[SOLVED] PC crashes that I can't figure out..

[bizarre225]

Hi everyone.
So a few weeks ago I put together a new PC.

Specs:
Ryzen 3600
CoolerMaster CPU cooler
Aorus B450 Pro WIfi ITX BIOS Verson f50a (suitable for Ryzen 3*** chips)
16GB 3000MHz RAM
500GB NVMe SSD
RTX 2060 Super
PSU: See below...

After building the PC it seemed fine for about a week. Then I installed some games from the Microsoft store and my PC crashed and rebooted. I thought that was weird but it didn't crash again so I didn't do anything about it, and then about 2 days later it started crashing constantly. The screen just turns off, my GPU fans spin up and then it boots like nothing happened. I initially thought it was a power issue, as I was recycling an older corsair PSU from a previous build, so I replaced it with an EVGA SFX psu (I'm building in a H200). The cables weren't long enough for the build so I returned it, but I did test if it fixed the issues before returning it and it didn't. I then replaced it with another EVGA 600w psu and the issue has persisted. I know it sounds like a power supply issue but I'm confident it isn't, that would be 3 faulty PSU's, and the original one worked with no issues for 3 years prior.

I've tried clean installing Windows, running MemTest86, using live Ubuntu's disk check utilities to diagnose any problems and nothings come up. All I know is that the error persists.
Interestingly the computer never crashes while in the BIOS, I can stay there for hours and it's fine.

I've turned off all overclocking, and actually lowered clock speeds to see if that would change anything, but it hasn't. I've disabled XMP, and I've reset the whole system to factory several times. The errors sometimes happens immediately after boot, or sometimes I can use the PC for 20 minutes before it occurs. And there's nothing in the event viewer or reliability centre.

A final stab in the dark would be a motherboard issue but I really don't fancy changing that out for a replacement, but obviously I would if it would fix this issue.

Edit: I forgot to mention the mobo.

Any advice greatly appreciated,
Cheers.

 

[rocktalkrock]

Are all your drivers up to date. Try running Task Manager to monitor memory, CPU and GPU usage.

 

[Nemesia]

Please check and report to us your temperatures. A computer restarting like that can easily be overheating problem.

 

[RARRAF]

try running whocrashed https://www.resplendence.com/whocrashed might give us an idea of the problem.

 

[bizarre225]

Hi guys, thanks for your repsonses!

Please check and report to us your temperatures. A computer restarting like that can easily be overheating problem.

I've checked the temperatures, both in OS and in BIOS and they're sitting in the mid 30s. I've also ouched osme of the heatsinks when the machines has just been shut off and they're cool to the touch. The crash happens so quickly that they don't seem to have time to heat up.

Are all your drivers up to date. Try running Task Manager to monitor memory, CPU and GPU usage.

I've updated all drivers with the latest ones from Gigabytes website, and my GPU through geforce experience. Maybe I should try downloading drivers directly from AMD?

try running whocrashed https://www.resplendence.com/whocrashed might give us an idea of the problem.

Thanks for the link to the tool! Unfortunately I don't think my machine is crashing in a compatible way. It just instantly turns off and then reboots, so no file is being dumped. I ran the simuate crash and it read the dump files for those perfectly, but the issue I'm having doesn't show up at all. It's like a straight to power off then reboot

 

[rocktalkrock]

Did you do a clean install of your GPU drivers?

How To - How to perform a CLEAN install of your video card drivers.

Updated 9-19-19 How to do a CLEAN install of your graphics card drivers using the Wagnard tools Display Driver Uninstaller A major issue on many systems is the presence of multiple graphics card drivers or drivers that have been incompletely uninstalled followed by the installation of...

forums.tomshardware.com

 

[Nemesia]

Hi guys, thanks for your repsonses!



I've checked the temperatures, both in OS and in BIOS and they're sitting in the mid 30s. I've also ouched osme of the heatsinks when the machines has just been shut off and they're cool to the touch. The crash happens so quickly that they don't seem to have time to heat up.



I've updated all drivers with the latest ones from Gigabytes website, and my GPU through geforce experience. Maybe I should try downloading drivers directly from AMD?



Thanks for the link to the tool! Unfortunately I don't think my machine is crashing in a compatible way. It just instantly turns off and then reboots, so no file is being dumped. I ran the simuate crash and it read the dump files for those perfectly, but the issue I'm having doesn't show up at all. It's like a straight to power off then reboot

Your problem is using Geforce Experience to update your drivers. It's well known that Geforce Experience can easily screw up the update of your drivers. I saw so many people with this problem on the Steam forum.

Here is how you update your drivers the right way.

• You download the drivers from the official website of Nvidia.
• You uninstall your "Nvidia Display Drivers" using Windows ADD/REMOVE programs.
• You reboot.
• You install the drivers WITHOUT Geforce Experience.
• You reboot.
• Done.

What you should do in your case is use DDU. So the steps would be.

• You download the drivers from the official website of Nvidia.
• You download DDU from https://www.wagnardsoft.com/
• You uninstall your "Nvidia Display Drivers" using Windows ADD/REMOVE programs.
• You start DDU and choose "Reboot in safe mode"
• While in safe mode you start DDU and you choose Nvidia at the right and you click on Clean (The recommended option)
• After the reboot you install the drivers without geforce experience.
• Reboot.
• Done.

Never use Geforce Experience to update your drivers anymore. Just go in google and type "Geforce Experience drivers problems" and see the hundreds if not thousands of pages talking about that

 

[bizarre225]

Hi guys,

Going to post an update post fix for posterity, and for anyone else who may fall foul of this situation.

Thanks for all your advice. I wasn't even able to boot for long enough to use DDU, so I decided to replace hardware to try to isolate the issue.

I wanted to check whether or not the issue was with the GPU or CPU, and because of the R5 3600 not having an IGPU, I bought an Athlon 200GE. I installed this and the system booted fine, and was completely stable, even under stress tests. This meant that I knew that it was either the GPU or CPU causing the crashes.

To determine which, I used DDU to purge all AMD drivers from the system and reinstalled my 2060 Super. This still booted fine, which meant I knew that it was the CPU causing the crashes. I returned the CPU for a new one, refunded the 200GE (bit cheeky but needs must) and installed the new 3600.

This completely resolved my issues, I haven't had any crashes since.

This was super hard to troubleshoot, but to anyone else having similar issues I'd really recommend buying an CPU with IGPU just to check if it's one of those core components.

Thanks again guys.