Driver has stopped working and has recovered

[AlexRD]

I keep getting that error while playing Skyrim on my GTX 295. It's not just Skyrim, it happens with Crysis 2 VERY often, like every 20 seconds, it happens with Deus Ex, only once though, as it crashes to desktop afterwards.

I have tried every possible driver combination, i updated to the latest beta driver and it still happens. I ran the program in XP compatibility, ran it in Iobit's Game Mode (which disables some services), and as Administrator mode. It still happens.

I ran it windowed, and also ran it as Single GPU card (which reduced the frequency of this happening, but didn't stop it), ultimately, i ran out of ideas.

Here's something interesting: Whenever i turn my computer off for 15 minutes or so, the game runs fine for 3 hours at least. My first thought was overheating, but i used EVGA Precision to measure the temperature, and it didn't go higher than 60 C when it crashed. It did, however, report a sudden spike of GPU- A usage to 100% when the error message appeared, but B remained constant.

Anyone have suggestions?

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

Possible bad/weak psu..... I'm not familiar with that brand, however 1000 watts and 70 amps on the 12 volt line is what you need for two GTX295's.....So your walking the edge at any rate.....

 

[AlexRD]

Possible bad/weak psu..... I'm not familiar with that brand, however 1000 watts and 70 amps on the 12 volt line is what you need for two GTX295's.....So your walking the edge at any rate.....

I only have one GTX 295

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

680 watts and 52 amps....half the card would roughly be 550/40 amps....However Johnny guru has a Diablotech review unit that died at 600 watts of draw...the psu was supposed to be a 1050 watt unit....Diablotek RPM-1050 1050W Review
Is this the power supply? SL-X1000EPS PC power supply B2B Wholesale Business Import Export


http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=187

 

[AlexRD]

680 watts and 52 amps....half the card would roughly be 550/40 amps....However Johnny guru has a Diablotech review unit that died at 600 watts of draw...the psu was supposed to be a 1050 watt unit....Diablotek RPM-1050 1050W Review
Is this the power supply? SL-X1000EPS PC power supply B2B Wholesale Business Import Export

yes that is it

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

It seems from my research the PSU is made by Solytech...who used to be known as Deer...who had about the worst possible reputation...PSUs from powercolor - Page 2 - jonnyGURU Forums Want to see why their rep is so bad?Allied AL-D500EXP 500W power supply review Review

Now anybody can clean up their act, and I am sure that Solytech/deer can make decent PSU's if the mood struck them to do so, but I would be very suspicious about the power supply, based on their past....

My best suggestion at this point would be to borrow a good 700 watt or better psu, and test with that....It could be other things so I would avoid buying anything until the PSU can be eliminated as the cause...

 

[AlexRD]

It seems from my research the PSU is made by Solytech...who used to be known as Deer...who had about the worst possible reputation...PSUs from powercolor - Page 2 - jonnyGURU Forums Want to see why their rep is so bad?Allied AL-D500EXP 500W power supply review Review

Now anybody can clean up their act, and I am sure that Solytech/deer can make decent PSU's if the mood struck them to do so, but I would be very suspicious about the power supply, based on their past....

My best suggestion at this point would be to borrow a good 700 watt or better psu, and test with that....It could be other things so I would avoid buying anything until the PSU can be eliminated as the cause...

i'm going to give it a try. the PSU was indeed cheap at the time, should have gotten a corsair one.

 

[haberdasher]

Display driver has stopped responding and has recovered

Hi,
I came across this post as I was looking for a solution to the same problem. However in my case, I was just watching a Youtube video through RealPlayer and at the same time browsing a couple of websites.
I can't recall now what exactly happened but I remember the video screen from Youtube turning green but the audio was still there. The error message appeared and then the computer stopped responding. I restarted the PC but it stopped responding after the desktop was displayed. I tried restarting again but now the PC stopped after the animated windows logo was completed. I tried to rollback and update the display driver but nothing worked. I don't think the updating of the driver was even completed because the computer would not restart completely.
I can still run the computer in safe mode. Another thing I noticed is that after the computer has stopped responding, I would usually turn if off with a long press on the power button - the fans would stop, the led on the casing would turn off, the monitor's power indicator would turn yellow, however, the led on the keyboard (the one that says "Num Lock") would remain lighted. I would have to pull out the plug or turn off the AVR to turn the light off.
I brought the unit back where I bought it for servicing but to my surprise, the computer worked just fine when the technicians turned it on. It was like nothing had happened to the computer -it went throught the normal process of booting and then to the desktop. I asked them what happened and they said it must be due to too many processes/applications that load on startup. They said they had deactivated a couple of them so they won't all load next time - but they did this after the PC had completely booted. So now I'm confused - how come the PC worked at the shop but not at home.
I didn't install any graphics card so I'm using whatever's on the motherboard (Intel DH61wwbr).

I hope you guys can help me because I don't really know much about this.

Thanks in advance.

 

[AlexRD]

Are there any other suggestions? The PSU is due to arrive in three days, i kind of want to troubleshoot before that.


Update: After some extensive troubleshooting, i started thinking when did this problem first start happening. I realized it started happening after i bought my UPS. And now i realize how stupid i was.
I have a 1000w computer connected to a 1000w UPS, which is also connected to a TV, Sound and External HD. Do you guys think thats the problem? Anyways, i'm going to do some testing and see if that is really the problem. Will come back with results!

