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I need help on random ATIKMPAG.SYS BSODs

Last response: in Graphics & Displays
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I do not know what is going on with my laptop. I have a Lenovo Y560 Ideapad with Win7 x64, i7, 6GB RAM, ATI Radeon HD5730. I keep having persistent atikmpag.sys BSOD. I have already had this laptop repaired 3x thinking it might be hardware defect but all 3 repair jobs didn't fix the problem. The repair shops replaced the motherboard in all 3 times I sent this laptop out for repair. I have downloaded updated drivers from Lenovo and those didn't solve the BSOD. I have tried installing previous versions of the drivers and still didn't fix my problem. I have tried remote access by Lenovo technicians and the patch job they did only fixed the problem for maybe an hour or two. I have tried the solutions put forth by the knowledgebase at both microsoft and lenovo, didn't fix the problem. I have tried updating everything including the bios and that didn't do anything. No matter what I do atikmpag.sys still gives me BSODs. I'm a full time student with very limited budget so I don't have the funds to invest in a new laptop since this laptop is my recent purchase. There was a brief period of 3 months after each repair job where this laptop was relatively stable. During that time I would install the software I use frequently and the installations do not trigger BSODs. The software I have installed are InDesign CS4, Illustrator CS4, Photoshop Elements 7, Dreamweaver CS5 Illustrator CS5, and InDesign CS5.

I do not know what causes the BSODs because even when I just turn on the laptop, it would load onto windows, let it sit idle for a minute, literally, and the system would BSOD to atikmpag.sys. Another time, wondows would load and I just touch the touchpad and it would BSOD. I have browsed the forum prior to writing this question in hopes of finding an answer but the articles I found had known causes leading to an effect. I do not want to buy another laptop as I spent most of my money on this laptop already. Can anyone help me figure this out?

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Can you run memory diagnostics ? Download a pre-compiled bootable iso from http://www.memtest.org/ down the page and make a bootable CD. Boot to this CD and run RAM diagnostic for a couple of hours, maybe overnight, and see if your laptop has RAM errors.

If you have no RAM defect after the long test above, then uninstall all ATI/AMD gfx card drivers in Programs and Feature in Control Panel. Now go to Device Manager and remove your gfx card, putting a checkmark in the box Uninstall drivers for this hardware. ( Please note this operation will not harm your computer. Windows will redetect your gfx card after restart. )

Restart as required by Windows 7.

You may have to remove the gfx card in Device Manager several times until you are left with VGA drivers only. ( Computer gurus suggest using a Driver Sweeper/Driver Cleaner program. But I do the driver cleaning chore myself. You may go to C:\Windows\System32\DRIVERS folder and manually delete Atikmpag.sys, Atikmdag.sys drivers. )

Now you can re-install the ATI/AMD drivers that you have downloaded from Lenovo support.

Hope this helps.

in process of trying method. ran memtest for several hrs and passed. Afterwards, I rebooted my laptop and everything went well for a few hrs then BSOD again. I will redo the entire process thinking i may have missed something though I have a feeling it wouldn't do any good.
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You have a problem with memory management as the first snapshot shows.

If you haven't done yet, install Service Pack for Windows 7 x64, install the other Windows updates, update all your hardware drivers. Install gfx card drivers from AMD. The latest one is CCC 12.3. Before updating the gfx drivers, do exactly as I had written in my first post regarding gfx card. This is important.

If your issue still persists, then remove all RAM sticks. Then try RAM sticks one by one. Run your computer with one RAM stick long enough until you are sure it is free of defects. Then try the other RAM stick and the other one, etc.. Sometimes it takes longer to pinpoint RAM defects.

Hope the above helps.

suat said:
You have a problem with memory management as the first snapshot shows.

If you haven't done yet, install Service Pack for Windows 7 x64, install the other Windows updates, update all your hardware drivers. Install gfx card drivers from AMD. The latest one is CCC 12.3. Before updating the gfx drivers, do exactly as I had written in my first post regarding gfx card. This is important.

If your issue still persists, then remove all RAM sticks. Then try RAM sticks one by one. Run your computer with one RAM stick long enough until you are sure it is free of defects. Then try the other RAM stick and the other one, etc.. Sometimes it takes longer to pinpoint RAM defects.

Hope the above helps.


I will give it a try.

I have checked Lenovo support and found out that there is a BIOS update. http://consumersupport.lenovo.com/us/en/driversdownload...

I do not know what this BIOS update addresses. But if this is your machine, I suggest you update BIOS of your machine. This may have gfx card and motherboard communicate better with each other, possibly avoiding kernel-mode driver conflicts, such as Atikmpag.sys.

If you opt to do it, please be advised that you may render your machine inoperable if you do not follow the recomendations carefully.

I have followed the previous instructions exactly as it was written in order and after running my laptop after the memtest and uninstalling and reinstalling the gfx card and drivers, the same atikmpag.sys error consistently occured. I have tried both the recent bios update and the previous versions and they did not resolve the BSODs. It seems the only time my system is perfectly running is when I run safe mode. I am starting to consider removing Windows 7 and replacing it with a copy of previous windows editions.

In Safe Mode, ATI / AMD gfx drivers are not loaded. Only the ones that come with Windows 7 are loaded. That is why you do not have the problem in Safe Mode.

There is no need to delete atikmdag.sys.mui file.

One thing, are you sure you installed the BIOS file correctly ? Can you check the version in BIOS ? If you were able to install the previous versions of BIOS as well, that may mean you have not installed anything. Previous version installation of BIOS is not allowed in new motherboards except for some workaround methods.

If you revert to an older Windows, that may not resolve the issue because you may have a hard-to-detect hardware problem.

You have not specifically said it. Have you removed RAM modules and tested them one by one ?

Anyway, if Windows drivers are O.K. with you, you may uninstall ATI drivers and be left with Windows drivers.

One other suggestion: Please try to download ATI mobility drivers from AMD and try ?

suat said:
In Safe Mode, ATI / AMD gfx drivers are not loaded. Only the ones that come with Windows 7 are loaded. That is why you do not have the problem in Safe Mode.

There is no need to delete atikmdag.sys.mui file.

One thing, are you sure you installed the BIOS file correctly ? Can you check the version in BIOS ? If you were able to install the previous versions of BIOS as well, that may mean you have not installed anything. Previous version installation of BIOS is not allowed in new motherboards except for some workaround methods.

If you revert to an older Windows, that may not resolve the issue because you may have a hard-to-detect hardware problem.

You have not specifically said it. Have you removed RAM modules and tested them one by one ?

Anyway, if Windows drivers are O.K. with you, you may uninstall ATI drivers and be left with Windows drivers.

One other suggestion: Please try to download ATI mobility drivers from AMD and try ?


I'm prettysure I installed the BIOS correctly as I followed the installer's instructions carefully, knowing the repercussions if I did it wrong. In any case, I did test each RAM modules by themselves and passed, although when I ran the probe in MEMTEST, The screen seem to pause, the timer at the side freezes but the red + sign next to MEMTEST + x86 still blinked. I'm unsure if that was normal but it happened to both individual tests. When I ran the probe when both modules are installed, I got an error in memtest and memtest looked like it crashed. Here is an image of the error.



I have have downloaded drivers from both Lenovo's and AMD's website and both drivers resulted in the atikmpag.sys.

I am ok with Windows drivers but I was intending to use my laptop to aid me in my Graphic Design work for my classes so I do need the graphics drivers to help with the rendering. The way it seems, there is no way to fix this error. I think I'll just have to save money for a new laptop that is more stable than Lenovo's IdeaPads.
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