My life in Blue Screen Hell

[TrainableMan]

Per the upload problem, there is a file size limit on zip files to be uploaded of 1.19mb - if your zip is bigger than that then take out some of the older DMPs. It could also be an actual site issue so I will send an alert to Ian.

You said you had 1 BSOD when you used a different PSU, even one to me would seem to indicate it isn't that.

So this makes your PSU, your RAM, or a virus all less likely.

You said your GPU crashed 4 months ago. You also said you crash during games. And you said IE & Firefox crash - would that happen to be on pages with video?

All of these could point to your video card or the video drivers. Do you know they are up-to-date? Have you tried pulling your GPU and reseating it? Any chance you have another GPU you could try?

Your browser issues could also be Adobe Flash which is a buggy insecure mess, so try updating that as well.

Keep replacing drivers or hardware until it works or you toss it down an elevator shaft. :dontknow:

oh, and have you tried completely removing Skyrim? Sounds too close to Skynet from Terminator to be a good product anyway At least try the Skyrim 1.8 Beta.

 

[Fhrblg]

No, the file was less than half the limit. I failed three times just now to upload some...

Firefox crashed a minute ago while I was trying to make a post here. It was the only tab open. Windows explorer sometimes crashes as the computer is first starting up. Really, like firefox, it seems to crash at random, whether video is playing or not.

The video card died in September. The four months I was talking about were June, when the problem really took off, through September, at the end of which the card died. When I had to switch to the backup one, I downloaded the most recent drivers for it. The only other card around is my brother's, and I'm kind of reluctant to ask him to use it, since whatever this problem is killed my other one.

I have removed the card a couple times lately to check it for dust, and made sure it was plugged back in right.

I'll try uninstalling Skyrim. Can't play it with this video card anyway.

A smaller folder of minidumps just finally successfully attached.

 

[TrainableMan]

I had a server error once yesterday just trying to enter a thread so I guess we are having some site issues. I did send a note to the admin.

A couple of them actually show other files at fault but they are all Windows OS. I don't know what to tell you, maybe your MOBO has a short or something. Your problem is beyond my abilities, sorry.

In the past I've seen another BSOD expert recommend you run Driver Verifier. It adds extra info to the log to make it easier to see what died, but sometimes the added strain of Driver Verifier makes you BSOD. I wouldn't know what to do with the results of driver verifier afterwards but maybe someone else would know if you get that far.

 

[Fhrblg]

Attached it a picture approximating my facial expression for the past few months.

Could something be wrong with windows then? Like something a re-installation could fix? Windows Defender crashes sometimes too. Also, sometimes folders hang up and won't display thumbnails.

If it were in fact a motherboard problem, do you know of any way I could confirm it? Or how much I should expect to spend on a new one fit for a gaming pc?

I'll try diver verifier. Maybe I can get somewhere with that added info. Do you have any ideas of where to start asking next?

Thanks for trying on this as long as you did. I really do appreciate it. I really wish I could just throw this piece of crap off of a cliff sometimes, but I really can't afford to start completely over. I'll keep trying stuff and hopefully I'll get lucky. I've got to get this thing up and running right- my only game system working right now is an old NES, and when you want to play Morrowind, Double Dragon and Super Mario Bros. just don't cut it.

 

[TrainableMan]

Well games themselves are well-known for causing issues, that's why they have so many patches. A completely fresh install definitely wouldn't hurt. You can back up your userids/settings/data to an external hard drive using "windows easy transfer" - type it in, it's built in to W7. Then format and install W7, run windows updates till you are current, then re-update all your drivers, then reinstall basic programs like Office, Alternate web browsers, IMGBurn, CCleaner, Adobe Reader, a codec pack, but NO Games. You can install but don't run CCleaner or any other reg or setting tweakers. At that point a system image to an external drive would be an excellent idea so you have a good "Basic install no data" point for restore. Then restore your Windows Easy Transfer. Take another image and this would be your "Fresh start image".

If you want to clean or tweak do that and take a third image. For my own machine, I trust CCleaner and a paid software called Tune-Up Utilities but I hear horror stories of other registry tools/cleaners making a mess so choose wisely. I would image again if you have the space.

If you can survive a few days w/o games (or at least with only the basic solitaire, spades, etc that come with the OS) then test the stability at that point.

After two or three stable days ...

I encourage people to create a different folder for games, not put them in \program files\, something like c:\games\ or if you have a lot of games and another partition maybe even install games in a games folder on the other partition, like D:\games\. The reason for this is NOT BSOD-related, it has to do with W7s tighter security being a problem for some older games because \program-files\ is considered a system folder.

So you decide but install your favorite game or two and patch them to the latest. Stability test again.

Of course if your system BSODs while you are in the basics then I suspect hardware failure.

I don't know what's wrong so I can't speculate on cost. But if you are up for it a fresh start may be worth trying.

