PC instantly crashes when loading games and restarts, don't know how to further go :c

[Johannes Kuckertz]

Hi guys,

So, i've had some problems already with my pc and all the past ones I managed to get fixed (also with the help of forums in here 😀). But i'm just stuck with this one and I would appreciate a lot if you guys would manage to help me out of this one.

Specs:
EVGA Geforce GTX 660Ti
Intel Core i7 3770k
12 gb ram
Corsair 800W
Asus P8Z77-V

So, I just bought Watch Dogs and i'm crazy to play it, but it doesn't get past that Ubisoft intro and my pc restarts out of nowhere. This happens with many other games too, like BF4, LoL, etc.

What I have already tried is: running BIOS with optimized settings, but when I do that, the gpu goes with 4000 something MHz and it just starts crashing even earlier and also outside games, but with BSOD. I decided to turn Turbo Mode off, so it turns into only 3600 Mhz and the PC gets stable, until I start gaming. I've also tried to underclock it and the PC crashes instantly.
Oh, when I turned off Turbo Mode in order to get only 3600 Mhz on the clock speed of the CPU, it would go sometimes off and then give me that Asus Anti-Surge Trigger. It was annoying enough for me to disable it, and as I said, it now only instantly crashes and restarts after starting a game.

I don't know at all if the defect is on a configuration, on the GPU, CPU or PSU, i'm totally desperate ;-;.

Once again, thanks if any of you manages to help me out!

 

[zenx]

You're welcome
Also as InvalidError pointed out, usually the black screen / driver crashing is the result of incorrect voltages to the GPU, you can basically recreate the same thing by overclocking your GPU and not increasing voltages accordingly... so I would assume (since I hope for the best) that your GPU is somewhat overclocked as well (maybe check for msi afterburner / nvidia system tools and the settings they're using)

Cheers!

 

[Johannes Kuckertz]

Dang it, managed to play perfectly yesterday. But today, later the day it started happening again (even though, rarely). xD

 

[zenx]

I assume it's the same problem again. You're GPU is somehow overclocked / not getting enough voltage for the frequencies it's running at and when you get to some more intensive parts in your game it simply crashes your video driver. As I've mentioned before check if you have MSI Afterburner / Nvidia system tools installed and the settings they have. Otherwise your bios might have some GPU overclocking functionalities as well.
Cheers!

 

[Johannes Kuckertz]

I assume it's the same problem again. You're GPU is somehow overclocked / not getting enough voltage for the frequencies it's running at and when you get to some more intensive parts in your game it simply crashes your video driver. As I've mentioned before check if you have MSI Afterburner / Nvidia system tools installed and the settings they have. Otherwise your bios might have some GPU overclocking functionalities as well.
Cheers!

Will do! 😀

Edit: So, I have MSI Afterburner (I was increasing the fan speed to 60% when I was about to start gaming and it sort of helped, I guess) and this is what appears:

Core Voltage (mV): +0
Power Limit (%): 100
Core Clock (Mhz): +0
Memory Clock(Mhz): +0
Fan Speed (%): 60% (But with AUTO enabled it is 30%, I've made the change)

Edit 2: Not even FurMark is running anymore without this f****** reboot, guess something is wrong with the GPU? Perhaps something with drivers or so?

 

[zenx]

You should keep auto enabled as if you set it to 60% by default it will not go over that even if it's overheating so just leave the fan speed at auto...
Also check for nvidia system tools.. (a "Performance" section within the nvidia control panel if it has that then it's installed otherwise no) or other overclocking software.. The symptoms still show that your GPU is simply not getting enough voltage for the clock speed it's running at... so this is the direction to go... check for overclocking software, disable them / set to default values... check bios for options regarding GPU overclocking and voltages supplied (maybe any form of auto voltage adjusting to the GPU).. if nothing works you can also try plugging in a different power cable to your gpu etc...
Between each step test with furmark as that will generally instantly reveal the problem if it stabilizes furmark enough that it won't crash then try (win+tabbing / aero) the furmark window.. etc.. and if it's fully stable then test with games.
If all else fails (and I really mean if all of the above failed) then you can try increasing the GPU voltage in Afterburner and testing like that to see if it stabilizes. (you need to enable the slider in the options and also check the box to load the settings on startup)

Cheers

 

[Johannes Kuckertz]

Everything with the GPU seems to be just fine and no reason to crash D: But I've seen that malwares may start processes/services that consume a big part of your processing and that that could cause those random restarts. Is this really possible?

