Random BSOD's during Boot

[Drellan]

Hi All,

Building my first system. All went well, until I began to update drivers. I get random crashes, resulting in BSOD's with ndis.sys and DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL. These crashes seem to occur with the beginning drivers from windows 7, or from most updated ones. I have re-installed windows 7 several times.

I have ran memtestx86 for 6 six hours with no errors, so I think the RAM is ok.

I would greatly appreciate any advice.

Thanks in advance,
Drell

My system specs are:

HAF932 case
Corsair 750W PSU
M4A79XTD EVO mobo (0704 BIOS)
X4 955BE AMD CPU (C3)
4 GIG 1333 DDR3 RAM GSkill
EVGA GTX 260
WD5001AALS 500G
V8 Cooler
Windows 7 64bit OS

 

[tecmo34]

This error is normally related to your graphics card. I recommend updating to the latest Windows 7 drivers for the EVGA GTX 260, which should help with the issue.
http://www.nvidia.com/object/win7_winvista_64bit_195.62_whql.html

 

[Drellan]

Tecmo,

I really appreciate the response. Unfortunately, as I am running the 195.62 NVidia driver, this does not appear to be the problem. I see these random BSOD with either the default driver that Win 7 installs, or with the most recent Nvidia drivers.

Any other ideas?

Thanks again,
Drell

 

[tecmo34]

Have you installed the latest board / ethernet (network) drivers from ASUS?

Have you verified your RAM is at stock timings and voltage versus default??

 

[Drellan]

Hi again,

As near as I can tell, my drivers for ethernet (Realtek) are current.

Before I attempted to confirm that RAM settings are stock (not sure how to do this, yet), I got a response from ASUS. They politely suggesting I remove the CMOS battery to get back to default conditions. Did this, same BSOD after a reboot or two. Then they suggested I breadboard this system - also done. (Sigh....all my work on cable management!) After rebooting a few times, same BSOD. Their next suggestion was to re-install OS. So, as I start that, I get this BSOD error on the intial boot with WIN 7 in the Odrive which should bring me to the boot menu. Instead, I get:

PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
Stop: 0X00000050(OXFFFFF88076791490,0X0000000008,0XFFFFF88076791490,0X00000000005).

Have to admit, that rattled me.

How should I proceed? What does this error mean, especially when getting it during an OS install?

As always, any advice welcome.
Drell

 

[tecmo34]

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc957625.aspx --- Things seem to point to faulty RAM or not at the correct settings (unstable)...

 

[Drellan]

You rock, my friend. Working on this atm by changing out RAM sticks. Will let you know.

Thanks again,
D

 

[shortstuff_mt]

You may not need to change out the RAM. Which exact RAM kit do you have? All these match your description:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=1052315794&Description=g.skill%20ddr3%201333%204gb%20desktop%20memory&name=4GB%20%282%20x%202GB%29&ActiveSearchResult=False

Your RAM will have a sticker on the side with the rated speed, timings, and voltage. You should start by manually setting all those values in the BIOS. This is a pretty common error when the RAM isn't getting enough voltage. Memtest86+ is great for finding faulty RAM, but not great at detecting incorrect settings. I would bet that the RAM isn't faulty, your motherboard probably just isn't giving it enough voltage under "Auto" settings.

 

[Drellan]

Hmmm....when I load up one stick of RAM...call it stick A...I got the BSOD mentioned above. When I load up stick B, same RAM for the same 2 stick package, I get no errors at all...after 10 reboots, loading OS, drivers, etc.

The ram is 1.5V stock, which is pretty low (I think?). I do not understand the ASUS bios well enough yet to set the ram voltage...looks like I may have to do that in the OC section - even tho I have no intention yet of OCing.

And yet, I did run memtest86 v4.00 for 6+ hours on with both sticks in the machine...and got no errors at all.

So, somewhat confused, but proceeding carefully on the assumption of one bad stick of ram.

As always, any advice is welcome.
Drell

 

[shortstuff_mt]

It does sound like you possibly have a bad stick of RAM. Have you run Memtest with just that stick of RAM installed?