Very intermittent BSOD

[PatriotAus]

I made a computer for a friend for a favour (the specs i have listed in my rego) and it all works and then i send it off to her and then it BSOD. Originally i thought it was something she was doing at her house but i have since to realise that usability just degrades over time. This is the worst thing about the problem because when i swap something in to trial that part, it takes at least 2 days to start Blue screening again.

So far i have put a new HDD in and installed W7 on that with no success. Leaving that hdd in i put a better PSU in, and after that was put in i started a game (windows chess 3d) and it showed up heaps of errors pertaining to the GPU and i opened firefox and it BSOD. I then put my gpu in to test and then after about 6 hours it didnt BSOD however i then left the computer off for an hour and then it BSOD instantly at bootup.

This is where i am at so far. It seems to be pretty stable when it gets up and running but if left off for a while it BSOD like crazy. I have also noticed that the MoBo splash screen stays up for 20s longer then my computer which has near identical specs (same mobo).

I have often come here for solutions but this is the first time i have posted because its a bit hard finding a solution. I Have spent weeks doing this because of the length of time it takes to BSOD.

I have found the dump files, i am going to just zip them and up them... hopefully ive done it right, just let me know if i haven't. (it wouldnt let me archive so i copied them and 'stripped them of personal details' and then it worked)

To anyone that tries to help out, thank you so much, this has been a nightmare and caused many sleepless nights.

 

[Jonathan_King]

Welcome to SF!

I suspect bad RAM. Download a copy of Memtest86 and burn the ISO to a CD using Iso Recorder. Boot from the CD, and run at least 5 passes.

Microsoft (R) Windows Debugger Version 6.11.0001.404 AMD64
Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.


Loading Dump File [C:\Users\Jonathan\AppData\Local\Temp\Temp1_dmp.zip\050210-14742-01 - Copy.dmp]
Mini Kernel Dump File: Only registers and stack trace are available

Symbol search path is: SRV*c:\symbols*http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols
Executable search path is: 
Windows 7 Kernel Version 7600 MP (4 procs) Free x86 compatible
Product: WinNt, suite: TerminalServer SingleUserTS
Built by: 7600.16385.x86fre.win7_rtm.090713-1255
Machine Name:
Kernel base = 0x83010000 PsLoadedModuleList = 0x83158810
Debug session time: Sat May  1 22:26:47.651 2010 (GMT-4)
System Uptime: 0 days 0:06:31.322
Loading Kernel Symbols
...............................................................
................................................................
..........................
Loading User Symbols
Loading unloaded module list
....
*******************************************************************************
*                                                                             *
*                        Bugcheck Analysis                                    *
*                                                                             *
*******************************************************************************

Use !analyze -v to get detailed debugging information.

BugCheck 1000008E, {c0000005, 8303d403, 9f4abb44, 0}

Probably caused by : hardware ( nt!_woutput_s+560 )

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

0: kd> !analyze -v
*******************************************************************************
*                                                                             *
*                        Bugcheck Analysis                                    *
*                                                                             *
*******************************************************************************

KERNEL_MODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED_M (1000008e)
This is a very common bugcheck.  Usually the exception address pinpoints
the driver/function that caused the problem.  Always note this address
as well as the link date of the driver/image that contains this address.
Some common problems are exception code 0x80000003.  This means a hard
coded breakpoint or assertion was hit, but this system was booted
/NODEBUG.  This is not supposed to happen as developers should never have
hardcoded breakpoints in retail code, but ...
If this happens, make sure a debugger gets connected, and the
system is booted /DEBUG.  This will let us see why this breakpoint is
happening.
Arguments:
Arg1: c0000005, The exception code that was not handled
Arg2: 8303d403, The address that the exception occurred at
Arg3: 9f4abb44, Trap Frame
Arg4: 00000000

Debugging Details:
------------------


EXCEPTION_CODE: (NTSTATUS) 0xc0000005 - The instruction at 0x%08lx referenced memory at 0x%08lx. The memory could not be %s.

FAULTING_IP: 
nt!_woutput_s+560
8303d403 ff8bc8c785d8    dec     dword ptr [ebx-277A3838h]

TRAP_FRAME:  9f4abb44 -- (.trap 0xffffffff9f4abb44)
ErrCode = 00000002
eax=85a6a730 ebx=8df36120 ecx=00000000 edx=00000000 esi=8df39308 edi=85ab76b0
eip=8303d403 esp=9f4abbb8 ebp=9f4abbd8 iopl=0         nv up ei pl zr na pe nc
cs=0008  ss=0010  ds=0023  es=0023  fs=0030  gs=0000             efl=00010246
nt!_woutput_s+0x560:
8303d403 ff8bc8c785d8    dec     dword ptr [ebx-277A3838h] ds:0023:667928e8=????????
Resetting default scope

