My life in Blue Screen Hell

[Fhrblg]

I got a mostly complete used computer from a guy my brother knows online in February of 2011. It came with RAM, a power supply, a motherboard and processor, and disk drives. I ordered a graphics card, monitor, modem, hard drive, and accessories. This is my second computer. My first was a Dell that, while it gave me plenty of problems, it was pre-built. This is my first pieced together one, so I've been on new ground as far as learning to work on computers.

Since around June I've been stuck in Blue Screen Hell. I get blue screens on top of blue screens, sometimes followed by a third while it's recovering from the last two. Sometimes it just restarts during booting up without even showing a blue screen.


Bear with me here, this will be a long-ish setup on this problem, because, as I said, I've had five months worth of trail and error developments.


It happens during almost every gaming session that lasts more than fifteen minutes. Games also tend to crash, not necessarily to blue screen, a lot more than they should. 3d games crash the computer the worst, even plain, un-modded Morrowind. 2d games like Baldur's gate aren't immune either. sometimes it crashes while I'm watching videos, or listening to music, or on the internet, or just when it's sitting idle not doing much of anything.


I'm running windows 7 64 bit.

I'm using two of my four sticks of G.SKILL DDRII 1 gb RAM. The other two are questionable.

My departed video card was a Radeon HD 6800 series from Gigabyte. The one I'm running now is a Nvidia 8800.

My power supply is a 650, can't remember the brand

My hard drive is a western digital 2TB Caviar Black SATA III.

This problem finally killed my graphics card at the end of last month. After installing speedfan I noticed it was a little hot. I opened up the case, took out the graphics card, cleaned out the dust, cleaned as much dust as I could from the power supply, processor fan and heat sink, and the case itself, then put everything back together and it wouldn't start. Finally when I took out the card and replaced it with the backup card that came with the computer, it booted up just fine. Now I use the inferior backup card.

I have run chkdsk and it found no problems. When I get my hands of some blank cds, hopefully today, I'll try memtest86. My brother tried my RAM in his computer and it worked fine, though.

Speedfan shows several temps overheating. When I tried installing my brother's 900 power supply the temps went down somewhat. I only tested it for about two hours, during which I got no blue screens from Fallout 3, which is reliable for causing them, but I did get one from Skyrim. I don't know if that proves anything, as I'm pretty sure this video card isn't suited for Skyrim.

When I used Event Viewer, I noticed a lot of errors with SPTD.sys. I uninstalled Daemon tools and went through a complicated rigamarole to get rid of sptd.sys from my registry. It stopped that specific error, but my blue screen frequency was unaffected.

Firefox has developed a habit of crashing frequently. So has Windows Explorer. I thought I had malware or viruses, partly because I would ALWAYS get a blue screen during a malware scan. While I was testing my brother's power supply, though, a malware scan finally was able to finish, and it didn't show anything.

Recently I've downloaded a program called BlueScreenView and finally have had a chance to look at the text from my errors again. I'm still getting used to windows 7 and am learning where this info is kept.
This is a screencap I took today of BlueScreenView: http://imageshack.us/f/43/bsvscreen.jpg/


It's like this computer is mocking me now. I've had so many false conclusions as to what's wrong with it. The problem keeps getting worse and I've got limited experience in working on computers. A few months more of this and I'm going to just snap and take it outside and kill it with a splitting maul and fireworks.

Ok, I won't do that but I'll end up even crazier than I already am. I really need help, guys and ladies. If someone thinks they can help, please, give me some good leads. Let me know what other info you guys might need.

Thanks in advance.

 

[TrainableMan]

I'm not a member of imageshack and don't plan to be so I can't expand your pic to see it. Please use "go advanced" and attach pictures directly to your posts (must be 93K or less).

Also, attach the actual zipped up DMP files not a just a screenshot.

Also look over THIS thread. Run Memtest86+ for 6 passes or more. Run the anti-virus testing. etc.

