Question I need help troubleshooting frequent crashes on a custom built PC ?

[cloud-it]

Hi, my PC crashes frequently, primarily with BSOD.

I have assembled my own PCs for years and I have always been able to eventually resolve the issues, but this one seems beyond me.
I've purchased the components on January 2024 and I've endured the frequent crashes all this time. I would like to find and fix the root cause now.

Observed behavior:

1. The PC crashes with BSOD at random times. Sometimes it's 1 minute after boot, sometimes after a couple of hours.
2. The error codes in the BSOD vary. Some codes I remember seeing: MEMORY_MANAGEMENT, PFN_LIST_CORRUPT, ATTEMPTED_WRITE_TO_READONLY_MEMORY
3. It seems that it gets worse while I'm playing a game. I don't play resource-intense games, I mainly play turn-based games.
4. It seems that it happen with more frequency when I'm switching from one application to another one.
5. It happens almost all the time when I leave Windows idle (so it enters standby). Basically, if I leave the PC idle and I come back to it later, the greatest majority of the times I notice that it has restarted.
6. I use Ubuntu linux as well. I don't see the same crashes obviously but I do get some minor failures here and there, like a tab or two in Chrome that crashes. The problem is definitely less severe in Ubuntu.

What I have tried so far:

• Fresh re-install of Windows --> no change
• I bought a brand new pair of RAM sticks --> no change
• I bought a brand new SSD and installed Windows from scratch on it --> no change
• I've tried changing on which HDD the games are installed --> no change
• Windows Memory Diagnostics: run multiple times --> no failures
• Ran TestMem5 with various configs: the "Extreme1@anta777.cfg" does show a few errors
• Opened the case, checked all connections, cleaned-up dust --> no change
• Re-installed GPU drivers --> no change

My build:

• https://pcpartpicker.com/list/ZcLsLc
• Nothing overclocked, everything is left at default settings.
• Motherboard BIOS is updated to latest version, as are the chipset drivers.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Motherboard BIOS is updated to latest version, as are the chipset drivers.
What BIOS version are you on for your motherboard?

Nothing overclocked, everything is left at default settings.
Is X.M.P enabled in BIOS?

You mentioned installing the OS from scratch, for the sake of relevance, did you recreate the bootable USB installer to rule out a corruption in said installer? Did you install the OS in offline mode, to later manually install all drivers in an elevated command, i.e, Right click installer>Run as Administrator?

you might want to pass on your .dmp files for us to take a look at and see if we can narrow down the culprit.

 

[cloud-it]

Hi Lutfij and thanks for the welcome!

Motherboard BIOS is updated to latest version, as are the chipset drivers.
What BIOS version are you on for your motherboard?

Nothing overclocked, everything is left at default settings.
Is X.M.P enabled in BIOS?

You mentioned installing the OS from scratch, for the sake of relevance, did you recreate the bootable USB installer to rule out a corruption in said installer? Did you install the OS in offline mode, to later manually install all drivers in an elevated command, i.e, Right click installer>Run as Administrator?

I've checked the BIOS version and it turns out there's a newer version that was released one month ago: I'm going to install that one and see if it helps. It's great you asked that question! 👍

In the BIOS I have set the memory profile to "Auto"; it's the section "Ai Overclock Tuner", which for my motherboard should be the XMP/DOCP setting. I don't know if auto means it's enabled or not. I will try with both disabled and enabled setting.

I don't remember if I recreated the bootable USB installer or re-used the same one... 🤔
I installed Windows using the default method: download the installer from Microsoft, flash to USB, boot from such USB and follow the prompt. Updates just happened after the first reboot.

Let me try these few things and then, if nothing improves, I'll fetch the .dmp files