 

[zenx]

No, not really. Malwares may cause random restarts and system instability but it would be unrelated to processing power. Your computer should run stable at full 100% load for extended periods of time (eg. that's why people do full load stress tests as long as 12 hours sometimes)
You could double-check the clock speeds with GPU-Z (according to evga site your GPU's base clock speed is 915 Mhz while boost is 980 Mhz)
Other than that it could be as simple as a driver issue, be sure to have the latest nvidia drivers (337.88) and maybe do a clean reinstall of the driver.
Let me know what you find

 

[zenx]

Oh.. and forgot to mention.. since you do have an evga card you should also check for a software called evga precision which basically has the same functionalities as afterburner, maybe there are some speed increases in that one. 😀

 

[Johannes Kuckertz]

Oh.. and forgot to mention.. since you do have an evga card you should also check for a software called evga precision which basically has the same functionalities as afterburner, maybe there are some speed increases in that one. 😀

Yea, I have it too. But just like the MSI Afterburner, nothing seems OC'ed. I also checked my settings in the Performance section in the Nvidia Control Panel and "factory shipped frequencies" is checked. In GPU-Z my default clock is shown as 980Mhz and Boost 1059Mhz and the GPU Clock is as 980Mhz and the boost at 1069Mhz too. Does that means it is OC'ed? If yes, do I underclock it normally in the EVGA Precision/Afterburner and how? As you can see, I'm a huge noob when it comes to overclocking 😀 Thanks for the help, once again 😛

Edit 1: Erm, I might have just seen that the EVGA GTX660Ti SC is the one with the Clocks I am running. I'm starting to think that I bought the Superclocked and I just discovered that now OR that something is just wrong and I should underclock it. I'm feeling dumb. But none of the drivers, Control Panel, Afterburner or any of those says that it is the SC.

Edit 2: Here is an image how it is displayed for me in GPU-Z: http://gpuz.techpowerup.com/14/06/21/crb.png

 

[zenx]

Yup, clock speeds seem to be in check, even if it's the standard version it 'should' support your current clock speeds without the need of any voltage increase. You can try to underclock it a bit with afterburner (I advise you remove all other gpu overclocking software from your pc so they don't interfere with one another) set it to the speeds I mentioned above and do a furmark burn test, see what happens. (If underclocking to these speeds won't solve the problem then it is most likely not an overclocking issue and we can check for other stuff..)
Oh by the way did you try a different power cable on the gpu?

 

[Johannes Kuckertz]

Yup, clock speeds seem to be in check, even if it's the standard version it 'should' support your current clock speeds without the need of any voltage increase. You can try to underclock it a bit with afterburner (I advise you remove all other gpu overclocking software from your pc so they don't interfere with one another) set it to the speeds I mentioned above and do a furmark burn test, see what happens. (If underclocking to these speeds won't solve the problem then it is most likely not an overclocking issue and we can check for other stuff..)
Oh by the way did you try a different power cable on the gpu?

I did it and Furmark crashes instantly xD
Well, doesn't seems to be an overclocking issue then. 🙁
I did tried another pair of cables on the GPU, same problems tho

 

[zenx]

Btw you also didn't say which driver you are using, are you using the most recent 337.88 nvidia drivers? Have you tried reinstalling it and selecting the 'clean install' checkbox? Also your windows version? (I assumed win7 64 bit) Check your event viewer (type event viewer in start menu search) and windows logs -> application. Right after your gfx driver crash occurs you should see an error message for the nvidia driver.

 

[InvalidError]

If you still get random shutdowns/restarts and anti-surge messages when you enable it, you still most likely have a power delivery/stability issue and no amount of messing with software, drivers, over/under-clocking, voltage tweaks, etc. will fix that. At best, it may reduce the severity and frequency of related issues.

 

[zenx]

Nah @InvalidError, those were solved already and were caused by the older buggy version of AI suite superclocking his CPU on the fly... from what I gathered now he only has GPU driver crashes and no anti-surge messages and no shutdowns which would indicate his GPU isn't getting proper voltage for the current clock speeds BUT could also be caused by a bunch of other stuff including faulty hardware / driver problems / software conflicts etc..
I assume he will have a TDR error message in his event log and would suggest him either to try different drivers (maybe do a clean OS install without any of the messy software that tends to modify clock speeds) or try increasing tdr timeout in the registry... (which I don't like as a solution but it could help...) - if you have any other ideas regarding this, let us know cuz I'm starting to run out )
Cheers!

Edit: @Johannes: Despite all of this your PSU could still be the cause of this as InvalidError pointed out in the first place so if you have access to another PSU (maybe borrow from a friend) you could do some tests with that.. but don't go out spending money on a new one just yet