 

[Fhrblg]

I'm not a member of imageshack and don't plan to be so I can't expand your pic to see it.

You've got be be freaking kidding me. They require you to join just to view a picture?! Ludicrous! I haven't used imageshack more than twice in almost three or four years, and now that I know that, I probably won't for another few years.

I'm attaching my last few crashes' info. Should I post more of them? I have ones with all sorts of different headings.

 

[TrainableMan]

Well most people likely are members of Facebook, in which case I believe they are automatically logged in, but I'm not a member of that either so I get a popup to join imageshack when I try to expand it fullpage to actually view it.

No need to post more DMPs at this time. Your dumps point to the kernal which is basically a catch-all and not very informative.

Since you mentioned your memory it might be a good idea to run memtest86+ for 6 to 10 passes to check it.

Also, I always recommend a good virus scan to rule that out. See HERE.

But of most concern are these older drivers:
secdrv.SYS - from macrovision 2006, EDIT: this is the latest & probably not an issue but you could delete it
RTKVAC64.SYS - from 2008, realtek Audio driver should be updated
nvm62x64.sys - from 2008, network adapter should be updated
LHidFilt.Sys, LMouFilt.Sys, LUsbFilt.Sys - early 2009 Logitech mouse drivers should be updated (Setpoint?)

So check & update video (not on the list above but check it anyway), network, sound, & mouse drivers.

Also, you might try, from a command prompt, running: SFC /scannow
This should replace corrupt system files if there are any.

 

[Fhrblg]

Well, SFC/scannow didn't find anything wrong.

I'm working on the drivers you mentioned, and will post another reply after I finish up with them.

I'm pretty sure my video drivers are up to date, as I just had to get new ones when I changed cards, but I'll still look into that, too.

I'm still waiting on memtest untill I can actually get a blank cd to burn it to. I live pretty far from town and haven't gotten a ride in yet.

Hopefully this stuff will work.

 

[Fhrblg]

I've got a new problem and I'm not even sure how best to describe it.

Recently certain pixels or sets of pixels in pictures and videos go crazy, flashing white and or purple, and the same spots show errors in those pictures and videos thumbnail views too. Also, greenish or purple stripes one or two pixels wide have started occasionally running along the width of the screen, flashing in and out at slightly different heights on the screen. Sometimes turning the screen off and then back on fixes it. It isn't at consistent places on the screen every time.

Today, a couple of minutes ago, I noticed a weird pinkish purple pattern running across the whole task bar, around the icons and the time and date. It really freaked me out.

It kind of reminds me of when my old CRT monitor died. It would have red graphical errors and tinting across the screen, and sometimes it would be tinted cyan over half the screen.

I really hope this monitor isn't on the way out too. I'm already afraid I'm going to have to buy new ram, a new power supply, and a new graphics card, I really can't afford to replace my less than two year old monitor too.

 

[TrainableMan]

If you don't have a weird virus then I would suspect hardware failure of some kind. Maybe a loose video cable.

Or, are you sure your power supply is adequate for your new GPU? I suggest you remove your separate video card and try just the on-board graphics to see if these new problems persist.

 

[Fhrblg]

As far as I know, I have no viruses. I think Avast constantly runs in the background and it doesn't pick up anything when I manually scan.

I wish I had onboard graphics. As is, I'm not sure my power supply is adequate enough for anything.

I haven't gotten a new video card yet, just the same old geforce 8800 that was a backup that came with the used computer stuff I got.

I don't want to assume, but since the nice video card I bought in Feb '11 died a couple months ago, and I've read that some of my problems have been linked to power supply failure, I'm really looking suspiciously at my power supply.

I've just been wanting to make sure, you know? I thought I had this all wrapped up months ago as a driver issue. Then I thought it was a RAM issue, Then a video card issue.

I'm still working on the drivers you recommended. The realtek one i tried started as one file and finished as another, a download link or something. I am having a hard time finding what driver to download that contains the file nvm62x64.sys. I still don't have a cdr for memtest. I may have to break down and waste a dvd on it.

