Recurring BSODS, recently changed error

nbalive2005

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Jun 1, 2012
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For almost 6 months now i've been getting intermittent BSODS, maybe once every 2 days so i didnt mind it too bad. Sometimes my computer wouldnt shut down and i'd have to shut it down manually (It's almost always when i have to do a forces shut down through windows 7, i dont know if that's pertinent)

I used "WhoCrashed" too find out why it was crashing and i got these errors

On Tue 2012-06-12 23:50:12 GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\061212-18860-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: atikmpag.sys (atikmpag+0x8768)
Bugcheck code: 0x116 (0xFFFFFA800B11B4E0, 0xFFFFF88007316768, 0x0, 0xD)
Error: VIDEO_TDR_ERROR
file path: C:\Windows\system32\drivers\atikmpag.sys
product: AMD driver
company: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
description: AMD multi-vendor Miniport Driver
Bug check description: This indicates that an attempt to reset the display driver and recover from a timeout failed.
A third party driver was identified as the probable root cause of this system error. It is suggested you look for an update for the following driver: atikmpag.sys (AMD multi-vendor Miniport Driver, Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.).
Google query: atikmpag.sys Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. VIDEO_TDR_ERROR




On Sun 2012-06-10 23:37:10 GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\061012-27378-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: atikmpag.sys (atikmpag+0x8768)
Bugcheck code: 0x116 (0xFFFFFA8003CB14E0, 0xFFFFF88003178768, 0x0, 0xD)
Error: VIDEO_TDR_ERROR
file path: C:\Windows\system32\drivers\atikmpag.sys
product: AMD driver
company: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
description: AMD multi-vendor Miniport Driver
Bug check description: This indicates that an attempt to reset the display driver and recover from a timeout failed.
A third party driver was identified as the probable root cause of this system error. It is suggested you look for an update for the following driver: atikmpag.sys (AMD multi-vendor Miniport Driver, Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.).
Google query: atikmpag.sys Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. VIDEO_TDR_ERROR




On Fri 2012-05-25 05:03:11 GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\052412-32261-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: ntoskrnl.exe (nt+0x7F1C0)
Bugcheck code: 0x1E (0xFFFFFFFFC0000005, 0xFFFFF80003612617, 0x0, 0xFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF)
Error: KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED
file path: C:\Windows\system32\ntoskrnl.exe
product: Microsoft® Windows® Operating System
company: Microsoft Corporation
description: NT Kernel & System
Bug check description: This indicates that a kernel-mode program generated an exception which the error handler did not catch.
This appears to be a typical software driver bug and is not likely to be caused by a hardware problem.
The crash took place in the Windows kernel. Possibly this problem is caused by another driver which cannot be identified at this time.


On Thu 2012-04-05 01:09:24 GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\040412-17316-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: ntoskrnl.exe (nt+0x7CD40)
Bugcheck code: 0x19 (0x3, 0xFFFFFA8003ADF300, 0x6A1400006828, 0x5844B0004E2C)
Error: BAD_POOL_HEADER
file path: C:\Windows\system32\ntoskrnl.exe
product: Microsoft® Windows® Operating System
company: Microsoft Corporation
description: NT Kernel & System
Bug check description: This indicates that a pool header is corrupt.
This appears to be a typical software driver bug and is not likely to be caused by a hardware problem. This might be a case of memory corruption. More often memory corruption happens because of software errors in buggy drivers, not because of faulty RAM modules.
The crash took place in the Windows kernel. Possibly this problem is caused by another driver which cannot be identified at this time.

The strange thing is that when i looked at my driver directories/details, i see the culprit file "atikmpag.sys" in a different folder. Where all my other drivers are located in C:\Windows\System32\xxx the "atikmpag.sys" along with "atikkmdag.sys" and ati.2erec.dll are in C:\Windows\System32\DRIVERS\xxx

I'm afraid of using Driver Sweeper because i think that's how i got that problem in the first place ( I used 2 different ATI catalyst versions to install... since i had a previous problem that i thought would be fixed by uninstalling the drivers, i rolled back but the ATIs were installed)

Now i just got a new message saying that i have BAD_POOL_HEADER and that the offending driver is unknown.

On Wed 2012-06-20 03:47:46 GMT your computer crashed
crash dump file: C:\Windows\memory.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: Unknown (0x034E41C0)
Bugcheck code: 0x19 (0x20, 0xFFFFFA8001D80680, 0xFFFFFA8001D80710, 0x409D5B9)
Error: BAD_POOL_HEADER
Bug check description: This indicates that a pool header is corrupt.
This appears to be a typical software driver bug and is not likely to be caused by a hardware problem. This might be a case of memory corruption. More often memory corruption happens because of software errors in buggy drivers, not because of faulty RAM modules.
A third party driver was identified as the probable root cause of this system error. It is suggested you look for an update for the following driver: Unknown .
Google query: Unknown BAD_POOL_HEADER


Please help

I have a Windows 7, 64 BIT ATI Radeon 6550M Acer Aspire Intel Core I-5
 

memadmax

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Mar 25, 2011
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19,960
Get the latest AMD drivers from ATI.AMD.COM Do not use driver sweeper any any other fubar driver programs.

Completely uninstall the AMD drivers using control panel > Programs and features.
On the list of programs installed remove anything that has AMD on the name.
Use the program that you downloaded from ATI.AMD.COM to install your drivers.
Once again: Do not use driver programs such as driver sweeper... Windows and AMD can update it on its own, but the AMD one may have problems updateing itself if it isn't installed properly or it has a really old CCC/driver installed.
 
Its the video card that's crashing, try the latest video driver or if that does not work try the driver that was on the CD that came with the video card. It may not be a bad idea to run a memory test program as well. Try running memtest86 for at least three passes.
 
This could be one of two things.

VIDEO_TDR_ERROR indicates the display driver crashed, tried to restart, and failed to respond. This typically means either an unstable video driver, or a damaged GPU (typically VRAM).

However, the second group of errors, specifically BAD_POOL_HEADER, is a BSOD typical of bad RAM.

I'd suspect bad RAM first, but its possible you have a GPU problem instead. I can't even rule out TWO separate HW faults right now (though thats very unlikely).

First and formost, run memtest86 and Prime95's blend test. If those pass, then RAM is probably stable. If not, find the bad stick of RAM.

After that, if you still have problems, try a different GPU driver version. If that fails, then try replacing the GPU.