Black screen crashes - think it's PSU?

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
F

formulafox

Honorable
Feb 23, 2018
76
1
10,535
Hello, everyone, sorry to have to bother you with my troubles, but back in August 2012 I bought a prebuilt system from HP, the H8-1230 - specs here: https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c03360575

I've not been running it in stock condition. I replaced the PSU with this: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16817182066
Replaced the GPU with a Sapphire Nitro Radeon R9 380
Replaced the stock CPU cooler with a Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO
installed a 240GB SSD
And upgraded to Windows 10

Over the past couple of months I have occasionally the computer crash to a black screen. The event viewer records no errors, and the events recorded leading up to the crashes are never the same. After the most recent crash, Windows 10's Start Menu had reverted to it's default layout(no other settings changed, no programs disappeared).

I've been looking up a lot of information, including past threads on these very forums, and what I've read is leading me to think it's the PSU(and I hope it is - I can actually afford to replace that immediately) as the crashes have never happened while the GPU and CPU are under any real load. Most of them happen while I'm just doing something as simple as browsing the internet, and it's even happened while the computer is sitting and doing nothing while I'm at work.

The reason I'm posting in spite of what the information is leading me to think is because of one aspect of this that it's never clear is the case in previous threads; The system is still ON after these crashes, even ones that took place hours before I got home and found it, and I was under the impression that PSU failures cause the system to turn off.

So I was wondering if I'm thinking along the correct lines for this? Can this still be the PSU or should I be looking at something else? All my drivers and software, etc are up to date.
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
While it could technically be psu, with that description, if this is hardware at all, I'd think memory before anything else. Run windows memory check and also memtest, 8 passes minimum and see how it goes.
But I would actually think this might be a windows issue as well. Just to be safe, check your drive first by opening command prompt (with admin privileges) and typinc chkdsk /r
Then try doing this in command prompt:
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/insider/forum/insider_wintp-insider_install/how-to-repair-your-system-files-using-dism-and-sfc/1021b42a-09ff-41a0-a95a-48f3ee3ae699
If it all comes out ok, then do the memory checks.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
okcnaline:

Nothing. There's no indication of something going wrong until it goes. If there's audio playing it right as the screen goes black it'll glitch out by looping about 1/4 second of the audio repeatedly for about five seconds before it goes quiet. After that, nothing can be done except to hold down the power button until the computer shuts off.

Sedivy:

I'll run that stuff and get back to you.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Sedivy: All recommended tests came back clean. Repair tests in linked thread, nothing. Memtest, nothing. Windows memory diagnostic, nothing. Chkdsk read-only, nothing. Full chkdsk on reboot, nothing.

So looks like it's not memory, system, or SSD.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
/scannow also came back clean? That's less good. It could still be software but less likely to be so. Live ubuntu usb would be a way to confirm with a degree of certainty: https://tutorials.ubuntu.com/tutorial/tutorial-create-a-usb-stick-on-ubuntu#0
You can test your hardware while in ubuntu, like so: https://www.addictivetips.com/windows-tips/benchmark-pc-hardware-to-diagnose-system-issues-with-ubuntu-live-disk/

Or if you don't want to mess around with ubuntu, you can try it in windows as well. You could try using http://www.ocbase.com/index.php/software/20-occt which does have gpu, cpu and combination (for psu) stress test built in to see if you can isolate which piece of hardware is the issue.
If neither of them can trigger the crash reproducibly, it leaves you with swapping components in/out until it stops happening. You need either another computer with compatible hardware for this, or a repair shop.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Do not do overnight tests or anything like that. If there is something seriously wrong with a component, I expect a crash in an hour and often in much shorter time (15 min or so) than even that. That program does allow you to set cutoff temp, so make sure you do, so it doesn't go into 90s in temp. I'd even go for a conservative 85C cutoff.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I have always aimed to keep my temperatures below 70. I've never come close to that on CPU or GPU since installing the new cooler and the current GPU - not even when playing a graphics hog like Fallout 4. 70C is what I've often seen listed as the max you want an AMD 6100 to hit.

