Blue screen while gaming - Have a look please.

[KennyBerg]

Hello, I found this forum while googling for my problem with no look.

I recently upgraded from Windows XP Professional 64 to Windows Vista Ultimate 64 - and I love Vista!

What kills the whole experience is that I can't play my favorite game (Grand Theft Auto IV) cause it ALWAYS get a BSOD within 20 minutes of playing. I don't think i Have a hardware problem as everything worked just fine in XP. The BSODs came the same day as I installed Vista, but only in GTA IV. See BSOD message and screenshot below.

I don't know if this is a problem isolated to GTA IV, but it's the only time I've seen it happen. I've played World of Warcraft and Left 4 Dead for hours without any hangups at all.

The error code:
0x00000101(0x0000000000000061.0x0000000000000000.0xFFFFFA60005Ec180.0x0000000000000001)

Computer specs: (Nothing is overclocked.
CPU; AMD X2 6000+ 3.0 GHz
Graphics; 8800GTS 320 MB
RAM; 6 GB pc6400 800MHz (2x1GB + 2x2GB, both matched and in dual-channel)
MB; MSI K9N Platinum SLI
HDD; Western digital 500 GB
Sound; Realtek High Definition Audio

Any help at all will be greatly appriciated!

BSOD:

 

[Dzomlija]

Hello, I found this forum while googling for my problem with no look.

I recently upgraded from Windows XP Professional 64 to Windows Vista Ultimate 64 - and I love Vista!

What kills the whole experience is that I can't play my favorite game (Grand Theft Auto IV) cause it ALWAYS get a BSOD within 20 minutes of playing. I don't think i Have a hardware problem as everything worked just fine in XP. The BSODs came the same day as I installed Vista, but only in GTA IV. See BSOD message and screenshot below.

I don't know if this is a problem isolated to GTA IV, but it's the only time I've seen it happen. I've played World of Warcraft and Left 4 Dead for hours without any hangups at all.

The error code:
0x00000101(0x0000000000000061.0x0000000000000000.0xFFFFFA60005Ec180.0x0000000000000001)

Computer specs: (Nothing is overclocked.
CPU; AMD X2 6000+ 3.0 GHz
Graphics; 8800GTS 320 MB
RAM; 6 GB pc6400 800MHz (2x1GB + 2x2GB, both matched and in dual-channel)
MB; MSI K9N Platinum SLI
HDD; Western digital 500 GB
Sound; Realtek High Definition Audio

Any help at all will be greatly appriciated!

BSOD:

From Microsoft:

Bug Check 0x101: CLOCK_WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT
The CLOCK_WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT bug check has a value of 0x00000101. This indicates that an expected clock interrupt on a secondary processor, in a multi-processor system, was not received within the allocated interval.

Parameters
The following parameters are displayed on the blue screen.

1 - Clock interrupt time-out interval, in nominal clock ticks
2 - 0
3 - The address of the processor control block (PRCB) for the unresponsive processor
4 - 0

Cause
The specified processor is not processing interrupts. Typically, this occurs when the processor is nonresponsive or is deadlocked.

From that, I'd conclude that your processor is busy dying. It may just be pure luck that this error happens only when playing GTA4 because the game may be using features of the CPU that no other programs are.

Do you have the latest non-beta Vista x64 (not XP x64) drivers installed for your motherboard and the CPU?

 

[MrNeeds]

Hello, I found this forum while googling for my problem with no look.

I recently upgraded from Windows XP Professional 64 to Windows Vista Ultimate 64 - and I love Vista!

What kills the whole experience is that I can't play my favorite game (Grand Theft Auto IV) cause it ALWAYS get a BSOD within 20 minutes of playing. I don't think i Have a hardware problem as everything worked just fine in XP. The BSODs came the same day as I installed Vista, but only in GTA IV. See BSOD message and screenshot below.

I don't know if this is a problem isolated to GTA IV, but it's the only time I've seen it happen. I've played World of Warcraft and Left 4 Dead for hours without any hangups at all.

The error code:
0x00000101(0x0000000000000061.0x0000000000000000.0xFFFFFA60005Ec180.0x0000000000000001)

Computer specs: (Nothing is overclocked.
CPU; AMD X2 6000+ 3.0 GHz
Graphics; 8800GTS 320 MB
RAM; 6 GB pc6400 800MHz (2x1GB + 2x2GB, both matched and in dual-channel)
MB; MSI K9N Platinum SLI
HDD; Western digital 500 GB
Sound; Realtek High Definition Audio

Any help at all will be greatly appriciated!

BSOD:

From Microsoft:

Bug Check 0x101: CLOCK_WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT
The CLOCK_WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT bug check has a value of 0x00000101. This indicates that an expected clock interrupt on a secondary processor, in a multi-processor system, was not received within the allocated interval.

Parameters
The following parameters are displayed on the blue screen.

1 - Clock interrupt time-out interval, in nominal clock ticks
2 - 0
3 - The address of the processor control block (PRCB) for the unresponsive processor
4 - 0

Cause
The specified processor is not processing interrupts. Typically, this occurs when the processor is nonresponsive or is deadlocked.

From that, I'd conclude that your processor is busy dying. It may just be pure luck that this error happens only when playing GTA4 because the game may be using features of the CPU that no other programs are.

Do you have the latest non-beta Vista x64 (not XP x64) drivers installed for your motherboard and the CPU?

hmm ive done some research and apparently the issue can be put down to amds cores drifting out of sync with each other, AMD have released a program to combat this called TSC (time stamp counter) which keeps the cores in sync with each other in dual core and quad core optimized systems during gaming. here is a link http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/content_type/utilities/TscSync.zip

 

[KennyBerg]

Thanks for the replies guys.

Dzomlija - Woulnd't I have noticed that my CPU was dying in XP too? Everything was working perfectly in XP Pro 64; no crashes, no BSOD, no nothing.

MrNeeds - thanks I'll check that out!


About drivers and Vista.. I was surprised to see that all motherboard drivers had installed themselves when I booted Vista for the first time. I checked with a driver tool and it said theyr were all up to date.

Can vista install drivers automaticly or have I dont something wrong?

 

[SCSIraidGURU]

I would start by checking the heatsinks on the CPU for problems. It could be overheating. Try cleaning out all the heatsinks and GPU fans. Check to see if your motherboard has a BIOS fix the includes CPU erratas to fix issues. Check your power supply for issues. A flaky power supply or something sharing on its circuit can cause power issues. Considering its only one game after 20 minutes of play, I doubt the CPU is going bad. You could get diagnostics software.

 

[patio]

What driver tool was used ? ?

 

[KennyBerg]

Update:

I cleaned my computer from dust and istalled the TCM dual core optimizer - I ran GTA IV and got the BSOD again after ~40 minutes of online multiplayer gaming.

I used the free version of Driver Detective to scan my drivers. It showed all as up-to-date.

Thanks for all the help so far!

EDIT: I ran a system stability tool in the Nvidia Control Panel for an hour too see if it could produce the same or an other BSOD. But it came out with no problems at all.

 

[Dzomlija]

Thanks for the replies guys.

Dzomlija - Woulnd't I have noticed that my CPU was dying in XP too? Everything was working perfectly in XP Pro 64; no crashes, no BSOD, no nothing.

MrNeeds - thanks I'll check that out!


About drivers and Vista.. I was surprised to see that all motherboard drivers had installed themselves when I booted Vista for the first time. I checked with a driver tool and it said theyr were all up to date.

Can vista install drivers automaticly or have I dont something wrong?

Vista does have an extensive driver database, but it still wouldn't hurt to go to the motherboard manufacturers website to download others.

Unless the "Driver Check" tool actually comes from any respective manufacturer, I do not fully trust any tool that claims to check my drivers. I always do so manually.

