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GF4 Crashes PC constantly! tried everything I can think of

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Neo81

Technical User
Aug 16, 2001
154
AU
G'day

I own a AMD 1800+, 512ddr pc2100 ram, 450watt duel fan p/supply any 14 fans to keep the sucker cool..... anyway the problem I am having is that sometimes when I restart my pc or while in a game or when its just sitting there my screen just turns white with wierd ass little lines and stuff in the shape of squares apear and you have to press the reset button .... this has been going on for a while and I have tried everything i can think of for e.g Extra cooling fan on the vid card, reformated twice, changed irq's of other cards so the cid card is on its own + many more things .... the video card is a Auriga GF4 ti 4200 128meg ddr ..... anyway I get errors in my event viewer like

Parse Error on CMDCD 00000000 000008ec f0ffffff 00000000 f0ffffff

No valid object on C 00000000 SC 00000007 M 00001f00 Data b3dcc704

Access to free channel on Ch 0000001f SC 00000003 M 00001ff4 Data ffffff7f

are just a few of the 20 or so that come up when it crashes... I have the latest detonator drivers and also use a program called powerstrip to brighten my monitor cause it is old .... I have tried not using this program up does the same thing .... anyone know what else I could do????

Thanks
Neo81

Later
NEo81 >:):O>
 
I'd say it's the memory or motherboard or both. Try to relax memory settings in BIOS: run at CAS 2,5 or 3 instead of 2, System performance Normal instead of Fast or Turbo, Fast R-W Turnaround disabled etc.
If all the above failed, try to us only one memory module (if you have 2).
14 fans!?! It's overkill ;)
 
Does it happen while playing any game or only one particular game. If so then check for a update on the game developers site.
 
Nah it happens while in a game while its just sitting there, just basicly anytime more so when its hot .... hmm the fan has stopped on the northbridge heatsink i think that wouldn't be the problem ... it does get pretty hot though ......

Later
Neo81
Later
NEo81 >:):O>
 
What kind of sound card are you using with that motherboard?

The northbridge chipset has problems with a lot of Creative or Aureal sound cards..... causes constant lockups :) (very horrible, i've experienced many).

 
Not sure that I can solve your problem, but I bet I can add a bit of info regarding my progress toward solving my 'related' video-crashing problem.

A few years ago I was running WinME on an Abit BH6 board with a TNT2/ultra card with an early nVidia Detonator package. I then upgrade to Win2k and had to, of course, replace my Detonators. I slapped v.12.x in there and blamm0 I started having lockups. What would happen was I could boot, then run any game I wanted to (was trying CS, Tribes and Tribes2). However, when I would exit any of these games and then run any other one, the lockup would happen between 30-90 seconds into the game. This drove my marginally insane for a long time, as I had to leave my game of choice running, then toggle out of full-screen and minimize the game, otherwise I had to reboot to avoid another crash. And, by the way, these crashes were quite severe... the system would halt, and the sound would continue as if looped. No chance of Alt-TAB, Alt-Enter, CNTL-ALT-DEL, etc.

Since I was sure the hardware worked, as it worked flawlessly under WinME previously, I decided the Detonators were the culprit and started replacing them as newer version became available. I used later releases of the 12.x series, then the 14.x and progressed from there. Noticing the the 12.x series were written *after* the GeForce2's were available, I got the bright idea of "downgrading" my drivers. Eventually I stumbled on v.6.62 of the Detonators and they were worked perfectly from then on. Never so much as a blip.

Currently, I'm using a Geforce2 GTS/32meg card under Win2k and I'm having yet a new problem. When I installed the card, I went ahead and grabbed the newest drivers (41.x series) and started having a NEW problem. As soon as a game starts (Tribes, MOH, T2, etc.), I get these 'white flashes', (reminds me of very fast lightning) that last perhaps 1/10th of a second, varying in frequency and intensity. Depeding on the frequency of the flashes, the game will crash anywhere from one minute to five minutes later. I can exit out and restart the game, and usually every 2nd or 3rd run, the game will work fine with no flashes. Also, for some reason, toggling between windowed view and full-screen does not produce the same result as fully exiting out of the game when attempting to bring about a stable mode. Additionally, I updated my mobo bios to newest available version to no effect.

Also, I just noticed that the Geforce-based errors are being trapped:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: nv
...
Description:
Parse Error on CMDCD 00000001 00000c94 00000000 00000000 00102c87

It seems that with the newer Detonators I at least get an error box rather than the halted system, but it still crashes nonetheless. I've tried going back to the old v6.62 drivers, and have tried perhaps 10 randomly-selected versions after those with no luck. I've yet to find any adequate recommendations for fixes in spite of *many* searches for answers, other than the standard "your card is bad" or "your ram is bad" or even "your mobo is bad". I'm using the exact same ram/mobo and have actually solved one of the issues through mere driver version changes. I'm confident I'll find a version that fixes the flashing/crashing problem too, but I'm not holding my breath : )

Again, this probably does not answer your question, but perhaps it may give you some ideas of work-arounds... like trying some different versions of the Detonators, or exit/reloading the game a few times until you get a good stable load. Heh.. at one point in time I wondered why there for 485 different releases of the Detonator series... perhaps this is why?

If you need find some older/different Detonator packs, check out They have a fairly extensive selection... and if my problems have taught me one thing, its that "making sure you're running the most-recent drivers" isn't always the best approach.

Keep us informed if you figure it out.
An
 
Hi,
I have the same problem as the thread starter. Ever since the first day I got my computer I've been having these problems:

The "Blue Screen" with the fatal exception errors.
Rebooting of computer without notice on AGP based games (all games)
Hanging on desktop when computer is idle or active.

I've done practically everything the 1st guy did.
My specs:
AMD AthlonXP +2000
Inno3D GeForce4 Ti4200
EPoX8K3A DDR333 Motherboard
256MB DDR Memory
DVD Drive
CDRW Drive
Seagate 40Gig 7200RPM Harddrive
Enermax 350w PSU

My cooling is good, and in fact i even leave my casing open with a big ass fan blowing at it.

Please post on ANYTHING you can help me with. I really need suggestions and solutions. Thanks

-maRcO-
 
You could try removing and reseating your video card and memory. Also just because you have umpteen fans doesn't mean your processor heatsink is cooling properly. What's your CPU temp.? There should be a PC health or something like that page in your BIOS.
 
When your are in screen properties/settings/advanced/ depending on your system you may have to lower the memory amounts lower than the default settings. Play with the settings in this section. I have found this to correct most problems. Also, make sure in your computer set-up system files, that you have selected either AGP or PCI video device. Otherwise your computer won't recognize the video card and searchers for the default drive.

In addition, are you having video card problems when the computer is booting up or when you are running a specific application; such as a game?
 
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