wouldn't explain the initial crash you described above - unless you'd performed a system restore previously. I do see a couple of 0x116 dump files from November 2018. Those are VIDEO_TDR_ERROR bugchecks and they indicate a failed attempt by Windows to reset an unresponsive display driver. They don't seem to have been entered in the event log for some reason, though. Have you noticed any messages popping up about the display driver being reset while using the computer?

Hello cwsink!

As far as I know I haven't received pop-ups related to the display driver resetting. Typically, my PC runs perfectly fine once it boots and gets into Windows but every so often (once every 5-10 boot ups) it will experience a crash at the very onset.

Back in November I was getting the BSOD and posted a thread on this forum. It was explained to me that my monitoring software for my motherboard (I think it was called Gigabyte Guru) was corrupted and causing the issues. I followed their instructions and uninstalled the software and thought that that proved to be the solution after about a month of no troubles. But, here we are and you are describing a different set of issues, if I understand correctly.

My video card is quite old at this point so I wouldn't be surprised if it was the culprit but I haven't the knowledge to ascertain whether this is the case.

Thank you for your response. I know I haven't been able to provide you with much information to work with but I will try and answer any further questions you may have if it helps. Cheers!

7 of the 12 dump files in the zip you provided are caused by VIDEO_TDR_ERROR bug checks. So, you're having those types of crashes whether you've noticed them or not.

The output in my response above is from the dump file named 010419-16520-01.dmp which is the most recent dump and was triggered by a memory access violation attempted by code in AppleCharger.sys. It has a reference to memory which is no longer valid. That is what you tried to address in your previous post. My hypothesis is that AppleCharger.sys is a victim rather than the culprit and it's still referencing memory which has become invalid when the display driver reset is successful.

I don't remember if the directory gets created on Windows 7 but can you look to see if there's a folder named C:\Windows\LiveKernelReports on your system and let us know?

This was inside the location you requested. Hopefully, I have zipped it correctly.

There are 19 dumps in the zip and the most recent among them seems to be from November 2017. There are none more recent in that folder?

They are all code 0x117 live kernel dumps which are supposed to get generated when a TDR occurs. There are many reasons TDRs can happen but it indicates a communication problem between Windows and the GPU.

Looking at the dumps from the first zip you made available I'm not even seeing an Nvidia graphics driver being loaded in the most recent 3 dumps - which is odd. Can you post a screenshot of Device Manager with the Display adapters node expanded? Mine looks like this, for example.

Here is the screenshot. Everything that was in that kernel report folder was zipped in the attachment.

That looks normal. I'm not sure why the Nvidia drivers wouldn't be showing up in the most recent dump files but I'd be tempted to physically reseat the GPU to be sure it has a good connection with the motherboard. I'd then want to reinstall the drivers after using DDU to remove them. Is that something you've already tried? If not, there's a tutorial on the linked page showing how to use the DDU tool.

Do you have experience physically adding/removing devices inside a computer and comfortable doing so?

OK, that sounds like a plan. Yes, I do have experience with reseating the GPU among other things attached to the motherboard, no problem. I will need to look up that tutorial on the DDU since it has been a while since I have actually tinkered with hardware.

I will follow through with your suggestion over the weekend and reply to this thread shortly after.

Thank you, cwsink! Your input has been invaluable.

Cheers!

I'm happy to help when I can. Another thing I would suggest doing if the computer is stable while using the BIOS settings menus is updating your BIOS to the latest version. I've seen BIOS updates fix TDR issues on quite a few motherboards.

You're currently on F4 (which I think might be the original BIOS for the motherboard) and the latest is F7 if this is the correct support page for your motherboard. Keep in mind it's possible to brick the motherboard if the BIOS update fails or is interrupted during the update so I'd only attempt it if it's actually stable in the BIOS settings menus. So no graphics/text corruption, freezing, or unexpected rebooting while in the those menus.

Please do let us know how it goes. If there are further crashes and you'd like us to have a look please rerun the collection app and make the new zip available in a reply. Good luck!