DEFAULT_BUCKET_ID:  VISTA_DRIVER_FAULT

BUGCHECK_STR:  0x8E

PROCESS_NAME:  MOM.exe

CURRENT_IRQL:  0

MISALIGNED_IP: 
nt!_woutput_s+560
8303d403 ff8bc8c785d8    dec     dword ptr [ebx-277A3838h]

LAST_CONTROL_TRANSFER:  from 8307e66d to 8303d403

STACK_TEXT:  
9f4abbd8 8307e66d 85ab76b0 85ab7770 0000003c nt!_woutput_s+0x560
9f4abc3c 8324171d 8843f9d8 8849d501 00000000 nt!KeRemoveQueueEx+0x4f8
9f4abc94 8321b1a6 8843f9d8 9f4abccc 9f4abce4 nt!IoRemoveIoCompletion+0x23
9f4abd18 8305342a 000002c8 0421ebec 0421ebac nt!NtRemoveIoCompletion+0x106
9f4abd18 779d64f4 000002c8 0421ebec 0421ebac nt!KiFastCallEntry+0x12a
WARNING: Frame IP not in any known module. Following frames may be wrong.
0421eb94 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 0x779d64f4


STACK_COMMAND:  kb

FOLLOWUP_IP: 
nt!_woutput_s+560
8303d403 ff8bc8c785d8    dec     dword ptr [ebx-277A3838h]

SYMBOL_STACK_INDEX:  0

SYMBOL_NAME:  nt!_woutput_s+560

FOLLOWUP_NAME:  MachineOwner

IMAGE_NAME:  hardware

DEBUG_FLR_IMAGE_TIMESTAMP:  0

MODULE_NAME: hardware

FAILURE_BUCKET_ID:  IP_MISALIGNED

BUCKET_ID:  IP_MISALIGNED

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

 

[PatriotAus]

Hey mate, i expected bad ram first and ran memtest all night ~ 10 hours. I also ran it for like 4 hours when i first put it together just to check before i was aware of an issue.

Is there evidence in the dump that it is the ram? or just what it looks like? Thanks for the quick reply

- i am aware the memtest misses some errors.

though can you think of any reason why it seems to manifest itself when the computer has been off for extended periods of times? when i have trouble starting it up (BSOD) i go into the bios and set to fail-safe defaults (even though it is already set as that).

 

[Jonathan_King]

Try updating the BIOS, and continue uploading dmps as they come.

 

[PatriotAus]

Okay mate, will do. I think i have already updated the BIOS though, its been a long haul its all kind of blurred together. But i shall keep the dumps coming. Thanks again, hopefully we can get this resolved. I am sure that when if i leave the comp off tonight that i will awake to a computer that wont turn on.

 

[Jonathan_King]

There are only two more things I can think of: a bad motherboard, and hardware not compatible with each other.

Also disconnect any USB devices that may be attached.

 

[PatriotAus]

Yeah mate thats what i narrowed it down to. I dont think it could be the cpu otherwise i would expect things to be much worse.

There is one more thing though, i originally had an old wireless card in (and had a 64 bit version of windows), and it never worked, i thought it was that what was causing the BSOD so i bought a brand new 'windows 7 ready' wireless network PCI card and installed 32bit rather then 64 bit just to make the whole driver situation better.

IS there any indication it is from that? i just have a feeling it may have something to do with it because it was the first thing i came across as a problem.

 

[Jonathan_King]

No, no indication of problems from the wireless card.

I also suggest a stress test for your CPU.

Free Software - GIMPS

Download the appropriate version of Prime95 from the link above.

 

[PatriotAus]

I ran prime95 the first time i set it up for a few hours... still waiting for it to crash again

 

[PatriotAus]

i havent had a problem so far.... i set the motherboard to be fail-safe defaults rather then optimised and it seemed to work... though i not confident because i know once i think its fixed it will come back and bite me on the arse.

I dont really know the difference between fail-safe and optimised bios settings, but what could it have been if this actually was the difference?

 

[Jonathan_King]

Fail-safe might have lower clock speeds for better stability, and stuff like that. I honestly have never researched that before.

 

[PatriotAus]

This whole thing has been very annoying. Since i have put the better PSU in things have got much better, but things continually crash, yet now they dont BSOD. I have tried reinstalling them, and as soon as reinstall them, i open it and it crashes again.

 

[PatriotAus]

google chrome and firefox has been crashing a lot and i just tried to unrar a file and it was corrupted, so i tried another one and it was corrupted also. does this sound like anything?

 

[Jonathan_King]

You may want to test your hard drive, and also test for viruses using Malwarebytes.

Open an elevated command prompt and run chkdsk /r /f.

You may also want to test your hard drive using one of these tools: HD Diagnostic