BSOD with HD 6950 2GB

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Graphxproblems

Weaksauce
Joined
Nov 10, 2008
Messages
65
I have been getting random BSOD's for the past week or so on my system. I started using a Sapphire HD 6950 2GB in late December and it has given me no problems until just recently. I can have the computer on for several hours a day and it will run without any issues. Randomly, however, when I am on the internet, I get an error saying "Display driver stopped working and has recovered." A few seconds after that, the computer will lock up and I will get a BSOD that says it is dumping physical memory. There seems to be no way to predict when this will happen. Some days the computer is fine and others I get this error. I was running the 11.2 drivers, did a standard uninstall, and installed drivers 11.1 and the 11.1a hotfix. Everything seemed fine but the display driver stopped working again. It did not go to BSOD this time, but I think that may be because I closed out of internet explorer and restarted the computer, whereas the other times I would leave internet explorer up and then it would crash. I have no idea what else would be causing the problem at this point. Virus scans come up clean and the system is running at low temps. What else can I try to fix this problem? Thanks.

System specs:

Sapphire HD 6950 2GB
6GB DDR3 RAM
EVGA 790i Ultra SLI motherboard
Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
Intel Q9650 (stock 3.00 GHz)
700 Watt PSU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...Inc.-_-17174028&AID=10440897&PID=2754649&SID=
 
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eViL_M@LuM said:
Is your 6950 unlocked or flashed to 6970?
Click to expand...

No, it is not. None of the components in my system are overclocked either. Everything is at stock. I ran memtest86 and then furmark right after. Memtest86 detected no errors. I ran furmark for 30 minutes and the system was stable. The framerate was consistent. The gpu temperature rose to a peak of 83* when the furmark test was about 15% done, and remained at that temperature for the rest of the test. I have never had the computer BSOD when I've been playing games or benchmarking. Only when I am surfing the web does the display driver stop responding, and shortly after that the BSOD appears. I also think there has been a youtube video up each time this has happened (it has happened two times, the third time the display driver stopped but there was no BSOD). With the third occurrence, a youtube video was up but it was on an Internet Explorer tab that was not selected. Perhaps this is why the BSOD did not appear?
 
do you load the video after you have the driver recovery error? That could be a coincidence of the situation. I know as I test my cards limits and when I get the "driver has stopped responding" error, if I load up anything that uses video such as you tube, msn messenger, media player, etc.... it will BSOD. as for the BSOD itself what is the error reading. Usually it gives and error message. Mine is typically. Atixxx.sys file has stopped responding or something similar where I over-clocked to far. I understand you're not overclocking. However, it could be a heat related issue. Try running MSi afterburner with fan speed profiles, that way you can have the fan adjust with temps. My temps never get above 65C under load on my cards in Crossfire @ 950/1450 with unlocked shaders.
 
eViL_M@LuM said:
do you load the video after you have the driver recovery error? That could be a coincidence of the situation. I know as I test my cards limits and when I get the "driver has stopped responding" error, if I load up anything that uses video such as you tube, msn messenger, media player, etc.... it will BSOD. as for the BSOD itself what is the error reading. Usually it gives and error message. Mine is typically. Atixxx.sys file has stopped responding or something similar where I over-clocked to far. I understand you're not overclocking. However, it could be a heat related issue. Try running MSi afterburner with fan speed profiles, that way you can have the fan adjust with temps. My temps never get above 65C under load on my cards in Crossfire @ 950/1450 with unlocked shaders.
Click to expand...

I am downloading a tool so I can view the .dmp files. My system idles at 39*C or less and it's at that temperature that I have the display driver stops. I have never tried loading something else when the display driver stops working. Thanks for your replies, btw.
 
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The debugging tool pulled up a lot of text. I'm not sure how much of it is useful, but this seems to be the error identification:

VIDEO_TDR_FAILURE (116)
Attempt to reset the display driver and recover from timeout failed.
Arguments:
Arg1: fffffa8006a144e0, Optional pointer to internal TDR recovery context (TDR_RECOVERY_CONTEXT).
Arg2: fffff880045a63bc, The pointer into responsible device driver module (e.g. owner tag).
Arg3: 0000000000000000, Optional error code (NTSTATUS) of the last failed operation.
Arg4: 0000000000000002, Optional internal context dependent data.

