Crashing Display Drivers

[Simo606]

Hi guys, I recently got a new PC with a Gigabyte GTX670 Windforce video card.

Occasionally (once every 2-3 days) the screen freezes at 2-3 sec intervals for about 15-20 secs then the screen goes black. After about 5-10 secs the screen comes back and a popup message is displayed saying my graphics card drivers crashed and recovered. This has only ever occurred while doing desktop tasks such as web browsing etc, so the card isn't under any stress.

I have tried driver versions: 301.42 and the previous version through rollback, the problem occurs with both drivers.

I heard that cards can go into a low power mode after a certain amount of time ie extending periods of time without gaming?. My brother has the same card and games alot more than me and hasn't had the problem. Maybe that is what's causing it?

Any advice to why this could be happening would be most appreciated.

 

[randomkid]

Does your motherboard happen to be an Asus P8Z77 v?
& what is the motherboard of you brother?

 

[Simo606]

Does your motherboard happen to be an Asus P8Z77 v?
& what is the motherboard of you brother?

We both have the same mobo: Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H

Also have same: PSU, Ram, CPU

 

[randomkid]

We both have the same mobo: Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H

Also have same: PSU, Ram, CPU

Okay, that is strange if you have identical sets. & it is uncommon for graphics card to crash on idle or low usage.

I asked if your motherboard is Asus P8Z77 because I read in a lot of forum that this mother board + the 670 have lots of driver crash & has recovered problem & the solution is to change the PCIe setting in the bios from PCIe 3.0 to PCIe 2.0
While your motherboard is not Asus, it turns out to be a Z77 chipset to so maybe it is worth a try. It is not guaranteed of course because your brother's set have no problem but things vary from chips to chips so who knows?

 

[Simo606]

Probably the only major difference between our computers is I have installed alot of GPU and CPU monitoring software which I have now uninstalled. The software caused my screen to go red and require a restart one time. Perhaps there is still traces of the software on my system and is causing issues?

I have read that kind of software can cause issues

 

[geekapproved]

It's not uncommon at all. It happens with amd and nvidia cards. I see it on this forum every single day.

I've personally had it with a 9800GT, HD4850 and HD5850. It's either gone away on it's own or I re-installed windows to fix it.

There are hundreds of forums dedicated to this issue, with no real fix. It's been around for years with everything from XP to win7, every motherboard ever made, and hundreds of different graphics cards. It is thought to be a windows issue.

Usually re-installing windows fixes the issue.

Google "nvlddmkm" and "atikmdag".

 

[Simo606]

It's not uncommon at all. It happens with amd and nvidia cards. I see it on this forum every single day.

I've personally had it with a 9800GT, HD4850 and HD5850. It's either gone away on it's own or I re-installed windows to fix it.

There are hundreds of forums dedicated to this issue, with no real fix. It's been around for years with everything from XP to win7, every motherboard ever made, and hundreds of different graphics cards. It is thought to be a windows issue.

Usually re-installing windows fixes the issue.

Google "nvlddmkm" and "atikmdag".

Thanks, I can rest assured it's really just an annoying driver issue. I might wipe my PC if it happens again and reinstall windows and see how it goes.

Thanks

 

[Simo606]

Best answer selected by Simo606.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey