I'm at my wits end. I built a PC last Nov 2015, and have experienced one single error, over and over. No matter what game it is. The game will just crash. It might be 4 hours into a session or it could be 1. But the game just crashes, screen freezes on the game, and sometimes the audio goes weird, the PC loses functionality (can't open Task Manager, can't alt+tab), and I need to hold the power down for 5seconds and turn it back on again. The audio distortion has not happened recently.
Specs:
Intel Core i5 6600K
ASUS Z170 PRO Gaming Motherboard
EVGA 1070 SC
Corsair Vengeance LPX CMK16GX4M2A2400C14 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 Black
Crucial BX100 250GB 2.5in SSD (now replaced by a Samsung 850 PRO)
Western Digital WD Blue 1TB WD10EZEX
CoolerMaster G750M 750W Modular Bronze Power Supply
CoolerMaster Hyper 212X CPU Cooler
Phanteks Enthoo Pro Chassis Black
TP-Link TL-WDN3800 Wireless Dual Band PCIE Adapter
Games this has happened in (what I've played mostly):
Doom
BF1
FF14
Rocket League
Gears 4
Steps I've taken:
1. First occurrence - update all drivers. This lead to a W10 boot failure/BSOD. Reformatted. Updated all drivers. Updated MOBO BIOS.
2. Second attempt to fix (when it reappeared) - test RAM using memtest86. Tested each stick individually until it achieved 8 "Pass" marks - each stick achieved with 0 errors. Replaced the SSD (now using a Samsung 850 PRO 256GB). Fresh W10 install. Updated all drivers. Didn't update BIOS (BIOS version was too recent (Jan2017) so didn't want to risk it just yet). The error occurred again just now.
Notes:
1. The crash occurs whether I'm on OC or not. Right now I'm on a 4.4GHz OC, idle temps are 28-40 (Summer here), usage temps while gaming 50-70. It never crashes through normal use (web browsing, doc editing).
2. It has never BSOD or just completely shut down to a black screen/off.
3. Event viewer never shows anything other than "the system was unexpectedly shut down" which happens after I hold the power button down for 5s.
4. The freezing issue still appeared when I was on my old GPU, a 7850 OC Radeon card (2gb, Gigabyte).
Thoughts:
1. Is the OC too high? I ran stress tests for the OC for 8-10 hours and it didn't crash/overheat. It just sat at around 70-78c.
2. Is the motherboard broken? I don't know how to diagnose that without trying a new motherboard. Surely it's not this?
3. Is the PSU faulty? From what I've searched, this is what I think it is - it just randomly loses power for a split second and everything dies.
If anybody has any insight, please let me know. I'm so desperate to fix this - the solution surely can't be to throw money at it (replace PSU) until it's fixed.
Thanks.
UPDATE 1 20170114
I've just completed a 7.5 hour CPU test in prime95 28.10 - blend, 4 threads.
No OC. Default BIOS settings. XMP off. RAM XMP off.
No tests were failed. No freezing. Temps ran from 48 - 68 on average with a few peaks at 73.
I think this safely rules out the CPU as being the problem. CPU = OK.
Next step is to test the GPU using Unigine Heaven. I'll be doing this tomorrow.
UPDATE 2 20170115
New PSU is installed. The journey so far...
Tried:
Turning off CPU OC - crashed when gaming.
Swapping SATA ports around with SSD/HDD - crashed when gaming.
8 hour prime95 28.10 stress test; no errors found
1 hour Unigine Heaven stress test; crashed, took the PC with it
4 hour Unigine Heaven stress test; crashed, didn't crash the PC
Turning off Geforce Experience - crashed when gaming
Haven't tried:
Testing DRAM
LatencyMon (should have done this sooner, sorry LilJokka)
Let's see what happens with the new PSU..
Specs:
Intel Core i5 6600K
ASUS Z170 PRO Gaming Motherboard
EVGA 1070 SC
Corsair Vengeance LPX CMK16GX4M2A2400C14 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 Black
Crucial BX100 250GB 2.5in SSD (now replaced by a Samsung 850 PRO)
Western Digital WD Blue 1TB WD10EZEX
CoolerMaster G750M 750W Modular Bronze Power Supply
CoolerMaster Hyper 212X CPU Cooler
Phanteks Enthoo Pro Chassis Black
TP-Link TL-WDN3800 Wireless Dual Band PCIE Adapter
Games this has happened in (what I've played mostly):
Doom
BF1
FF14
Rocket League
Gears 4
Steps I've taken:
1. First occurrence - update all drivers. This lead to a W10 boot failure/BSOD. Reformatted. Updated all drivers. Updated MOBO BIOS.
2. Second attempt to fix (when it reappeared) - test RAM using memtest86. Tested each stick individually until it achieved 8 "Pass" marks - each stick achieved with 0 errors. Replaced the SSD (now using a Samsung 850 PRO 256GB). Fresh W10 install. Updated all drivers. Didn't update BIOS (BIOS version was too recent (Jan2017) so didn't want to risk it just yet). The error occurred again just now.
Notes:
1. The crash occurs whether I'm on OC or not. Right now I'm on a 4.4GHz OC, idle temps are 28-40 (Summer here), usage temps while gaming 50-70. It never crashes through normal use (web browsing, doc editing).
2. It has never BSOD or just completely shut down to a black screen/off.
3. Event viewer never shows anything other than "the system was unexpectedly shut down" which happens after I hold the power button down for 5s.
4. The freezing issue still appeared when I was on my old GPU, a 7850 OC Radeon card (2gb, Gigabyte).
Thoughts:
1. Is the OC too high? I ran stress tests for the OC for 8-10 hours and it didn't crash/overheat. It just sat at around 70-78c.
2. Is the motherboard broken? I don't know how to diagnose that without trying a new motherboard. Surely it's not this?
3. Is the PSU faulty? From what I've searched, this is what I think it is - it just randomly loses power for a split second and everything dies.
If anybody has any insight, please let me know. I'm so desperate to fix this - the solution surely can't be to throw money at it (replace PSU) until it's fixed.
Thanks.
UPDATE 1 20170114
I've just completed a 7.5 hour CPU test in prime95 28.10 - blend, 4 threads.
No OC. Default BIOS settings. XMP off. RAM XMP off.
No tests were failed. No freezing. Temps ran from 48 - 68 on average with a few peaks at 73.
I think this safely rules out the CPU as being the problem. CPU = OK.
Next step is to test the GPU using Unigine Heaven. I'll be doing this tomorrow.
UPDATE 2 20170115
New PSU is installed. The journey so far...
Tried:
Turning off CPU OC - crashed when gaming.
Swapping SATA ports around with SSD/HDD - crashed when gaming.
8 hour prime95 28.10 stress test; no errors found
1 hour Unigine Heaven stress test; crashed, took the PC with it
4 hour Unigine Heaven stress test; crashed, didn't crash the PC
Turning off Geforce Experience - crashed when gaming
Haven't tried:
Testing DRAM
LatencyMon (should have done this sooner, sorry LilJokka)
Let's see what happens with the new PSU..