Driver Power State Failure

[omgzilla85]

I just bought an Acer V3-771g laptop. I put my SSD into it and did a clean format and installed Win 7 Ultimate x64. I'm getting random Driver Power State Failure BSODs. All drivers that I can find are up to date. I've tried the provided VGA drivers from Acer as well as the newest Beta from Nvidia. I've run disk check and memtest without any errors. I use an external sound card, a USB powered laptop cooler and a USB powered USB hub. My minidump files are attached. I would appreciate if anyone can take the time to analyze them and find the culprit of these BSODs for me. Thank You.

 

[Kougar]

I can't analyze minidumps, but your mention of the SSD was a red flag...

Some SSDs have problems with power states and will cause this exact problem. When you boot to Windows 7 go to your Power Options settings. Find the power plan you are currently using, and click to modify its settings. You will then need to click on the advanced settings link.

Once there, you should see "Hard Disks" on the list of options. Expand that tree out and set it to "Never". You can type a 0 in the field to do this. Save it out and close. Hopefully that will be the problem.

Edit: I will go ahead and mention that if the above does NOT fix you problem, then you can try setting everything to "always on", and disable both sleep mode and the power states for all onboard devices. This isn't optimal, but that should at least stop the problem so you can use the laptop until a fix is found. My bet is still on the SSD though.

 

[omgzilla85]

I'll try that and see what happens. Although I was using the same SSD in my desktop with win7 and never had a driver power state related bsod. Thanks for the quick response.

 

[omgzilla85]

Well I just came back from lunch and the machine had another Driver Power State Failure while I was gone. I guess the SSD wasn't the culprit. Not sure what else to try.

 

[Shintaro]

Welcome to the forum.

I hope that we can help you solve your problem.

A couple of things:

1/ SSD's are still new technology. And as such still buggy. So check the manufacturers website for a firmware update.
NOTE: Updating firmware on SSD's will most likely wipe the SSD. Hence backup all your data.
2/ You need to install Windows 7 SP1.

Windows 7 Kernel Version 7600 MP (8 procs) Free x64

Please don't hesitate to ask questions.

Let us know how you go.

Hope this helps.

 

[omgzilla85]

I'm about to get the firmware upgraded and SP1 installed. But for the time being I've unplugged the USB sound card I started using when I bought the laptop, and I haven't had a crash yet. It's most likely unrelated but I figured I'd give it a chance since I wasn't using it on my desktop with the same SSD and the same version of Win7.

 

[Kougar]

I'm about to get the firmware upgraded and SP1 installed. But for the time being I've unplugged the USB sound card I started using when I bought the laptop, and I haven't had a crash yet. It's most likely unrelated but I figured I'd give it a chance since I wasn't using it on my desktop with the same SSD and the same version of Win7.

A USB sound card? USB devices can have this problem, so that may have been it.

If the problem does not occur again that will pretty much be the clue you need. USB device power saving is another option you can disable from the power options menu, and that may allow you to use the sound card again.

 

[omgzilla85]

A USB sound card? USB devices can have this problem, so that may have been it.

If the problem does not occur again that will pretty much be the clue you need. USB device power saving is another option you can disable from the power options menu, and that may allow you to use the sound card again.

Yeah so, after updating the SSDs firmware and installing a clean Win 7 with SP1, the system was going good without the sound card plugged in. Until I woke up this morning and the system crashed within minutes. Not sure what to do here, I really don't want to have to RMA the laptop.

 

[Shintaro]

Sorry for the late responce, how did you go with this?

 

[Kougar]

Yeah so, after updating the SSDs firmware and installing a clean Win 7 with SP1, the system was going good without the sound card plugged in. Until I woke up this morning and the system crashed within minutes. Not sure what to do here, I really don't want to have to RMA the laptop.

At this point all I can suggest is putting the original drive back into the laptop, and seeing if the BSoD's go away. If they do then there's a hardware conflict with the SSD and the system. I know some SandForce drives had this issue, but it was pretty rare from what I know about it.

Assuming switching to the HDD again resolves the problem for a week, and if the latest SSD firmware did not fix it and changing Windows to NEVER power down the SSD does not fix it as well, then there isn't anything else to do except switch to a different SSD with a different controller.

 

[Shintaro]

Of course the other thing to try is updating the laptop BIOS.

 

[omgzilla85]

I did update the laptop's BIOS to the latest version. I ended up RMA'ing the laptop the other day. We'll see what newegg says about it, I have a feeling they are just gonna send the same machine right back to me. But if the SSD was the issue, wouldn't it also cause the same issue in my desktop? I've been using it in my desktop now for a few days and haven't crashed once. Thanks for the replies by the way.