GTX 960 random kernel crashes

[Rasengetsu]

So this has been happening for a while now and I'm not finding much info about this.
I have a GTX 960 card. I randomly get kernel crashes. Screen goes black, flickers, comes back. Sometimes I just doesn't come back and I have to reboot. It never really goes over 45 Celcius so I doubt it's overheating. I used to think it wasn't happy with me running two screens but that theory went out the window when the second monitor died and I got the crash anyway using a single screen.

Is this a driver issue? I'm running the latest geforce experience and stuff.
Sometimes it crashes while I'm not even doing anything, most of the time it's while I'm playing games though.

 

[Greeko85]

It would be worth a try to do a full clean install of your display drivers. Use an application such as DDU to completely remove all old drivers and then try installing the latest ones from the Nvidia site.

 

[Rasengetsu]

Thanks for the advice. I've already tried reinstalling the display drivers before, albeit not while using DDU make a clean removal first so I'll try that. It should be noted that I do not get very many crashes anymore now that my second monitor is dead and unplugged. I read something that said some crashes can be caused by a faulty PSU or bad power. I have no idea how to test that though.

 

[LoRikU]

Thanks for the advice. I've already tried reinstalling the display drivers before, albeit not while using DDU make a clean removal first so I'll try that. It should be noted that I do not get very many crashes anymore now that my second monitor is dead and unplugged. I read something that said some crashes can be caused by a faulty PSU or bad power. I have no idea how to test that though.

First of all, hey and I hope I can fix your problem

Next, follow these steps:

1) Download Prime95 from this website: http://www.mersenne.org/download/
2) Run the program and a box should pop up, press "Just Stress Test" and tick the 2nd box (http://prntscr.com/a2shfp), press "OK".
3) Wait a few minutes (10 should be enough), if your computer doesn't crash within the 10 minutes, it's probably not your PSU. If it does crash, you should start looking for a new PSU.

 

[Rasengetsu]

Right so, uh, I completely forgot about this after being off the computer for a month. Then I started playing games again and got the crash which made me remember. I stress tested as mentioned by LoRikU for 10 minutes with no crashes. I've also recently reinstalled new drivers using clean install option. The one component that even comes close to overheating is my processor, but it's under the recommended maximal temperature, even if only by about 10 degrees. Being at 100% all the time tends to make parts heat up. Everything else, including GPU, barely even scratches 45 degrees at load.
To make sure people have the most information here's my computer specs, and before you say it's old shit and I should replace it I'll just say that you're free to pay for the better parts, although if the parts are indeed the problem I'd like to know.

GPU: GTX 960
PSU: RS-600-PCAR-E3
Mother Board: First International Computer Inc. PTM33
Processor: Q6600 Intel 2 Quad 2.4 GHz
RAM: 4x DDR2 2GB RAM
HDD1: WDC WD30EZRX-00D8PB0
HDD2: Samsung HD160JJ

 

[Rasengetsu]

I'm really out of ideas at this point and I really hope the problem isn't due to the old hardware bottlenecking since that would require changing nearly the entire computer...

 

[DerickH]

I'm really out of ideas at this point and I really hope the problem isn't due to the old hardware bottlenecking since that would require changing nearly the entire computer...

Did you ever solve this?