P5Q BSOD on Boot when installing Sound Driver on Win 7 X64

[Misterfied]

Do you recall the code? 0x7E?

Yes. There's a screenshot on the first page of the thread. Did you not see it?

 

[Golden]

So, you get the same BSOD 0x7E regardless of whether the sound drivers are installed or not?

 

[Misterfied]

So, you get the same BSOD 0x7E regardless of whether the sound drivers are installed or not?

It's definitely a 0x7E error when I restart after enabling verifier.exe, but not sure if the other details are exactly the same.

After restarting, the stop came quite along way into the boot process this time, with the Windows logo stuttering as it tried to join together, but never made it to the desktop, then eventually BSOD'd again!

With the sound drivers the STOP is very early in the boot just as the logo dots start to converge.

Again, no Minidumps anywhere though.

What else can I do?

 

[Golden]

So, since we get 0x7E both with and without the sound drivers installed, we can conclude that the problem is not neccessarily the sound drivers only.

Event[30]:
  Log Name: System
  Source: [B][COLOR="Red"]volmgr[/COLOR][/B]
  Date: 2015-01-31T17:39:18.169
  Event ID: 46
  Task: N/A
  Level: Error
  Opcode: N/A
  Keyword: Classic
  User: N/A
  User Name: N/A
  Computer: 37L4247F27-25
  Description: 
[COLOR="red"][B]Crash dump initialization failed![/B][/COLOR]

I suspect hard disk errors.

Run the LONG test of the DOS version of SeaTools on both the Kingston and 3 x WesternDigital disks:
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/313457-seatools-dos-windows-how-use.html

 

[Misterfied]

Aha, wait.

I manage to boot into safe mode on Win 7 and got a report of an error and a mini dump!

Here it is:

 

[Misterfied]

Re: Not only sound drivers.

Yes, as I said earlier in the thread. I tried updataing the SATA drivers and also got a BSOD too. I REALLY don't see how the hard drives can ALL be faulty.

I've installed it on 3 different drives now, both of the WD 500GB drives on various partitions and also on the Kingston SSD. No difference.

 

[Golden]

*******************************************************************************
*                                                                             *
*                        Bugcheck Analysis                                    *
*                                                                             *
*******************************************************************************

Use !analyze -v to get detailed debugging information.

BugCheck A, {10, 2, 1, fffff800028a9440}

Probably caused by : rdyboost.sys ( rdyboost!ST_STORE<SMD_TRAITS>::StDmCurrentRegionSet+9b )

Followup: MachineOwner
---------

Turn ReadyBoost OFF on every device that has it turned ON.

Complete the hard disk checks.

 

[Misterfied]

Remember this a fresh vanilla install! ReadyBoost I have NEVER consciously used. It's not on by default is it? Surely it's only for removable drives like USB sticks anyway? Not hard disks?

OK, I'll check the hard disks tomorrow, but I am certain it will be a waste of time.

It's 3 am here! Will report back later.

 

[Misterfied]

As expected, all the hard disks check out OK, and the SSD too.

 

[Misterfied]

I also changed the graphics card. No difference at all.

 

[Golden]

I also changed the graphics card. No difference at all.

In that case, the problem must lie with the motherboard.

 

[Misterfied]

I also changed the graphics card. No difference at all.

In that case, the problem must lie with the motherboard.

Hi, yes, I think that's the problem too.

I always turn the computer off at night and re-boot it in the morning.

Just for interest sake, I re-booted into Windows 7 instead of 8.1 yesterday (where I had previously installed the Asus sound drivers and which had the night before caused a BSOD on boot) and it booted up absolutely fine!

I then attempted to install some graphics card drivers (after creating another restore point) and it crashed on boot. Restoring to the point where the Audio drivers were installed but the graphics driver wasn't, also caused a BSOD on boot! Remember, it was booting fine before the 'graphics card driver' install this time.

This morning, having left it as it was, and the computer being off for 9 hours or so, it booted fine into Windows 7 again!

I re-booted two more times just to check and it was still booting fine (Audio drivers installed).

This time I installed the 2009 ATK0110 APCI driver just for interests sake (after creating a restore point) and rebooted and it caused a BSOD. I restored to the point before the ATK0110 driver was installed (audio drivers installed) rebooted and BSOD on boot! Remember, prior to adding this driver I'd re-booted 3 times with the audio drivers installed with no problem.

It's so weird. On Windows 8.1 everything is rock solid using the same sound and graphics drivers given that apparently the motherboard is faulty?!

I have no idea why the 64 bit version of Windows 8.1 behaves perfectly, whereas the 64 bit version of Windows 7 does not (even though it USED to work absolutely fine). It's a real mystery.

There just doesn't seem to be a 'logical' reason for all this.

 

[Misterfied]

Well, this is embarrassing!

I'd already checked the memory using the Microsoft boot test which had passed with no problem.

Out of desperation, I downloaded Memtest86+ 5 and let it run while I was out for a few hours and came back to see over 1400 errors!

So, mystery solved I would assume?

All I need to do is find out which stick(s) to replace as not too sure how to interpret the results, other than it's pretty clear that on particular parts of the RAM the last 4 bits are ALWAYS corrupted.

Edit:

Well, it was quite easy to identify which sticks were faulty. I left the original Corsair RAM in and re-tested. That was fine. I moved the Kingston Hyper-X RAM into the slots previously occupied by the Corsair RAM and re-tested. The memory errors were at exactly the same addresses as earler today, so definitive proof that the sockets on the motherboard weren't to blame, and bad RAM.

Won't be buying Kingston RAM in future.

Only thing remains is whether Amazon will take them back under the Kingston 'lifetime' warranty? Anyone know?

I reinstalled Windows 7 X64 for the millionth time, installed all the drivers again and it's rock steady with 2 GB RAM installed on the SSD. Woohoo.

Thanks to all those that tried to help.