TMI Posted March 10, 2011 Share Posted March 10, 2011 I started experiencing some problems this morning I could use help diagnosing…While browsing the internet, my M17x-R2 suddenly rebooted itself. No shutdown notice, no BSOD… the screen just went blank and I was rebooting. Shortly after getting into Windows, a BSOD appeared with an IRQL_not_less_or_equal message. This happened repeatedly after several reboot attempts, each time within seconds of seeing my desktop.This seemed like a potential memory issue, so I ran the Windows memory diagnostics and hardware problems were detected. At this point, I decided to reboot once more just for kicks, and experienced another BSOD, this time with the message APC_index_mismatch. Fantastic. So I took out my 8GB of OCZ RAM and reinstalled the stock 4GB of RAM from Dell, ran the memory diagnostics once more in safe mode, and everything checked out.Now, I rebooted normally again, the Windows welcome screen appeared and started flashing on and off. The screen continued to flash the welcome screen and never booted to the desktop. After this happened several times, I decided to uninstall my ATI drivers (11.2), thinking they might somehow be corrupt. Afterwards, the same problem continued until I had to go to work, just at a lower resolution…Before I do an OS reinstall, has anyone seen this before, or have a potential diagnosis? I haven’t made any recent hardware changes, but did install Rivatuner a couple weeks ago and performed some relatively minor OC’ing (775/1100). I uninstalled Rivatuner as well, thinking that may be the culprit, but continued to get “stuck” at the flashing welcome screen.Also, I did attempt to repair Windows, but no problems were found.Any guidance would be much appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mw86 Posted March 10, 2011 Share Posted March 10, 2011 (edited) First out of anything start windows in startup repair with F8 choose it from the list and see if that will repair the boot problem. If not I would get a dump from those crashes and analyze it with Dells diagnostic tool for BSOD memory dumps. See what file the errors on could be driver issue. Drop all your over-clocks back and try the repair again possibly after typing "chkdsk /r /f" into command prompt when booted from Windows & DVD. By the way if you go to recovery console on Windows 7 DVD and you can get to command prompt type "c:/" and enter to change to C: drive then "sfc /h" this will list commands for System File Checker. Set a scan up that points to your offline windows directory and offline boot directory thats listed like but fill in whats true for your computer. You'll see the commands listed type SFC/ offlinebootdir=c:\ offlinewindir=c:\this is wrong but it will look similar. This helped me once. Please if anyone else here knows a couple of windows repairs please add help with this response. By the way if you can get into windows successfully you can perform an in place upgrade by going to upgrade on the windows 7 DVD when you are booted in windows and start the dvd. Also called a repair install> Some drivers get reset and desktop preferences but you will keep your programs and data intact. Edited March 10, 2011 by mw86 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TMI Posted March 10, 2011 Author Share Posted March 10, 2011 Thanks for the suggestions mw86. I did try the startup repair approach earlier, and no issues were found, but I'll give your other ideas a shot tonight after work.I really appreciate the tips. I'm very puzzled as to why BSOD's caused by an apparent memory hardware issue transitioned into a boot problem after re-installing "good" memory. Here's hoping one of your suggestions is the fix I need... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder Brian Posted March 10, 2011 Founder Share Posted March 10, 2011 TMI,If you started experiencing lockups and BSODs after installing Rivatuner for overclocking, it may be because you did not set EnableULPS 1 to 0 in the registry. Or if you did, you could have missed an entry and it caused a BSOD on reboot. I know that happened to me in the past. Try booting into safemode, go to Start and type "msconfig" and in the startup tab, disable the Rivatuner Wrapper service. If that isn't the case, then it could be that the aftermarket ram you required needs more voltage which is something you could try. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TMI Posted March 10, 2011 Author Share Posted March 10, 2011 TMI,If you started experiencing lockups and BSODs after installing Rivatuner for overclocking, it may be because you did not set EnableULPS 1 to 0 in the registry. Or if you did, you could have missed an entry and it caused a BSOD on reboot. I know that happened to me in the past. Try booting into safemode, go to Start and type "msconfig" and in the startup tab, disable the Rivatuner Wrapper service. If that isn't the case, then it could be that the aftermarket ram you required needs more voltage which is something you could try.The aftermarket RAM was performing well for 2 months or so, and then I swapped it out this morning after the diagnostic found hardware errors, so I was kind of expecting all would be well after re-installing the Dell RAM. Since issues persisted, now I'm thinking this has something to do with Rivatuner (as well?), so I'll be sure to check those registry settings.I didn't recall seeing posts about Rivatuner causing issues like these for other R2 owners, so it's good to know about your BSOD.I just want to get home and try out these suggestions. It's very unsettling knowing something is amiss. