Disk usage hits 100% while gaming, games stutter and then freeze (SSD, more specs in post)

[Tornik]

This began to happen about a week ago, without me having done anything in particular I can remember either hardware- or software-wise.

I play three games, two of which are FPS and racing simulation. After launching and playing these games for about 15-20 minutes, they start stuttering, which I can also hear in audio and not only in dropped frames. This coincides with the disk usage tab in Task Manager starting to show 100% usage, without any particular process in the tab exceeding 0.1% disk usage.

Within about 10-15 seconds, this gets to the point where the games freeze and become unresponsive along with the NZXT CAM monitoring software. After this the only thing I can do is reset the PC with the power off button and start it again.

This does not happen with the third game, which is an RTS.

I have searched for some solutions on this - disabled superfetch and Windows search/indexing, ran disk check and did a few other things. It does not seem to affect the issue at all. My drivers and BIOS are also up-to-date. I built this PC about 1,5 years ago, and never had this issue.

Specs: https://pcpartpicker.com/user/Tornik/saved/VBrLD3 (also in signature below)
Windows 10 64-bit, DirectX 12

 

[quilciri]

Disable all non-system processes within task manager, then run one of the games and see if the issue occurs. If not, it's one of the disabled processes. If so, it's something the game is accessing. Since it happens across multiple games, it's likely a common system process called by all 3 games.

That is....assuming it's not windows 10 forced updates spiking your HDD usage...

 

[zebarjadi.raouf]

Make sure it's the game that is maxing the disk usage (check processes tab form task manager). While you're at it, download Defraggler and optimize your SSD (It's the equivalent of defragmentation for HDD). If you have used the SSD a lot, it can help.

There's also the chance that it's failing, but let's not point at conclusions.

 

[Tornik]

Disable all non-system processes within task manager, then run one of the games and see if the issue occurs. If not, it's one of the disabled processes. If so, it's something the game is accessing. Since it happens across multiple games, it's likely a common system process called by all 3 games.

That is....assuming it's not windows 10 forced updates spiking your HDD usage...

I disabled all non-system processes and the issue is still there.

This is what the Resource Monitor shows before and during the 100% disk usage. I took these images with phone, as my screenshot software stops working when the 100% spike happens.

The Event Viewer shows these error messages (not during the freeze but during normal OS usage).

The new thing that has happened during freezes today is that they have been followed by blue screen errors. The first error message was SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION and the second was KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR.

What I did today:

(1) Run Defraggler to analyse my SSD. It shows 35% fragmentation and Disk Health: GOOD after I ran optimisation on it.
(2) Run chkdsk again, after last night;
(3) Run sfc.exe /scannow to scan OS files (it found and fixed errors);
(4) Run Malwarebytes (it told me files of the SlimDrivers driver update app, plus some other files were potentially unwanted stuff, so I quarantined all of them);
(5) Run Windows Memory Diagnostics - no problems detected;
(6) Check for Windows update or OneDrive activity - none;
(7) Uninstall AVG antivirus;
(8) Run the game with all processes other than system processes terminated through Task Manager;

Nothing seems to affect the disk spike and freeze.

 

[Tornik]

Make sure it's the game that is maxing the disk usage (check processes tab form task manager). While you're at it, download Defraggler and optimize your SSD (It's the equivalent of defragmentation for HDD). If you have used the SSD a lot, it can help.

There's also the chance that it's failing, but let's not point at conclusions.

It does not seem to be the game that is maxing the disk usage - it's usually the System entry that is shown at the top when sorted by usage.

I ran Defraggler to analyse my SSD. It shows 35% fragmentation and Disk Health: GOOD after I ran optimisation on it. More info in my reply to the other suggestion.

 

[zebarjadi.raouf]

So you're maxing your SSD with 1MB usage. I would think a part of it is failing (especially somewhere windows was installed) since SSD is just a bunch of memory put together (like 10 50GBs). You might need a fresh windows install and through SSD check to fix it. Follow this guide:
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-1840191/ssd-bad-sectors.html
--------------------------------------------------------
Also, KMSEmulator should be 1. Malware 2. Windows cracker

 

[Tornik]

So you're maxing your SSD with 1MB usage. I would think a part of it is failing (especially somewhere windows was installed) since SSD is just a bunch of memory put together (like 10 50GBs). You might need a fresh windows install and through SSD check to fix it. Follow this guide:
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-1840191/ssd-bad-sectors.html
--------------------------------------------------------
Also, KMSEmulator should be 1. Malware 2. Windows cracker

Thank you, I will attempt this solution.