FAULTING_IP:
atikmpag+73bc
fffff880`045a63bc 4883ec28 sub rsp,28h

DEFAULT_BUCKET_ID: GRAPHICS_DRIVER_TDR_FAULT

CUSTOMER_CRASH_COUNT: 1

BUGCHECK_STR: 0x116

PROCESS_NAME: System

CURRENT_IRQL: 0


FOLLOWUP_IP:
atikmpag+73bc
fffff880`045a63bc 4883ec28 sub rsp,28h

SYMBOL_NAME: atikmpag+73bc

FOLLOWUP_NAME: MachineOwner

MODULE_NAME: atikmpag

IMAGE_NAME: atikmpag.sys

DEBUG_FLR_IMAGE_TIMESTAMP: 4d409c8d

FAILURE_BUCKET_ID: X64_0x116_IMAGE_atikmpag.sys

BUCKET_ID: X64_0x116_IMAGE_atikmpag.sys

Followup: MachineOwner
 
uninstall your drivers like normal, then load into safe mode and run driver sweeper here and clean all the ati files out of your system. Then reinstall your drivers. Preferably a new version of them. Delete all the downloaded copies you have.
 
I followed all the steps you listed and installed the drivers off of the CD that came with the graphics card. Now I'll just have to wait for a few days to see if it works, as the problem would only come up once every 3 days or so. If this works I will move up to more recent drivers. The ones off the CD worked well when I first used them though, so I will test with these first, unless that doesn't make sense. Thanks for your help.
 
eViL_M@LuM said:
uninstall your drivers like normal, then load into safe mode and run driver sweeper here and clean all the ati files out of your system. Then reinstall your drivers. Preferably a new version of them. Delete all the downloaded copies you have.
Click to expand...

I managed to force the problem to happen by opening many youtube videos at once. Again it did not go to BSOD, but only displayed the Display driver stopped working warning. I closed out of IE but did not restart. I assume this must be an error with flash player, but I don't know what it is or how to fix it.

UPDATE: Right after making this post, I tried to open a video and the system immediately crashed, even though I waited quite a while after the Display driver stop error to attempt opening a youtube video. Flashplayer must be conflicting with the display driver somehow.
 
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If you have the system running for a long time, and have lots of youtube videos open, eventually you will run into this issue. Usually it's caused by running 3D load (i.e. a game) then returning to the desktop and then after a while using youtube again. Too many mode switches faults the driver in this way, I've seen it happen on a few occasions. I don't know if this bug was fixed in newer drivers, I'm still using 10.12a.
 
samuelmorris said:
If you have the system running for a long time, and have lots of youtube videos open, eventually you will run into this issue. Usually it's caused by running 3D load (i.e. a game) then returning to the desktop and then after a while using youtube again. Too many mode switches faults the driver in this way, I've seen it happen on a few occasions. I don't know if this bug was fixed in newer drivers, I'm still using 10.12a.
Click to expand...

I never encountered it before, though. I seem to have fixed it by reinstalling flash, however. I am on the 10.11 drivers, as they are the ones that were on the CD that came with this graphics card.
 
Hmm, I'll keep that in mind, it might be a problem with flash. Running faulty code through GPU processing has no crash protection as such yet. Opening certain types of corrupt files in a GPU-accelerated media player can cause a BSOD every time.
 
samuelmorris said:
Hmm, I'll keep that in mind, it might be a problem with flash. Running faulty code through GPU processing has no crash protection as such yet. Opening certain types of corrupt files in a GPU-accelerated media player can cause a BSOD every time.
Click to expand...

Well this is interesting. I wanted to test your assertion about the mode switching, so I ran Furmark for 60 seconds and then opened a bunch of videos. Nothing happened. I then opened some videos, ran Furmark with the videos still open, then after Furmark finished I opened even more videos and the system crashed to a BSOD. The only issue is that I have seen this problem on days where I haven't played any games at all. Hopefully I have fixed the issue of the BSOD just coming up without the mode switching involved. I almost never have a video up while playing a game, so I don't think it has been responsible for the BSODs I have experienced before this one. Also, do these crashes damage the computer?
 
crashes are to prevent damage to the computer due to either faulty software or faulty hardware.
 
Had the crash happen today. I played a game and then opened a bunch of videos to see what would happen and it crashed. What do you guys think is the limit for the number of videos that can be open before a crash will occur?
 
I had the same problem with my sons computer. I ended up reformatting with win 7 and only installing the display drivers. I also was told to disable the aero desktop and have switched to basic desktop. For some reason ,there is a problem with catalyst command center and win7 in some machines, "god knows why ??? but it was a huge headache for me. There is a page listed for the same problem here on hardforum and here is the link to the ati site. :::::::format, then I switched to basic desktop, then installed drivers only.

http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview.cfm?catid=260&threadid=120896
 
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