Old Laptop ASUS C90S screen goes black but cpu still is running . . .

[rvpwsf]

I am running Win7 pro SP1 7601 intel 6600 @ 2.40ghz 3GB RAM
GeForce 8600m GT 512 MXM2

Soon after I load up my GPU drivers, The screen will glitch now and again and crash as soon as I try to run any programs, especially something involving the video card to any serious degree.

In the Event Viewer I see some events re-occuring over & over along with the crashes of my screen.

Level - Error; source - event log; event id - 6008; task catagory - none
Level - critical; source - Kernal Power; event id - 41; task catagory - (63)
Level - Error; source - event log; event id - 1101; task catagory - event processing
Level - Error; source - WMI; event id - 10; task catagory - none



When my screen goes black, you can still hear the computer running, just with no screen.
Unfortunately, my only choice at this point is a hard power down, which results in the option to boot in safe mode when it starts back up, so I do not know if any of these errors are related to the hard shutdown. (holding down power button)

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[wither 2]

Not sure how much I can help but, if you go to Control Panel, Device Manager, are there any errors (yellow triangle) for the display adapter? While there, try disabling the driver for your GPU and rebooting. Do you get a stable screen then?

Also, is the fan vent for the GPU clean and is the fan running?

 

[rvpwsf]

There are no yellow triangles in device manager once I get the drivers installed, but that's when trouble begins. If I disable the drivers then the system is stable. The system will run stable in safe mode too.

The cooling system on this machine is pretty robust and everything is clean and operating.

I can get the gpu driver installed, and the system appears stable at first. The screen will glitch occasionally, but I can cruise around in windows and run various on board utility windows programs.

However, If I try to play a video, then the screen goes black, but you can hear the video running in the background.

Thank you for your input.

 

[wither 2]

Would you follow the instructions here-

Speccy - Publish Snapshot of your System Specs

and post your system specs?

 

[rvpwsf]

Thanks for your help!

http://speccy.piriform.com/results/aeK23ri8VjOZx1DauHxcZ6s

 

[wither 2]

I'm truly confused. Is your Win 7 fully up to date? It provides a complete list of installed updates on 1/18/2020 but your speccy is showing that you have IE 8 and .network 4.0 installed.

The system I'm on right now is from 2008 and originally had two GeForce 8800 GT discrete graphics cards. Both failed because NVIDIA inexplicably disabled fan control in it's drivers. Since you have a NVIDIA chip for graphics, I don't know if it relates.

I tried to find the temperature limits for your GPU and can't find any. Your specs are showing 72 degrees C which seems high to me. Have you checked to see if the vents on your system are clean and the fans are running? Usually, when a GPU overheats, it blue screens.

If you run dxdiag.exe and then the 64 bit dxdiag and look in the Display tab, are all the DirectX options enabled? Are any problems noted?

 

[rvpwsf]

I wouldn't say it's completely up to date. The more up to date I let it get, the more trouble it has.
I let it do quite a lot of updates recently and the machine barely got through the boot process after. Just as the boot would finish and windows was just about finished building it's desktop, the screen would go black. (computer still running)

I had experimented with installing many of the updates, while avoiding a lot of the security stuff.
I had had to go back to restore point recently and reload the gpu driver; seems like there might be some left over / residual mess from all the abuse I have put this old laptop through recently.

Today when I fired up the C90S it still had a few updates it wanted to do. it got through them ok and I was able to cruise around in windows and run dxdiag, ect., but when I tried to launch WMC to play a video, shortly after all I have is audio.

I was unable to find any specific temp rating info for my specific gpu, but all the generic info for similar nvidia cards shows that 72 celcius was well within the acceptable range. I don't get BSOD, my screen goes black with audio still running.

64 bit dxdiag shows three accellerations enabled: Direct draw, Direct 3D and AGP texture.
Notes: no problems found.

 

[wither 2]

Go here-

Download official VLC media player for Windows - VideoLAN

and download/install the player. Try to play a video in it.

In Programs and Features, what is the latest version of .netframework and Microsoft C++ redistributable that you have?

 

[rvpwsf]

I tried VLC and it did the same thing: screen goes black with audio running.

.Net Framework 4.8

C++ 2013 Redistributable (x64) - 12.0.21005

Thanks!

 

[wither 2]

Does this happen with all files? It sounds like it might be a codec issue.

Also, which driver did you install?

 

[NoN]

What about going in Bios settings and allow more Ram (something like 128Mb shared Ram) for the video. I have this setting on an old HP Laptop, also i have unmount the Laptop to clean fans and redo the thermal paste on both CPU and GPU.

 

[rvpwsf]

It happen with all files.
Running a video file is just an easy way to see the failure in action and know that the cpu is still running.

The laptop will experience similar failures if I try to launch the tv card, or other programs which put a lot of strain on this old machine.

I have tried both the newer drivers and some old ones I still have.

Some have suggested problems with Ram or even the Processor, could be the culprit. I have let some mem tests run extensively with no results.

I don't really have anyway to test the motherboard.

I will look into assigning more Ram in the BIOS as suggested by another member when I get a chance.

Thanks again.

 

[wither 2]

You should be able to get the correct driver by going to the ASUS support website. From what i can find, the correct driver for your legacy card is this one-

NVIDIA DRIVERS GeForce 340.52 Driver WHQL