Computer keeps getting BSOD and then restarts automatically.

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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I've been having this problem for about a month now, but have not been able to figure out exactly what is wrong. I have a feeling that it has something to do with my graphics card but I am not sure how to fix it. I get random crashes very often, sometimes up to 12 times a day. Seems to happen more often while I am playing music on youtube in one of my tabs while reading on a different tab.

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA Z68
Processor: Intel Core I5 2500k CPU @ 3.30GHz
Graphics: nvidia Geforce GTX 460 2win
Ram: 16 Gigs of 1333 MHz
PSU: KENTEK 1000W
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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By random crashes i mean a BSOD immediately followed by a restart. The error message that used to come up after one of those restarts was simply that windows has recovered from an unexpected shutdown. For some reason that error message does not show up anymore. How would i go about obtaining the Sop code?

 
Goto control panel / system / extended options (or something like that in the left menu) / extended tab / start and recover options. Uncheck the "automatic restart after error" and search for the last memory dump in the location below that. You may find the last error code in this file.
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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I managed to find and uncheck the "automatic restart after error" box but i do not know how to get to "%SystemRoot%\MEMORY.DMP" to check the last memory dump.

* i just got another BSOD while writing my reply and i wrote down the stop code that i got with it.
STOP: 0x000000c4 (0x0000000000000091 , 0x0000000000000002 , 0xFFFFFA8010D54510 , 0x0000000000000000)
not sure if this is what you had meant before when you said Sop code, but this is what my BSOD had on it.

I have to go to sleep already because it is almost 6 in the morning and I need at least 5 hours of sleep before work tomorrow. I will try to provide all of the necessary information as soon as I can though and thank you very much for your assistance thus far.
 
You did everything right so far! The %SystemRoot% is a system variable and points to the disk of your windows installation. I assume that is the c drive in your case. You will find the file there. The problem is though, that the error code is very unspecific. It can be a driver (update your graphics driver first) or a problem with faulty ram. I would recommend updating the nvidia driver to the newest version first.
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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I just downloaded the newest graphics driver from the nvidia site and installed it. I had tried this before after reading this suggestion on other forums where people had the same problem. I uninstalled the previous driver for my graphics card and then switched to my on-board graphics and did a restart and then installed the new driver and did a new restart. I will see if i get any more crashes throughout the day or not. Since on average I get a BSOD about 12 times a day I will see if this did the trick or not. About the ram, I had already tried to switch it out for new ram in case that was the problem. I went from 16 gigs of 1333 MHz ram to just individual sticks of 4 gigs each to see if any one of them would work properly on its own, but none did. I then bought 8 gigs of 1600 MHz ram and installed them, but I continued to get BSOD with the same stop code.

*It seems that I am no longer getting BSOD (well, not so far anyways), but instead, I am now getting this weird thing where the screen goes black and then comes back to normal. After that a message saying "display driver stopped responding and has recovered".
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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That is something that I have not tried actually. I will give it a try and hopefully I can get some positive results from this.
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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Everything seems to be working fine now after I re-adjusted the graphics card in the slot, but I cannot be absolutely sure about this until i do further testing and give it at least a whole day or so. Thank you very much for your help so far though, it is very much appreciated. I will report back tomorrow.
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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Seems I didn't really have to wait that long after all. I am definitely not getting the BSOD anymore, but the black screen followed by the message, "Display driver has stopped responding and has recovered", still persists.
 

Sam Lee

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Jul 19, 2013
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Yeah, what can be done in this sort of instance?
 

necrids

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Apr 4, 2013
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That black screen followed by the display driver message only happened for a week or so and then it went back to BSOD for me. What I ended up having to do was get a new graphics card instead. All signs pointed to my graphics card having some hardware damage so I replaced it with a GTX 760 and the problem went away completely. It's been over half a year since I've gotten any error message.
 

Sam Lee

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Jul 19, 2013
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Yep, I guess I will have to now try taking out my inno 3d nvidia gtx550ti and see if intel hd thats part of my motherboard can suffice to keep it up until I get a new one... can't believe these graphics cards fall out on us. :p well I have to be patient until a new gpu for my hd media