 

[TrainableMan]

nvm62x64.sys should be an Nvidia network driver of some sort.

I don't know what to tell you about your computer parts. And as for power, if depends on the 8800: a GT supposedly needs 42watts while an Ultra running 3D graphics can pull 172Watts (Source). You will have to strip it down and test ... I guess starting with a cheap video card.

 

[Kougar]

Can you check what brand of PSU this is? If possible you might consider swapping it out and seeing if the artifacts and corruption goes away.

If a computer restarts itself without a BSoD then that's a sign of hardware or power failure. Windows by default has a setting that restarts the PC when a BSoD occurs though, so it is important to distinguish between the two.

Given what you have said regarding the graphics corruption, I would strongly suspect the video card is failing. The 8800 cards were hot cards that had solder bump quality problems, and given the age of the cards today it's not unusual for them to fail. I would strongly suggest borrowing a GPU if you don't have another one available to swap out with. It is still possible it could be a PSU problem though, hence why I ask the brand.

Let us know what the memtest86+ results are when you are able to run them!

 

[Fhrblg]

It is a 650 watt Cooler Master power supply.

I sometimes get the restart without a blue screen when it's starting back up after a blue screen has already happened. Sometimes it's in a sequence of three, like blue screen, blue screen, restart without blue screen.

I have literally no idea how much use this video card has gotten before I installed it. And yeah, it does run hot.

 

[Fhrblg]

This is like the third time I'm trying to make this post. I've had seriously like 20 blue screens in the last 40-45 minutes. With all that only 3 dumps got made of them, which I'm attaching.

I was trying to download some drivers, found my comp having recovered from a blue screen, then when I touched it it blue screened again, and then over and over and over and over again.

Everything's going crazy!

This is literally the worst streak of continuous blue screening I've ever seen it do. It included at least one restart without a blue screen, too. I don't know what started it.

 

[TrainableMan]

you should try running in safe mode and see if it still BSODs

2 of those 3 dumps are completely empty - other isn't helpful, just points to W7 kernal which is the catch-all

Did u ever run TDSSKiller, RKill, and an A/V scan in safe mode yet?

 

[Fhrblg]

Ok, my brother turned out to have memtest on his boot menu, so last night he installed my ram into his computer and ran it. After six passes, it found no problems.

I have updated Realtek and my mouse drivers, and am still looking into nvm62x64.sys. I still haven't figured out what driver download contains this file, and aren't sure about the sites that claim to have a download available of just that file. They're not really labeled as to how recent the version of the file is. Doing some more googling, I found that it has something to do with motherboards and something called n-force. I'm not sure if I have N-force instaled, and are not sure how to find that out, if it's not a conventional program.

I looked and have an ASUS m2n4 SLI motherboard. I'm not sure why I didn't look for and mention this earlier. I'm looking into getting my drivers current for it.

On the virus scanning issue, I've noticed that Avast has been consistently failing to update. It makes me wonder if I have a virus IN MY ANTIVIRUS?! Seriously though, I was suspicious like, months ago, about this, and even switched to avira for a while. I thought avira sucked, by the way, and returned to avast within a week. I may dump avast too for that windows one...

So now I need to look into these other things, TDSSkiller and RKill...

 

[TrainableMan]

I, and am still looking into nvm62x64.sys. I still haven't figured out what driver download contains this file, and aren't sure about the sites that claim to have a download available of just that file. They're not really labeled as to how recent the version of the file is. Doing some more googling, I found that it has something to do with motherboards and something called n-force. I'm not sure if I have N-force instaled, and are not sure how to find that out, if it's not a conventional program.

I would not download "just the file". Better to update the driver or uninstall it. Based on what you said it my be THIS but that is definitely designed for Vista so you may have the latest.

I looked and have an ASUS m2n4 SLI motherboard. I'm not sure why I didn't look for and mention this earlier. I'm looking into getting my drivers current for it.

