BSOD from ntoskrnl.exe

[Vir Gnarus]

There's a component of the realtek audio drivers that is very old, the driver labeled as MBfilt64.sys. While your other parts are dated sometime this year, this one seems to be left dormant with a timestamp of July 30, 2009. Perhaps it's some old remnant left behind from when you installed your motherboard's drivers? Sometimes Driver Sweeper will help clean up these ancient relics, which you can then use the opportunity to install fresh new drivers. Remember to get the drivers from your mobo vendor, not from realtek.

Your motherboard vendor's website should all the drivers for components like network and audio. You look to have an ASRock 970 Extreme 4. Go to the website, go to the appropriate page for that mobo, and download the drivers. Do not download any utilities or software (or the "driver" marked AICharger if it exists). In fact, if you have any software that came with your motherboard software suite (the cd that came with your mobo), you'll want to uninstall em (prolly with Driver Sweeper). Update BIOS too while you're at it, of course.

 

[Qieth]

I've gotta say, Vir, you are speaking tech on a slightly higher level than me. Could you dumb it down just a little bit?

I went to AS Rock's homepage, but I can't search for AsRock 970 under Downloads - and I certainly have no idea how to upgrade my bios. As I recall, I didn't install motherboard drivers. It just worked after installing Windows.

 

[Vir Gnarus]

What browser are you using? The ASRock website has in their download section a very simple interface, which is on the left side what type of stuff you're looking for (BIOS, Drivers, Utilities, Other) and then when you click on one it'll list their motherboard brands. Perhaps your browser has a hard time displaying it?

The drivers list is indeed a bit cumbersome. What you want to do is click the name of the motherboard you have and it'll bring up its own page dedicated to that mobo. You then click the "Downloads" section on the left and it'll bring you a list of downloads specifically catered to that mobo. I recommend you grab all drivers except the AppCharger. Stay away from the utilities, but note their names and uninstall any from your system that you may find with the same name.

The BIOS should be a little bit more trickier only in that its installer will have your system restart, then it will apply the BIOS update, then restart again. Make sure of course that your system is stable during this update (don't run other applications, etc.) as if this messes up, you may end up bricking your motherboard, which means it'll no longer function and you'll need to replace it.

 

[Qieth]

Alright, I found this: ASRock > Synchronizing Web Database

How many of these do I need to download, and do I need to install them in a specific order?

 

[Vir Gnarus]

Doesn't matter on order. Get All-in-one, Lan, Audio and USB drivers.

 

[Qieth]

I'm back. I'm sorry that I haven't responded for a few days. I have the week off, so I haven't got the chance to spend too much quality time with my computer.

I've downloaded and installed All-In-One, LAN, Audio and the USB drivers. You mentioned updating my bios as well, but I'm not sure where I should download that from and how to proceed.

A few incidents I would like to mention:

Today, just before I decided it was time to update these drivers (in fact, this was what spurred me into action), my screen started pixelating. It was almost like when a Windows window crashes, and it turns all white, except it was sort of fading white throughout the screen and I could see the pixelation. It happened for a few seconds (and while it was going on, the mouse was unresponsive), and it happened 3-4 times in a row. I haven't been able to make it do it again, but I'll let you know if it does. Could this have something to do with the crashes.

Since we are updating USB drivers, I figure I would mention something. It's probably not related to this, but I'm just putting it out there. Whenever I boot up my computer, after my desktop comes up, it usually takes 15-20 seconds before my mouse and keyboard are responsive. In my USB, I also have an external harddrive, and when the mouse/keyboard wakes up, so does the drive it seems. I also have a USB microphone plugged in, for reference.

Anyways, I figured I would mention these things. I'm looking forward to your future directions.

EDIT: The screen pixelation happened again, and it kept going for 10-15 seconds before it suddenly stopped. I guess it's either the screen or the graphics card - or maybe it's related to these other issues?

 

[Vir Gnarus]

Sounds like a graphics issue, or the "screen" being faded to white may perhaps be Explorer.exe hanging, which will cause your desktop and taskbar to fade to white, much like when any other application happens to be unresponsive for a while. Does this sound right to you? Or do you think it's some form of graphics artifacting that's taking place?

 

[Qieth]

No, it definitely doesn't feel like explorer.exe crashing. The screen was acting all weird. When it happened last night, there were big blotches of different colors on the screen, but it looked like it was "pulsing".

 

[Vir Gnarus]

Smells like a graphics problem to me. Looks like your GPU is pretty bad off. If it's onboard (on the motherboard), it's time to look for replacing the motherboard. If it's a dedicated graphics card, that's gonna have to be replaced.

 

[Qieth]

Could this be whats causing the BSOD's? Whats funny is that this pixelation only happens when I'm just browsing the net, but I have not yet seen it while playing a game.

 

[Vir Gnarus]

There may be varying factors involved. Perhaps the graphics generated by your browser are Gdi-based, which will utilize the CPU, but the games are DirectX which are GPU-accelerated. Who knows. I personally would like to see a screenshot of the effect as it occurs. If you can do a PrintScreen when it happens and send us a JPG we may get a better understanding of what's going on.