 

[KennyBerg]

I have now checked with the manufactures websites for driver updates and everything is up to date.

Is there any other helpful information I can get in any logs or so on my computer or so? I'm not very good at things like this.

 

[Figgy]

Lets just face it, Rockstar games suck. GTA3 worked just fine but since San Andreas the games has been totally worthless (speaking of compatibility). This is what you get when the priority goes to consoles. Even the thought of games for consoles are stupid. Computers has the better technology and is so much better in anyway. Even the hand-held controls are stupid...

Until the developers starts putting the priority on PC's, games will always have problem running.

I'm on the same mainboard (MSI K9 570 SLI), GTX 260, AMD 6400+. I can run any game without the slightest problem. But when it comes to rockstar games, my computer crashes. GTA IV shouldn't even require that much performance... It doesn't look that very good, the textures has bad quality, for a DX10 game the overall experiance is very low and I can't stand that when trying to turnaround quickly the character makes a ****ing 10meter radius turn getting stuck in some corner or behind a lightpole...

I'll update my mainboard next to see if that'll fix the problem. But I doubt it.

 

[KennyBerg]

I was hoping this was a problem caused by the bad GTA port as you say, but now I got two new blue screens while playing World of Warcraft.

Name: IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL
Stop code: 0x0000000A

First:
(0x0000000107E25D06,0x000000000000000C,0x0000000000000001,0xFFFFF80001CA1397)

Second:
(0x0000000107DC196,0x000000000000000C,0x0000000000000001,0xFFFFF80001C68397)

I got these two blue screens during a 3 hour session of WoW. Can they be connected to the other bluescreen in GTA?

It looks like I have to leave wonderful Vista if a miracle don't happen

I appriciate all the help!

Sorry for the low quality pictures.

 

[Klaudius]

Untill you figure this out driver wise you could just do the following to make it run on only one core , ( this shouldent make a difference because games speed is mostly video anyway, well at least until you start using massive amounts of AI)
1) run GTA
2) hit ctr+alt+ delete
3) go into task manager
4) right click on GTA and select go to process
5) right click on the process and select set affinity
6) uncheck all cores but one
7) click on ok
8) close task manager,

Now your game will only run on one processor, the downside is, everytime you shut down the game I think it looses that setting, I havent looked to deep into it, there may be a way to permanantly set affinity but i doubt it.

 

[KennyBerg]

Untill you figure this out driver wise you could just do the following to make it run on only one core , ( this shouldent make a difference because games speed is mostly video anyway, well at least until you start using massive amounts of AI)
1) run GTA
2) hit ctr+alt+ delete
3) go into task manager
4) right click on GTA and select go to process
5) right click on the process and select set affinity
6) uncheck all cores but one
7) click on ok
8) close task manager,

Now your game will only run on one processor, the downside is, everytime you shut down the game I think it looses that setting, I havent looked to deep into it, there may be a way to permanantly set affinity but i doubt it.

Hey, thanks for the tip. I don't know about you but I get very, very low frame rates when I disable one CPU core. It's unplayable

 

[Figgy]

Thats because you only use half of cpu performance... This solution is not for games...

 

[KennyBerg]

Thats because you only use half of cpu performance... This solution is not for games...

Yes of course. Maybe I misunderstood what he said - I thought he wanted me to play with one core only.

 

[Klaudius]

Yes I do mean play with one core only,
It shouldn't really slow down the game that much if at all, especially with your video card.
Like I said, the processor doesn't do much other than AI and physics, and if you have a physics card it doesn't even do that.
Besides, this is just a solution to get the game up and running till you get a cpu solution from either your vendor or AMD, just trying to help.

The solution I gave you does NOT shut off the other core, it just makes it so the game runs on one core, the OS will still use both cores, as well as every other process, that's why this solution works pretty well.

DO NOT shut off dual core in the bios, that will really slow down your machine because now all processes have to time slice instead of getting to use both cores.