 

[Peter Martin]

you do NOT need to defrag SSD, windows already does it running TRIM automatically.
you can turn on a schedule for it under the drive properties accessed in Windows Explorer, right click drive, choose Properties and then the Tools menu, and Optimize button. If it is not already there scheduled, you can schedule the TRIM optimization of the SSD. no stupid malware ridden external tools needed.

by and large, stay the hell away from all registry cleaners, driver installers and most ALL free utilities. GARBAGE that cause more issues

windows has all the built in tools that work fine. anyway, I think your SSD died.

 

[Tornik]

I tried swapping RAM sticks around, or only leaving one in - no effect;
Replaced the SATA cable between my PSU and SSD - nothing;
Disabled my CPU overclocking - not a solution;
The Intel Rapid Storage Technology software, Windows Disk Manager and the SMART test via "wmic diskdrive get status" command all say my SSD is healthy.

I will reinstall Windows and see if that fixes anything. Thank you for replies.

 

[Tornik]

"I tried swapping RAM sticks around, or only leaving one in - no effect;"

I need to correct myself on this: last night I only tested two things: swapping out the two 8GB modules between their slots and removing one of them.

Today I removed the other one and played played two 15-20 minute sessions of one of the games that used to stutter and then freeze - and it went without problems.

If this is a RAM stick issue, what can I do about it? Why do both sticks work fine while in Windows and in the third game, but then that one stick begins to act up in the other two games?

 

[zebarjadi.raouf]

Dual channel mode can cause instability if it's not configured properly or if one of the RAMs is failing.

Try underclocking RAMs to 2133. Also, make sure you have the latest BIOS. Check Gigabyte's support page for your MB.

 

[ElectrO_90]

I'd say something has got corrupted in an update, probably graphic card update.
Uninstall the latest version and go back 2-3 versions ago and try it.
If that works, problem sorted, if not, well then it's not that

Also use DDU from guru3d.com to uninstall graphic card software

 

[Tornik]

I updated my BIOS a few days ago, so that's sorted.
There was a NVIDIA update about 10 mins ago, so maybe some kind of fix related to that? Will test with both modules installed and if the issue reappears then attempt underclocking RAM or rolling back GPU driver.

Also, can virtual memory setting be related to the problem? I have it set to automatic.

Thanks for suggestions.

 

[zebarjadi.raouf]

I updated my BIOS a few days ago, so that's sorted.
There was a NVIDIA update about 10 mins ago, so maybe some kind of fix related to that? Will test with both modules installed and if the issue reappears then attempt underclocking RAM or rolling back GPU driver.

Also, can virtual memory setting be related to the problem? I have it set to automatic.

Thanks for suggestions.

Manually set page file to 16384MB (same size as RAM) (Both custom initial and max size), as setting it to auto can reduce SSD life. But it shouldn't affect performance that much.

 

[Tornik]

The issue was back when I attempted to play with both RAM modules in. I went to BIOS to try underclocking, but memory clock setting doesn't seem to be there. The only setting that seemed similar was something that allowed to choose between 'Relax OC'/'Normal'/'Stability' settings for RAM performance. I tried the latter but it didn't help, with the game stuttering, freezing and then crashing to KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR again.

 

[Tornik]

I rolled back my NVIDIA driver to a version that I remember was working correctly (May 26 edition) and played for 30-40 mins without the issue reappearing. Unless this was a lucky session, the problem must have been caused by a recent GPU driver.

Again, thanks for suggestions.

 

[Tornik]

Just posting the final results from this issue, for anyone who might encounter them in the future:

It was residual settings from my CPU overclocking that were causing the stutter, freeze and/or BSOD.

It wasn't immediately obvious, because when I initially reset BIOS settings to defaults the issue was still there. But then I looked into the overclocking manual I had used a year or so ago to overclock my CPU, and followed all the steps in there to reset all the settings to defaults. That solved the issue.

 

[Peter Martin]

Mods please mark his post as the answer