Random shut downs without warning, no notification, and system reports it as "PC lost power unexpectedly."

[Volmaaral]

So, earlier in August I started running into a peculiar issue. My PC, whilst I was playing a game or watching a video, or anything really, would randomly black screen and restart. I don't mean it showed the shut down screen. I mean the lights cut out, all processes stopped, it DIED. And then immediately restarted. Reliability monitor was just saying that the system lost power unexpectedly. I tested the power outlet and power strip, no issues. Me and a friend figured after much trial and error that it was likely the PSU. An EVGA NEX650G. My PC is one year old by the way. All custom parts, all should be compatible. I have an MSI Z97 Gaming 5 motherboard, DDR3. An MSI R9 380 Graphics Card, a 2TB Seagate Barracuda HDD Sata, an Intel-Core i5 4690K, and my RAM is the G.Skill Ripjaws 8 GB. We RMA'd the PSU, getting a replacement. But to our great annoyance, the problem persisted. We checked the temperatures. They never seemed to get any higher than 65 Celsius for my Processor, and seemed to stay within acceptable levels across the board. I tested the memory with no issues. Eventually the crashes hit at a very bad moment and corrupted the OS. Me and my friend salvaged the necessary files from the HDD, and were forced to wipe the HDD and do a clean install, as it would not allow any repairs to be done, and without this drastic measure my PC was stuck in a restarting loop showing a blue screen and the 0xc000021a error. I had few other options. We successfully accomplished this task (or rather, he did. I was completely useless for most of the troubleshooting as I've not had to do this before.), and everything was up to date. Everything was the latest software version, my Windows 10 Pro, my graphics card drivers, BIOS drivers...everything. And it still, crashed. I redownloaded Attack on Titan Wings of Freedom, as the last thing I recalled to herald a crash, and it crashed the same way as it originally did after one Online mission. (I apologize to the squadmates who lost the host...) Black screen, restart, system lost power unexpectedly. But it's not just games, it also crashed when I was doing something so decidedly not system stressful as reading an article on Bannerlord. We are trying to determine now, if it could be the A) RAM, B) Processor, or C) Motherboard. The HDD seemed to pass every test with flying colors. He has to acquire his backup RAM from home and we will test those to see if it maintains functionality later this week. By the way, the latest crash led into a Windows Update. It acted a bit odd, would get some percentage up and then say it was restarting, restart, and then continue where it left off. I looked into it and apparently it's a fix for the Anniversary Update that gave everyone so much trouble? Either way. I've currently got 7 different windows open in different positions on the screen with YouTube videos at max quality settings, processor temps still just below 65 Celsius. Graphics card also below 60 Celsius. It still hasn't crashed. So maybe all this trouble was yet another victim of the Anniversary update? I didn't see my symptoms in the list of problems it caused though. Fingers crossed it was something as simple as the OS being garbage...and I'm going to punch a Microsoft executive in the face if this truly was the problem. What do you all think? What could have led to the symptoms of my system's sudden losses of power, if not the PSU, if not the temperatures and if not the memory? Any ideas?

 

[Faux_Grey]

Eugh.

Line breaks sir! Line breaks! Wall of text alert!

I can see somewhere you RMA'd the PSU. But then see you reinstalled windows or something and now it's working.

I wouldn't be surprised if it was a bad driver or something, windows 10 is junk.

 

[Volmaaral]

Eugh.

Line breaks sir! Line breaks! Wall of text alert!

I can see somewhere you RMA'd the PSU. But then see you reinstalled windows or something and now it's working.

I wouldn't be surprised if it was a bad driver or something, windows 10 is junk.

Sorry about that, I typed that up on my phone since I was testing my PC with the YouTube wall of death. I didn't think of line breaks since my thumbs desired for my death shortly after finishing the post.

EDIT: Also, I said that after installing Windows again, the problem still occurred. After the latest crash however, a Windows update occurred. Since that update, no crash despite 7 individual windows were opened with a bunch of YouTube videos at max quality. I dunno if it's just teasing me and will crash as soon as I think that update fixed it or not. Not getting my hopes up. I just want to know what weird situation could lead to the symptoms of my PC, barring all the things I tested.

 

[Faux_Grey]

We can test if it's a hardware issue.

I could suggest running some individual stress tests.

Run Prime95 for a few minutes.

Then run Furmark for a few minutes.

Then run both of the tests at the same time.

Hopefully it crashes somewhere, and that'll help show us the problem.

 

[faalin]

So error 0xc000021a "occurs when a user-mode subsystem, such as WinLogon or the Client Server Run-Time Subsystem (CSRSS), has been fatally compromised and security can no longer be guaranteed" according to microsoft.