Just try the instructions I gave you earlier and tell me if it still crashes.

 

[KennyBerg]

Okay so I didn't misunderstand. Sorry if I sounded rude - I appriciate your help Klaudius.

I followed your instructions and played for 45 min with a FPS of 1-10 in 1680x1050 resolution and all settings on lowest. I tried to increase my FPS by changing res to 800x600 but it made no big differance.

I only get playable FPS when I'm in a building or a tunnel where there are no big buildings etc to load.

I've heard GTA IV is a CPU-intense game,, maybe it doesn't work here?

I will do more testing tomorrow (it's getting late here in Sweden).

Thanks, KennyBerg.

 

[Klaudius]

Ok now that you have the game not crashing, you have to work on the speed of the game.

2) things to try.

1) you have 6 gigs of ram, but you might wanna take out the 2 one gig sticks, and run 4 gigs, or get 2 more 2gigs and run 8. (6 is a really bad idea)
The reason why is, Dual channel means all the channels have to be the same size of ram. I know you would think that 2 1 gigs and 2 2 gigs in separate slots would be ok, but thats usually not the case. Each processor Is going to need the same ram size.
If your manual says you can run 2 one gigs and 2 2gigs ok, but it most likely doesnt, and this will cause blue screens and crashes.

I would remove the two 1 gig sticks, and retry GTA and see if it crashes without resetting the affinity.

2) Im guessing you already did this.
Did you update the video driver ? The one that comes with vista as the basic driver is really slow, and from 10/25/07 there is a new one but even it is slow as hell.

 

[KennyBerg]

Hi again.

1) I read my manual and didn't find any specific about matching up diffrent sized sticks.

- In dual-channel mode, make sure that you install memory modules of the
same type and density in different channel DDR DIMMs.

If I understand correctly the density has nothing to do with the ammount of memory in the stick? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

What I was thinking though - woulnd't I get the same problem in Windows XP Pro 64 as I get in Vista? I ran XP just fine with 6GB of RAM. And if you are right and there is a conflict of some sort between the CPU and RAM - is it possible to disable Dual-Channeling? Can it damage my system, and will it affect performance a lot if it's possible? Will it help?

2) All my drivers are up-to-date.

I'm sorry for bitching this same topic for days. It's just that I'm a real 'n00b' when it comes to this and I really have a hard time understanding a lot of information that I find on Google and other forums.

Thanks again, Kenny Berg.

 

[Klaudius]

Its no problem, and heck I may be wrong, but when dual channeling came out, you had to have all slots of the same size ram or you ran into problems

Its kind of like this,
Imagine you have 4 cups

| | | |
| | | | | | | |

the first two cups are 2 gig chips the second 2 are 1 gig chips.
the first 2 cups are for processor 1 and the second 2 are processor 2
The memory gets written across evenly across the cups and the processors.
when you get to 4 gigs of used memory everything is ok.
Once you use anymore than 4 gigs of memory, the last two cups have to switch to paged memory on your hard disk, while the first two cups are using actual memory.

since memory runs in nano second speeds, and hard drives run in milli second speeds. you have a huge diffrence between data movement to the processors.
This used to cause a CRASH< BSD.
Thats why all Intel boards would have memory configurations like below
memory channel 1 2 3 4
size of memory 1g = 1g total
1g 1g = 2g total
1g 1g 1g 1g = 4g total
2g 2g = 4g total
2g 2g 2g 2g = 8 gig total
all memory banks had to be filled with the same size memory or you can end up with crashes.

If you NEVER go over 4gb in this situation it most likely wont happen.
GTA may require more than 4 gb of ram, so bam , your cup runnith over, and bluescreens you.

Again this is the way it used to work, heck maybe im wrong and the way dual channeling used to work is changed.

But just to be safe, run with 4gb of ram, and try it. Maybe it works, ?
heck if not, jsut get 4more gigs of ram, why not run with 8 x64 can handle it unlike x32