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder Michael Posted March 10, 2011 Founder Share Posted March 10, 2011 One more thing you could try is the 'last known good config' from the f8 menu. I know it helped me a couple of times in the past. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TMI Posted March 11, 2011 Author Share Posted March 11, 2011 Thanks for the ideas guys, but I've tried them all (and a few others) without success. I'm still getting stuck at the flashing Windows welcome screen and can't figure out why for the life of me.I'm going to go start a complete re-install of the OS...mw86 - I didn't realize 'repair installs' were an option until today. Awesome tip. I decided to start from scratch since I won't be losing too much data. Just kind of a pain in the *** ;-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder Michael Posted March 11, 2011 Founder Share Posted March 11, 2011 Good luck! Report back with results Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TMI Posted March 11, 2011 Author Share Posted March 11, 2011 The OS reinstall worked (at least so far...). I suspect registry/driver issues were created by the repeat BSOD's I was experiencing, but I'll never really know. I do know I've got some bad aftermarket RAM after only two months of use though, so it's time to get a return started. Hopefully my problems are fixed, and thanks to all who posted - +1 karma to all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder Michael Posted March 11, 2011 Founder Share Posted March 11, 2011 The OS reinstall worked (at least so far...). I suspect registry/driver issues were created by the repeat BSOD's I was experiencing, but I'll never really know.I do know I've got some bad aftermarket RAM after only two months of use though, so it's time to get a return started. Hopefully my problems are fixed, and thanks to all who posted - +1 karma to all! Great! Glad to hear you solved it. I was afraid it was a hardware issue tbh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder StamatisX Posted March 11, 2011 Founder Share Posted March 11, 2011 The OS reinstall worked (at least so far...). I suspect registry/driver issues were created by the repeat BSOD's I was experiencing, but I'll never really know.I do know I've got some bad aftermarket RAM after only two months of use though, so it's time to get a return started. Hopefully my problems are fixed, and thanks to all who posted - +1 karma to all! You should try the Kingston ones, I literally abuse them with OCing and after a year they are still holding strong, glad that you are back online with the OS. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TMI Posted March 11, 2011 Author Share Posted March 11, 2011 You should try the Kingston ones, I literally abuse them with OCing and after a year they are still holding strong, glad that you are back online with the OS. I read about reliability issues with the OCZ RAM I installed AFTER I ordered it, but figured all RAM experiences failures from time-to-time and hoped for the best. Now after this experience, I'll be looking at other brands. The RAM was fine until I started OC'ing more, which may be more than a coincidence. Kingston HyperX seems to get a good amount of support, so I will probably try that next if the price is right. I'd like to dish out more than a couple weeks of abuse 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mw86 Posted July 4, 2011 Share Posted July 4, 2011 @TMI how are the Kingston memory modules treating you, you've added them to your sig. Are they overlooking to your liking or are you running them stock? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AssimilatorX Posted July 7, 2011 Share Posted July 7, 2011 I using G.Skill long time ago never had trouble. BSOD i had twice since i installed 920XM ES ,problem caused by the motion sensor...i not installing it anymore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TMI Posted July 9, 2011 Author Share Posted July 9, 2011 @TMI how are the Kingston memory modules treating you, you've added them to your sig. Are they overlooking to your liking or are you running them stock?To be honest, I haven't been benching much lately, but my system has been very stable with the HyperX, 5% BIOS OC and occasional Throttlestop use. I bought the same memory you have in your sig in case I upgrade to the M18x down the road. No plans to do that just yet though... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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