I know it can be frustrating, I had a board years ago that would work fine for hours and then shut down. I tore it all apart and put it back together and it worked a while till it got hot. I believe the heat caused the board to pop out the video card enough to short or loose connection. My solution was to put a wooden pencil under the MOBO which pushed up enough to bow the MOBO enough that the card didn't pop loose any more. So it takes a lot of hair pulling and WTF moments but sometimes you get lucky.

 

[Fhrblg]

I turned on driver verifier and had it make a setting based on all drivers installed. It said I needed to restart after making the change. I restarted and then it blue screened over and over again untill I booted in safe mode and deleted the setting from verifier. Then I restarted and it booted the first time. You were right about it causing bsods.

I've already been considering backing up all my stuff and reformatting. It's been on the drastic measures list for a month or so. I will have to buy either an external HD or some flash drives. My brother is going to try my power supply on his machine, which runs without problems, and if it causes no complications, we can fully eliminate it from the running. Same with the video card.

He suggested I try running the computer without my modem. It makes sense to try, as my last computer developed a habit of blue screening any time the modem and sound card were both active at the same time. Some kind of resource incompatibility between soundblasters and internal dial up modems. Maybe this computer has some sort of similar problem, although I've never had a sound card. I'm running on realtek onboard audio, stuck in mono. I used to have the monitor and graphics card process my sound, as the other graphics card had an HDMI port.

The thing that drives me nuts is that it worked fine for a year and a half. Why would it suddenly start having real problems? Or should I look at the blue screens that Skyrim gave me when I first installed it in December as the beginning of this same problem? It's hard to tell because other games didn't do it then, it didn't occur randomly then, and it quit doing it for months after I got Skyrim updated. By the way, I did uninstall it last night, and then just to be funny, the comp blue screened like five minutes after.

My brother says I should mention the weird stuff inside the computer when I got it. There was a small speaker magneted onto the bottom of the case. It didn't have any function I was aware of, and the guy we got the computer from didn't remember it or what it was for. I was sort of afraid to mess with it too much initially. There was also a small light tube which was connected but didn't work, a set of usb ports in the front which have never worked, nor do I remember how they connect, and a fan control which had a broken wire. We took all this stuff out or disconnected it one of the days when we opened it up to clean out dust, somewhere from July to September. *edit* My brother wonders if switching back to the default card, (which was near that magnet) would be making things worse, for that reason. The newer card ran with it there for a year and a half almost before I got rid of the speaker. I don't know if it would effect anything or not, but it was approximately eight inches away from the video card, and about six inches from the hard drive. I don't think anything is wrong with my HD though. Just bringing up anything we can think of that could be potentially useful. A friend was telling me I should disconnect everything from the motherboard and clean the contacts on everything, just to exclude that sort of issue from possibility.

 

[TrainableMan]

Do you seriously have a dial-up connection?

Well usb on front should basically be a hub but you have to plug it in to a usb connection on the mobo. there is also usually a mobo connection for a speaker which is helpful to test that it will post even w/o a video connection or HD, basically you turn the machine on and that beep says u passed BIOS load, I can only speculate the speaker was in there for that. Magnets and HDs don't mix so if it was stuck right on the HD I would worry but away from everything stuck on the case - no problem.

 

[Fhrblg]

Everywhere I go I get the same reaction of disbelief. Yes, I have dial up. I live out in the woods in Northern California, and our internet choices are either this or get F'ed by hughesnet or someone similar for exorbitantly priced satellite internet that we're contractually bound to lease the equipment for for at least two years, with a monthly data cap that's lower than what I can download in a month on this crappy dial up connection. That's the idyllic life of a forest dweller, I guess.

I'll have to see if I can get the second usb hub running. It would be nice to connect my keyboard and mouse to the front of the computer...

Good to know about the speaker. Thanks for the info.

 

[TrainableMan]

Well at one time this was the "boonies" too are you too far out for even DSL? Two years ago I saw an ad for cable and when I said I was only interested in cable internet they just said no. Then finally 2 months ago they offered internet in our area. So there is hope.

Well your specs say each of those can be wired to a pair of jacks for a max of 6 usb devices. I hooked up a hub on the front of my computer and my mouse works fine but I have a backlit keyboard that draws too much power (I guess) because if I plug it in the front my gaming screen on it goes all crazy like displaying upside down etc, so I have to plug that in the back. a basic keyboard should be no problem though.

 

[Shintaro]

If I may, perhaps you could try and update the BIOS. The BIOS you are running is from 2006 (Ver. 0301).

[BIOS Information (Type 0) - Length 20 - Handle 0000h]
Vendor Phoenix Technologies, LTD
BIOS Version ASUS M2N4-SLI ACPI BIOS Revision 0301
BIOS Starting Address Segment e000
BIOS Release Date 07/14/2006

http://www.asus.com.au/Motherboards/AMD_AM2/M2N4SLI/#download

The latest is Ver. 1301updated in 2010.

