Question Computer is seemingly locking up at random times

[jsramair]

Hello. I built a new computer for myself a few months ago and it's been working great up until a week or so ago. It locked up on me and I had to press and hold the power button on the case to restart it. I didn't think anything of it but it's been doing this same thing more and more. It can easily do this a dozen or more times over the course of a few hours. It seems as if certain activities cause the computer to lock up more frequently than others. For instance, I can watch YouTube without any issues. I can visit other websites (none specifically) and the comp. will lock up. However, activities that are actively accessing the drives seem to create this issue much more frequently (browsing Windows explorer, saving files, etc). Even when I access Event Viewer I usually only have a minute or so before the computer locks up.

This happened frequently enough to where, apparently, some Windows 10 startup files became corrupted and Windows would no longer load. No problem...I was going to reinstall Windows 10 anyway to eliminate any software conflicts. I did this but still have the same issue so I believe this is a hardware problem. I also updated my BIOS as well. Here is my hardware list:

ASRock X570 Steel Legend WiFi ax
AMD Ryzen 7 5700X
Thermaltake Gravity A2 CPU Cooler
Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 2x16gb 3200Mhz
MSI MAG A550BN 80+ Bronze 550w Power Supply
MSI GeForce GTX 1630 Ventus OC Video Card
Samsung 980 PRO NVMe M.2 500g for OS Drive
+ a couple old mechanical drives for storage

Nothing is overclocked and I'm running the BIOS default settings.

Once the computer has rebooted I'm getting a Kernel Power 41 (63) critical error in Event Viewer.

I tried reading the .dmp file (totally foreign subject for me) and seems like I have a few things going on. Something about my symbols being wrong and

Bug Check 0x133: DPC_WATCHDOG_VIOLATION​

I don't really know what this means. Can anyone guide me?

Thanks, Jeff

 

[CodeConnoisseur]

Please upload the dump files to a cloud storage platform such as OneDrive, Google Drive, or OneDrive and share the links here.

 

[jsramair]

Here is all I have since I reinstalled Windows:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/10zdC5kcA8xa4sm3Yf862TQiQbCT6lE89?usp=drive_link

Thanks for looking in to this.

 

[CodeConnoisseur]

The freezing is being caused by errors exclusively from nvlddmkm.sys, which is your GPU's primary driver. This most likely points to an issue with that driver or your GPU. I would first try using Display Driver Uninstaller from safe mode then installing fresh drivers from GeForce Experience before looking more closely at your GPU.

 

[jsramair]

I uninstalled my drivers using DDU in safe mode and then reinstalled new drivers (newer than what I was using) from Nvidia. The problem still persists. This implies that it's a GPU hardware issue. However, I've been using just safe mode since I reinstalled video drivers and the computer hasn't locked up yet. My motherboard doesn't have onboard video so I have to use my video card...and it's been working in safe mode. That seems to imply a software issue, so I'm confused.

I just so happen to have TWO of these video cards (the other is in my wife's computer). I'll try swapping the cards around and see what happens.

Thanks.

 

[CodeConnoisseur]

I uninstalled my drivers using DDU in safe mode and then reinstalled new drivers (newer than what I was using) from Nvidia. The problem still persists. This implies that it's a GPU hardware issue. However, I've been using just safe mode since I reinstalled video drivers and the computer hasn't locked up yet. My motherboard doesn't have onboard video so I have to use my video card...and it's been working in safe mode. That seems to imply a software issue, so I'm confused.

I just so happen to have TWO of these video cards (the other is in my wife's computer). I'll try swapping the cards around and see what happens.

Thanks.

Windows will use the Microsoft Basic Display Adapter driver by default in safe mode instead of the NVIDIA drivers you installed. That alone therefore doesn't really help much in determining if it's a software or hardware issue as it will not take full advantage of the GPU.

The fact that it's not working specifically outside of safe mode does indeed tend to indicate a software issue, but as I just mentioned it could also be because the default Microsoft driver isn't trying anything that will cause the issue to appear. Swapping the cards is a good idea, let me know how it goes.

 

[jsramair]

Well after a decent amount of time 'testing' (using my computer normally) the problem has gone away with a GPU swap with my wife's computer. Interestingly, my wife has no problems running my GPU in her computer. Her hardware is all different than mine but similar...(Samsung NVMe, etc).

Only time will tell what happens. My GPU used to work fine and then it didn't.

Thanks for your help, CC. I wouldn't have known to look at the GPU if you hadn't looked at my .dmp files.