BSOD on certain games

[SquireJames]

Hello there,

I started experiencing a strange BSOD, different to anything i've experienced before, whilst playing Napoleon Total War the other day. I read this might have been a problem with said game, and when lowering my graphics settings it seemed to go away. However, I just experienced it on Europa Universalis IV, which is nowhere near as graphically intensive, so I am puzzled as to the cause.

The error reported in BluescreenView is "CRITICAL_OBJECT_TERMINATION" and it's in ntoskrnl.exe.

Attached are the last 5 BSOD Minidumps (4 during NTW, 1 during EU:IV)

Is it my graphics card at fault? Harddrive? I'm honestly baffled. If you require any system stats, I have a CPU-Z file I can upload with all the required information.

 

[TrainableMan]

All those DMPs point to the kernal which is really a "catch all" so I would check your video driver (Current one is from April 16, 2013) to see if there is a newer one from AMD. Also make sure you have the game patches up-to-date.

Are you running the games inside Virtual Box?

 

[SquireJames]

I updated my graphics card drivers recently, (currently running 13.251.0.0, from 06/12/2013 so it says in Device Manager). Games are fully up to date and not running inside virtual box. I also just had another bluescreen just from trying to lock my PC, but this bluescreen is my old nemesis KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED, again in ntoskrnl.exe

 

[Shintaro]

Please run the following scans:
1/ Please download and run Windows Defender Offline. It will create a CD / DVD / USB and will boot and scan your hard drive offline.
2/ Download and run TDSSKiller.
3/ Install Malwarebytes (Free Version) and scan your computer.
4/ Please upload screen captures of the completed scans.
5/ Please upload your CPU-Z text file.

The reason why we ask you to scan your computer is that sometimes some crashes are related to virus activity. Even though you might have a AV product installed.

Then please run Driver Verifier so that we can get a better look at who is causing the crashes.


Driver verifier

The Driver Verifier tool that is included in every version of Windows since Windows 2000 it is used to detect and troubleshoot many driver issues that are known to cause system corruption, failures, or other unpredictable behavior.

***FIRST: Please backup your stuff and then make sure you've got access to another computer so you can contact us if problems arise.
Then make a System Restore point (so you can restore the system using the Windows 7 Startup Repair feature.)

1. Go to Start and type in "verifier" (without the quotes) and press Enter
2. Select "Create custom settings (for code developers)" and click "Next"
3. Select "Select individual settings from a full list" and click "Next"
4. Select:
   ---- Special Pool
   ---- Pool Tracking
   ---- Force IRQL Checking
   ----Deadlock Detection
   ---- Security Checks (Windows 7 & 8)
   ---- DDI compliance checking (Windows 8)
   ---- Miscellaneous Checks
   
5. Click "Next"
6. Select "Select driver names from a list" and click "Next"
7. Then select all drivers NOT provided by Microsoft and click "Next"
8. Select "Finish" on the next page.

Reboot the system and wait for it to crash to the Blue Screen.
Continue to use your system normally, and if you know what causes the crash, do that repeatedly.
The objective here is to get the system to crash because Driver Verifier is stressing the drivers out.

How Long should I wait for a crash?

- If it doesn't crash for you, then let it run for at least 36 hours of continuous operation.

How do I turn Driver Verifier off?!

- Reboot into Windows (after the crash) and turn off Driver Verifier by going back in and selecting "Delete existing settings" on the first page.

- Or press the Windows Key + R, and type in "verifier /reset" (Without the quotes)

- Then locate and zip up the memory dump file and upload it with your next post. then locate and zip up the memory dump file and upload it with your next post.

I can't get in to Windows, what do I do?

- If Windows will not start and get to a login screen or desktop, because it crashes too soon, try it in Safe Mode.


- If you can't get into Safe Mode, try using System Restore from your installation DVD to set the system back to the previous restore point that you created.

And please run MemTest86. The software needs to run through at lease 8 passes. This will take some time, so maybe you need to let it run over night. Here is a HowTo on MemTest86.

 

[SquireJames]

Right

Ran Malwarebytes. Found a few pesky PUPs that like to sneak into Google Chrome occasionally, but nothing major.
Ran TDSSKiller, nothing found.
Ran Windows Defender Offline, nothing found.

Going to go ahead and create the system restore point now ready to run Driver Verifier. Here is the CPU-Z text file.

 

[Shintaro]

Did you run Memtest86?

 

[SquireJames]

WIll run that now. It took a little while but I managed to get it to crash (believe it or not, it refused to). However, unlike normally, it didn't produce a bluescreen. It restarted, but no "your computer has recovered from a serious error" message when it did. Also, no minidump file was created. I'll turn driver verifier off and then run memtest.

 

[Shintaro]

Memory crash files can be in a couple of different places.
c:\Windows
C:\Windows\Minidump
C:\Windows\LiveKernelReports\WATCHDOG

 

[Shintaro]

Also in "Startup and Recovery" can you un-tick "Automatically restart". You will need to reboot for it to become effective.
The reason I would like that un-ticked is so you can see what happens when it crashes and it if say's that it created a crash dump file.

 

[SquireJames]

I usually have that unticked. Not sure what re-enabled it. Either way, its unticked now and I will re-enable the driver verifier and see if I can get it to crash again

 

[SquireJames]

Right, weirder and weirder.

No more bluescreens, but, instead I get this;-

and of course, it's completely locked up. No memory dumps were created.

 

[Shintaro]

No image for some reason.

Anyway before the lockup happens again Set the following:

1. With PS/2 keyboards, you must enable the keyboard-initiated crash in the registry. In the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\Parameters, create a value named CrashOnCtrlScroll, and set it equal to a REG_DWORD value of 0x01.
   
   
2. With USB keyboards, you must enable the keyboard-initiated crash in the registry. In the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\kbdhid\Parameters, create a value named CrashOnCtrlScroll, and set it equal to a REG_DWORD value of 0x01.

You must restart the system for these settings to take effect.

After this is completed, the keyboard crash can be initiated by using the following hotkey sequence: Hold down the rightmost CTRL key, and press the SCROLL LOCK key twice.

That way if it locks up again you can hit the key sequence and get a crash dump.

 

[Shintaro]

Any crash files in those directories I pointed out?

 

[SquireJames]

Unsure why you can't see the image. Anyway it's a picture of my screen, which I took with my phone, completely garbled. There are memory dumps in the folders you indicated, but none with a recent timestamp (dates back 3 or 4 days to my previous bluescreens, not the current crashes)

 

[Shintaro]

How did Memtest86 go? Did you run through 8 passes?

Upload 4 (put them in a zip file) of the latest crash files, even though they are 3 or 4 days old.

That image did show up, looks like a video ram problem, but lets wait for another crash file.

 

[SquireJames]

I'll run some memtests this evening. I took my graphics card back to the outlet I got it from, and as part of the warranty they tested it ready to go back to the manufacturer for repair or replacement. However after exhaustive benchmark tests, he couldn't get it to do the above (showed him the picture also). So puzzlingly we can rule out physical card damage.

The "MEMORY.DMP" is over 100mb when compressed. I can't upload that. The logs in the LiveKernel folder are over a year old, and i've already uploaded the ones from the Minidump folder.

 

[Shintaro]

Can you upload the memory dump somewhere else? Media fire or skydrive/onedrive?

 

[SquireJames]

Doing so now

 

[SquireJames]

http://www.mediafire.com/download/z838es2asq76wai/MEMORY.zip

 

[Shintaro]

The crash dump is pointing to Mozilla Thunderbird. Do you have the latest version installed?

Also Verifier is off so it is a bit more difficult finding the source to the problem. Could you please re-enable it.