**NOTE: follow the instructions carefully you can turn you motherboard in to a brick.
p. 4-1 of your motherboards manual.

Hope this helps.

 

[Ian]

Sorry to hear about the problems uploading to the site - I've done some digging at this end as the 500 error is logged in IIS on the server. It looks like your upload is timing out, so it could be that you need to split the zip file up in to a couple of chunks if it's still causing problems. I guess this may be why the smaller zip file has worked for you. If you use something like WinRAR/WinZip then you should be able to specify a zip splitting size (perhaps 500K?)

 

[Fhrblg]

Well, my brother just tested my power supply for the last 24 hours in his computer. He had a blue screen at first, but once he made sure everything was connected right, it worked fine for the whole 24 hours. We tested it running Skyrim, GTA4: EFLC, the internet, and videos and music. GTA was run with max traffic density and really taxing mods. In fact, it was so memory intensive that it crashed the game, but no blue screen. Also, he alt+tab-ed and forgot about it and accidently ran it and skyrim at the same time.

So if the power supply was the problem, it would have blue screened him almost as bad as it does me, and it didn't, so you were right. Now I can look past it at other stuff.

I'll probably start getting ready for a reformat.I may not have a virus right now, but I have before, and maybe one of them harmed some of my core windows files. Some of my blue screens mention sys32, and I'm pretty sure that's a windows file.

I don't know about you guys, but it seems plausible, considering it was working fine, and now it's not.


I WISH they offered us DSL here. My uncle lives a lot closer to the city and gets DSL, and his internet is pretty good. I think there's some way to get some kind of internet from the one cell phone company that gets service out here, but I know literally nothing about fancy new phones and using the internet on them.

When I took out the power supply I noticed those front usb ports are still plugged into the motherboard. I guess they just don't work.

Shintaro, I'll look into those bios files. They might help. As far as the instructions for my motherboard are concerned, I got this computer used from a guy who may in turn have gotten it used as a fixer upper. I don't even know how many years of use any of the used parts, like my power supply, ram, and current graphics card have had. For less than 200 bucks, I guess I can't complain though.

Ian, thanks for looking into that. My files were more in the 300kb neighborhood already though.

 

[TrainableMan]

I didn't suspect the PSU.
System32 is a folder. It holds tons of system files.
System repair replaces bad system files, so they wouldn't still be an issue.
If virus FUBARed anything that is still causing issues it is more likely registry damage
... but anyway ...
new install is a good plan.

 

[Fhrblg]

I didn't suspect the PSU.

I know. You said you thought it wasn't the power supply, and I was saying you were right. It passed our test. I can stop worrying about it and look past it for the real problem. I just needed to eliminate it.

 

[TrainableMan]

sounds good

Shintaro mentioned your BIOS needs updated. Please update that once you have power again.

 

[Fhrblg]

Well, I updated to the most recent Vista 64 bit bios since there's none for W7. Then my mouse and keyboard wouldn't work, so I changed to a different version. Did nothing for my blue screens though. I think I'm using one from 2008 or 2010.

I did some work for my neighbor last month and am still waiting to get paid. When I do I'll either buy an external HD or a HD dock for the one I have laying around, and then back up my stuff and do a reformat and re-installation.

I'm worried my motherboard might end up having to be replaced, and that sucks, because I'd have to make sure it fits in the case I already have, or have to buy a new one of those too.

I really really hope that the mobo will be ok. if I only have to buy one part, the card, I can get a good one.

 

[TrainableMan]

A BIOS is not language specific. The manufacturer may have listed it under Vista but BIOS controls what happens before any OS at all is read.

With a new MOBO, you would also need to make sure the power connections are the same otherwise you will need a new power supply too. EDIT: I looked at your MOBO and I believe you currently have ATX so you should be fine, but very old AT boards would have had a different PSU.

 

[Shintaro]

Mate,

Post #30 I suggested to update the BIOS. It *MAY* help with your problems. The Motherboard is old. So a BIOS update may help with compatability problems.

 

[TrainableMan]

One of the major differences between XP and Vista was ACPI sleep functions. Many MOBOs had the BIOS updated to support that so hopefully your BIOS update helps.

Have you had any BSODs lately? If so post the new DMPs.

 

[Fhrblg]

Shintaro, I know you weren't saying it would fix everything. I'm used to the "do away with all the other things it could be" system by now. I was just saying it had no effect.

I've attached the last few minidumps that were more than 0kb.

I've been trying to update flash, but it uses a crappy system where I download a downloader, and it is supposed to download and install flash, but the downloader erases the exe used to start it when it starts, and doesn't finish, and then I have to download the downloader again. It is exactly as convoluted as it sounds, and really starting to aggravate me.

I downloaded a flash game yesterday, and flash keeps crashing part way through it, and blue screened during it once too. It's like the computer is going, "what? have fun on my watch, will you?" and nips it in the bud.

Lol, I've started to consider the possibility that my computer is just haunted.