Unfortunately your board was only supported through Vista so older drivers may be all they offer. You may have to use the Vista drivers HERE and may in fact be what you have running now. I don't KNOW it is a problem, it is just what you need to consider after BSODs.

On the virus scanning issue, I've noticed that Avast has been consistently failing to update. It makes me wonder if I have a virus IN MY ANTIVIRUS?! Seriously though, I was suspicious like, months ago, about this, and even switched to avira for a while. I thought avira sucked, by the way, and returned to avast within a week. I may dump avast too for that windows one...

So now I need to look into these other things, TDSSkiller and RKill...

It's not likely Avast or Avira are the virus but many viruses disable/limit your virus software

Links to TDSSKiller and RKill are available in our Freeware DB. These are not A/V programs they are designed to do specific things to help stop running rootkits and virus stealthing programs but you still need to run an A/V. If you want to try a different A/V consider the freeware version of Malwarebytes. It is a good passive system (only runs when you call it) and makes a good secondary defense. Just do not activate the free trial if you have Avast, etc running because the trial is active scanning and two active scanners can conflict or slow your system.

 

[Fhrblg]

I can't get the virus scan to finish.

At least four times today a virus scan was interrupted by a blue screen before it could finish. It makes no difference if I'm running in safe mode or not.

I used RKill and TDSSkiller. Neither have found any malicious processes or services or anything like that.

Not sure what to do when the antivirus gets interrupted every time I use it. Would that be a symptom of a bad power supply, possibly? Or some kind of crazy virus that tries to protect itself?

 

[TrainableMan]

To be honest, I don't think it's a virus if TDSSKiller & RKill found nothing.

Yes low voltage could cause BSODs but you would probably have to be running dual high-end GPUs to need more than 650W.

Have you tested your RAM? Maybe run Memtest86+

 

[Fhrblg]

A couple of days ago we ran memtest86 on the ram overnight for six passes and it found nothing.

 

[TrainableMan]

I don't know what else to tell you. Maybe post your latest DMPs to see if anything new is showing up.

 

[Fhrblg]

Though you guys have rules against swearing in the forums, I'm more than making up for it right now on my end.

I've tried seven times to upload the zip of dumps and it keeps showing an error 500, server malfunction.

I'll get them uploaded when I can.

So, it looks like we're running out of things to check, without any concrete answers. I was afraid of that. Let's maybe recap the facts about the case, as they say, to see if we can think of something we didn't before.

I know it's a problem that either I acquired after use of this computer for a year and a half OR it laid dormant for that amount of time.(Note: For a while, early this year, I had major problems with Skyrim crashing and blue screening. De-dusting the computer and updating Skyrim had wiped that out until the start of crashes en masse in June)
((I have cleaned the dust out of the computer regularly since the real problem started, I know it isn't still that))

I know that my once brand new video card died about four months into the problem.

I know it's not a problem with the ram.

I know that in the last two to three months, Firefox and Windows Explorer have become very prone to crashing.

I know that the problem causes a crash during EVERY deep virus scan, safe mode or otherwise. Same case pretty much for malware scans.

I know that just the act of restarting from a blue screen crash can cause more.

I know that while running a graphic-heavy game causes proportionately more crashes, (When I want to force one, I play Fallout 3((even on the lowest settings)) for about five minutes) the computer isn't safe from them even while idle.

I know that when I borrowed my brother's power supply for a few hours I only had one blue screen crash in that time, despite actively trying to crash it.

I know that the rootkit detectors you recommended didn't find anything.



Crap, man, I've got to figure something out before I go out get any new hardware. I don't want to get new stuff only to have it either not have been the problem or die like the last part. If I was one of those lucky so and so's with a disposable income, I could have dropped a few hundred bucks on this thing already with all my different guesses as to what's wrong with it.

Also, thanks, by the way, for sticking with helping me, unlike the last forum i tried where I got asked a couple questions and no responses to my answers.