So reading through the wall of text, you seem to always have an issue after istalling Attack on Titan Wings of Freedom. That would lead me to believe that there is a driver issue between that game and windows 10 that is causing the issue. I would uninstall the came and then run the computer through its passes and see if you have issues.


https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff560177(v=vs.85).aspx
http://appuals.com/best-fix-steps-fix-error-0xc000021a/

 

[Volmaaral]

So error 0xc000021a "occurs when a user-mode subsystem, such as WinLogon or the Client Server Run-Time Subsystem (CSRSS), has been fatally compromised and security can no longer be guaranteed" according to microsoft.

So reading through the wall of text, you seem to always have an issue after istalling Attack on Titan Wings of Freedom. That would lead me to believe that there is a driver issue between that game and windows 10 that is causing the issue. I would uninstall the came and then run the computer through its passes and see if you have issues.


https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff560177(v=vs.85).aspx
http://appuals.com/best-fix-steps-fix-error-0xc000021a/

I do not believe it to have been that, for one major reason: The game was only installed after we replaced the PSU. I named it as the game I used for the testing in the middle of all this, sorry if I confused it as being the main issue. The problem was occurring before I even bought the game.

 

[Volmaaral]

We can test if it's a hardware issue.

I could suggest running some individual stress tests.

Run Prime95 for a few minutes.

Then run Furmark for a few minutes.

Then run both of the tests at the same time.

Hopefully it crashes somewhere, and that'll help show us the problem.

Right, I've been running this awhile now. I ran Prime95 for roughly 20 minutes, and then started up Furmark to go alongside it as I really need to sleep soon, and I wanted to test whether it would even crash at this point. Prime95 has now been going 30 minutes, and Furmark has been going 12 with Prime95 still going in the background. The temperatures I monitored in HWMonitor got a bit high, with Core 0 and Package being at 88 degrees Celsius, with Cores 1-3 being at 84 and below. Then the fans would kick in and knock it back down somewhat. The GPU hit a max of 68 degrees Celsius.

Still no crash, and this is after my YouTube Video wall of doom with 4-5 Markipliers, a Robbaz, and a Surrealbeliefs all going at the same time with the videos set to 1080p. It hasn't crashed in a couple of hours despite all this insane stress testing. I'll resume tomorrow, but I think I can safely assume that temperatures are not the causes of the crashes. I recall while playing the games that the fans didn't even make a peep and the temperatures had barely hit 70 the last I checked them. Of course, maybe that last Windows 10 update really did fix the issue, and it was some unique symptom that trash of an Anniversary Update spawned within my custom rig.

I'll keep testing for the next few days. If there is no crash within the next week, or rather, a crash like the ones I've been having, instead of the likely overheating crash I'll cause from overdoing it with the testing, then I might consider this having solved itself...and then I'll have to strangle a Microsoft executive for that blasted "Anniversary Update" having been the bloody cause the whole bloody time...it has hit 40 minutes for Prime95 and 25 minutes for Furmark as well now. Core temps are slowly inching into the worrying levels at 90 degrees Celsius, but even the most strenuous games shouldn't push it this far. So yep, think temperature problems are out. Will check again tomorrow night after classes. Now though, I must pass out.

 

[Volmaaral]

Annnnd the problem is back with a bloody vengeance and will for destruction. I can barely start up the computer, log in...before black screen shut down. I did those stress tests before no issue. But now it can't even handle the pain of starting up. And since it crashed so fast, the OS got re-corrupted. Now starting up is beyond it. I can't fathom the problem. I can't test anything, since the friend has the boot drives and can't test it right now. I'm going to try to take some USBs I bought and create some boot drives on the old iMac I have upstairs, hopefully it doesn't cause issues. I can no longer tell if this is a software or hardware issue. At all. Can anyone say what else I should even do in this situation?

 

[faalin]

Try installing a window 7 OS it will give you a 30 trial without a key so you can test to see if it is and OS issue or hardware issue.

 

[Volmaaral]

Nope. Can't even boot it anymore. Problem got way worse. We tested RAM by changing it, it wasn't the RAM....then we ran into an odd error, I forget the code but it was a letter and a number in the bottom right of a black screen. Apparently it was linked to the motherboard having issues communicating to the USB ports.

We're out of options we can perform with the PC itself, software wise. We've narrowed it down to an estimated 90% probability that it is the motherboard. It can't boot. We can't update, it'll just black screen shut down on us every time. Wiping HDD again didn't prevent it, changing RAM didn't prevent it, we removed GPU and the issue continued to occur in exact same way, so it isn't related, leaving the processor or the motherboard itself. And since I ran the Prime95 test during that ONE session I was able to get the PC to cooperate with me for a few hours with no crash, with the processor performing better than expectations, I'm fairly sure it isn't that either. We performed a reset of the CMOS in the motherboard by removing the battery, still a no-go.

He's talking to some techie friends of his for more ideas, but as it is there's little more we seem to be able to do except RMA the motherboard...