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

Could be, have you tried it plugged in direct? A 1000watt psu would draw about 20% or more wattage from the wall at 100% load.....Could check and see if the fans are all running/no dust monsters...blow out everything with canned air.....take the sides off the case, and have a fan force air in case....Could try underclocking the video card.....Could set the CPU back to stock settings....

 

[haberdasher]

Are there any other suggestions? The PSU is due to arrive in three days, i kind of want to troubleshoot before that.


Update: After some extensive troubleshooting, i started thinking when did this problem first start happening. I realized it started happening after i bought my UPS. And now i realize how stupid i was.
I have a 1000w computer connected to a 1000w UPS, which is also connected to a TV, Sound and External HD. Do you guys think thats the problem? Anyways, i'm going to do some testing and see if that is really the problem. Will come back with results!

Do you mean the PSU is not providing enough power? One of the technicians who checked my PC actually suggested plugging the CPU directly to the outlet. But would it make a difference if the AVR is indicating the correct voltage supply?

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

haberdasher: You would do better to start your own thread....That way you can get your own personalized help.....

 

[haberdasher]

Oh...sorry. Didn't mean to just jump in. Thanks!

 

[AlexRD]

I think i have bandaid'd the problem.
First, i tried to connect the PC directly to the wall. It black screened three times the moment i started playing the game, and it's like three screens and you're out cause it freezes your computer after the third.

So i tried connecting my computer to the UPS alone, and it worked. I mean, its not perfect, i still get the occasional black screen, but it's enough to play the game and enjoy it until my new system arrives.

My uneducated guess would be that the UPS is doing what the PSU wasn't? Well, i really don't know, i'm just glad its working

 

[acr]

Hey

I have been following the thread because I have a 295 GTX myself and I've been having the very same problems with Skyrim . And not only that, but also Witcher 2, Might & Magic Heroes VI, Gothic series (though the latter seems manageable). While I do not use an UPS and I have a good enough PSU, the problems persist.

That said, I had read on another forum how disabling 3d performance maximization in nVidia Control Panel fixed it. Ultimately, I decided to try it out and the result was /fine/. The driver would no longer die out (did not occur once). However, the performance drop was severe. And this is not the result I am seeking.

Hence I am thinking there is some internal driver problem with handling 295s that causes this to happen. Games before certain date (2010) have problems only every so often (and it is more often that not physical memory related), but newer once aint working that well.

Just my two cents and I hope I found a suitable solution too.

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

Do you (either) have problems with any games that are dx10 based or earlier? What we could have is a dx11 problem......... All the system would see from a ups is smother current flow....(unless the power went out), but we had determined that your PSU was a re-badged Deer...and it would need all the help it could get anyway......

 

[acr]

Let's just say I have not tried that many games to know which exact DX they were based on. Suffice to say, the latest which I have tried where Skyrim, The Witcher 2 and Might & Magic. As far as I know, Skyrim was built on DX9 and so seems TW2 (according to the requirements), but I am not sure. Gothic 3 (2006 game) and Risen (2009) were both DX9 for certain.

 

[AlexRD]

Let's just say I have not tried that many games to know which exact DX they were based on. Suffice to say, the latest which I have tried where Skyrim, The Witcher 2 and Might & Magic. As far as I know, Skyrim was built on DX9 and so seems TW2 (according to the requirements), but I am not sure. Gothic 3 (2006 game) and Risen (2009) were both DX9 for certain.

I don't know, but setting the TDR Delay in the registry to a higher value such as.. 8


1) open your registry editor
2) go to the key : HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\GraphicsDrivers\
3) highlight it then right click on this key
4) Add DWORD TdrDelay
5) Set value of TdrDelay to the number of seconds you allow your GPU to run with no feedback to the system (ie Timeout watchdog..)
personally I've set this value to 8 seconds (from the default 2s) so that it leaves plenty of time to the GPU to perform overcomplicated computing intensive kernel without having windows 7 considering a fault and hence "recovering the device"
6) reboot

 

[AlexRD]

Let's just say I have not tried that many games to know which exact DX they were based on. Suffice to say, the latest which I have tried where Skyrim, The Witcher 2 and Might & Magic. As far as I know, Skyrim was built on DX9 and so seems TW2 (according to the requirements), but I am not sure. Gothic 3 (2006 game) and Risen (2009) were both DX9 for certain.

I don't know, but setting the TDR Delay in the registry to a higher value such as.. 8


1) open your registry editor
2) go to the key : HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\GraphicsDrivers\
3) highlight it then right click on this key
4) Add DWORD TdrDelay
5) Set value of TdrDelay to the number of seconds you allow your GPU to run with no feedback to the system (ie Timeout watchdog..)
personally I've set this value to 8 seconds (from the default 2s) so that it leaves plenty of time to the GPU to perform overcomplicated computing intensive kernel without having windows 7 considering a fault and hence "recovering the device"
6) reboot

Using this DLL has fixed my skyrim problem completely.
Skyrim Better Performance - UI - Skyrim Mods - Curse

 

[Ivan the SoSo]

Good to hear that....Thanks for the follow up....