Based on your advice and how I've managed this system, I'm thinking 30 minute tests with a 70C cutoff for the CPU tests and 85C for the GPU. Sound good?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
70C is a bit low for a stress test for a cpu. Keep in mind no game will come close to a torture stress test that these put cpus through in order to try and trigger a crash. You will likely get into 80s so by setting it to 70C, the test will just prematurely shut down and not tell you much.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
At this point I'd be updating all your hardware drivers but...hp's site is uncooperative as it gives you 0 downloads or drivers and forces you to use hp support assistant which I obviously can't. Can you open it up and check that all your drivers are up to date? Are you on latest bios?
Other than that you're left with swapping components with a similar computer, until it stops happening, in order to isolate it that way. You could start with your old gpu if you still have it. If you swap it back in, do the issues stop happening?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Ah. Hm not sure what to tell you then. You could try ubuntu live in hope it might still be a software issue but otherwise what's left are drivers and component swapping. If you can't find anyone with compatible hardware, take it into repair shop, they'll have components they'll be able to swap in and test for you.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
A new crash has allowed me to possibly rule out GPU, may have indicated the possible cause, and further research has turned up a possible contributing factor.

GPU ruled out? - When the screen went black this time, I booted up my tablet and loaded up Plex Media Server to try and access my media folder. Plex could not see the computer on the network, indicating the entire system had crashed. As I understand things, this points AWAY from GPU, as if the GPU is going, shouldn't it just be the screen going dead while the system is still running in the background?

Possible cause? - After my reboot, I checked the Event Viewer and saw that the last entry before the data gap, entered right about when the crash occurred, were notes of the mbamservice (MalwareBytes Anti-Malware) having updated. I recall these to be the last entry in the log prior to the data gap in the previous crash as well(not sure about ones before that).

Contributing factor? - In further research I stumbled across people having trouble with AMD Overdrive causing black screen crashes when overclocking. Now, I use AMD Overdrive to UNDERCLOCK my CPU in a way - specifically, I use it to turn OFF the CPU's built-in boost function (base clock speed of 3.5GHz, boosts to 4.1 when needed) for longevity, as at the time I was hoping to initially carry over the CPU to a new build so I could upgrade slowly(and I've yet to come across a game I'm interested in where the boost was needed, particularly after my GPU upgrade), but the AM4 socket being not backwards compatible has torpedoed that plan. After this last crash, I'm leaving the boost function ON to see if that makes a difference.

Am I right about the GPU, and would it make sense for the other two things to possibly be an issue?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Blackscreens with continued audio are a gpu failure, not a psu failure. As far as the psu goes, the gpu either has enough power to work, or not. Those cards alone average 200-260w draw, 95w cpu (stock) anywhere upto @100w for the mobo and drives. Tight for a mediocre 450w Capstone G under heavy load conditions. But doable.

It's almost always 1 of 2 things cause blackscreens. Overheated vram/VRM's, driver conflicts. Gpu temps are next to useless as that's the processor which has a temp sensor, not the vram/VRM's which does not. Make sure that the heatsink is clean and the fan at the rear of the card is working correctly. The front fan is above the processor, both should be equitable speeds. The R9 series fans are a common failure place.

Drivers include the gpu drivers, windows drivers and the motherboard drivers, with windows 10 updates it's important to make sure all 3 are the latest/newest.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
The audio has not "continued" the few times it's been running when the crashes happened. It glitches out for a couple of seconds, then stops completely. All drivers are up to date, and the fan is working. The crashes have happened even while I've been at work and the computer is doing nothing.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Wierd. Doesn't crash during stress tests, but does at idle. Crashes in certain software, but not others. Hardware seems intact, psu will generally fail during stress, but can fail at low voltage levels instead.
How full is the ssd? Is malwarebytes kept on hdd not the ssd?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
The SSD has 67GB free(out of an actual size of 231). Malwarebytes is installed on it, as are most non-game programs.

I'm sure it would eventually crash during stress tests if I ran them long enough, but it seems that whatever is causing the crashes simply is not reliably triggered by the tests.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Possibility exists that Malewarebytes is causing crashes. However, for the first time I've had an error pop up in the event logs leading up to some of the crashes. The following appeared twice within ten seconds of three crashes:

Fault bucket , type 0
Event Name: LiveKernelEvent
Response: Not available
Cab Id: 0

Problem signature:
P1: 141
P2: ffffc10bdae33010
P3: fffff8052c2ef99c
P4: 0
P5: 32c
P6: 10_0_16299
P7: 0_0
P8: 768_1
P9:
P10:

I don't have another PSU or tower to test with, sadly. However my brother is letting me use his just-acquired GTX 1050Ti to see if the GPU really is the problem(since he doens't need to install it right away).
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
His computer's an hour and a half away. Him bringing the GPU for me to try was only possible because he was stopping by for other reasons.

I'll try this again since it apparently didn't post the first time, but there's been a new development: On the most recent crash I got a blue screen instead of a black screen. Came up VIDEO TDR FAILURE, What failed: atikmdag.sys

Based on what I've looked up, this is most often caused by outdated drivers. However, all of my drivers are up to date.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom