Unexpected Store Exception BSOD contantly

[chulito4596]

Anyone else been getting at least daily BSOD (but generally more stable multiplayer since the cap was increased to 700K) but have noticed stability getting worse since this weekend? I've pretty much accepted that at least once every day or two I'll Blue Screen either as soon as I join a match, after dropping in, opening the store, or any other random action. But the past 3 days I've played maybe 6 missions without violently crashing then having to mess with a recovery drive to make my C drive bootable again. Before you ask yes I've run SFC, chkdsk, updated drivers, (hesitantly) disabled AV, and checked my memory. I'm extremely doubtful any of my hardware is an issue considering ONLY this game causes any BSOD. For reference I'm running a 3060 Ti, old i7-4660K CPU, 1 TB ssd where HD2 is, and 16 GB RAM. I've also read that massively increasing the page file minimum/maximum to double your RAM size helped some people but honestly I just think I'm screwed as of this patch.

[roflwaffles]

If the game stability on your system has anything to do with server capacity....let's just say that doesn't make any sense. You should never BSOD...let alone over server capacity or any network issue (besides hacking).

The fact you keep getting a hard system crash likely indicates overusage of your hardware. That's what was happening to me.

I underclocked my hardware and the system crashes (BSOD) went away. Now when the game crashes it is just the game, not my whole system.

I have tinkered a bunch but it seems all aspects of my hardware needed to be underclocked to prevent overusage (GPU, CPU & RAM). I have not tested if RAM is nessesary, but given how bad this game is at using resources I thought better to be safe than sorry.

So I came to the conclusion that the game is not using system resources properly. This seems evident by this reddit post:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1beh5jo/psa_potential_permanent_performance_issues_with/

TLDR
From all appearances this game will eat your hardware.

[chulito4596]

Originally posted by roflwaffles:

If the game stability on your system has anything to do with server capacity....let's just say that doesn't make any sense. You should never BSOD...let alone over server capacity or any network issue (besides hacking).

The fact you keep getting a hard system crash likely indicates overusage of your hardware. That's what was happening to me.

I underclocked my hardware and the system crashes (BSOD) went away. Now when the game crashes it is just the game, not my whole system.

I have tinkered a bunch but it seems all aspects of my hardware needed to be underclocked to prevent overusage (GPU, CPU & RAM). I have not tested if RAM is nessesary, but given how bad this game is at using resources I thought better to be safe than sorry.

So I came to the conclusion that the game is not using system resources properly. This seems evident by this reddit post:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1beh5jo/psa_potential_permanent_performance_issues_with/

TLDR
From all appearances this game will eat your hardware.

Oh I'm not implying server capacity increase had anything to do with not BSOD'ing. I'm just using that as a point of reference for what patch seemed to make things noticeably more stable. I've heard there can be issues with underutilization yeah. When looking at metrics on average my GPU usage is approx. 56-60% with similar CPU utilization. Given that I find it strange that if they're not being used at full capacity how does underclocking help? Logically wouldn't doing so further reduce the total usage of both components? For example if normal clock at 3.0 ghz produces 3000 instructions a second wouldn't a 2.7 ghz clock reduce total instruction capacity to 2700? Reducing total performance? Ik those aren't actual numbers it's just the gist of what I'm trying to ask.

[roflwaffles]

Originally posted by chulito4596:

Oh I'm not implying server capacity increase had anything to do with not BSOD'ing. I'm just using that as a point of reference for what patch seemed to make things noticeably more stable.

Ah...got it. Sorry for the assumption.

Originally posted by chulito4596:

I've heard there can be issues with underutilization yeah. When looking at metrics on average my GPU usage is approx. 56-60% with similar CPU utilization. Given that I find it strange that if they're not being used at full capacity how does underclocking help? Logically wouldn't doing so further reduce the total usage of both components?

You are understanding underclocking correctly.

For me the problem doesn't lie with total utilization. It lies with single core and thread utilization. In my experience the game is overusing certain cores/threads, overheating/thread locking and crashing part of the system. This is where underclocking becomes important. Because a single core was being abused at max boost the temperature on that one small section of CPU goes way up. The rest of the CPU is fine but the temperature spikes around that area and more than likely causes the crash.

My CPU was at less than 50% utilization and had temps over 80c. Saw a single core maxed and figured that's the issue. My CPU never goes that high...ever. And now it doesn't again.


The GPU was harder to identify since all the parameters were fine.

My GPU is a 5700xt
It's utilization wasn't at 100% either, but I still was having driver errors. Temperature, usage, drivers, you name it - all fine. Turned the graphics all the way down and still was having the same problems (BSOD). I underclocked my GPU to close to the base clock and wouldn't you know...finally no more BSOD.


Haven't had a BSOD since underclocking all my gear - played 20 hours+ (played more today/yesterday too).

Since it was going so well I decided to test the GPU (hoping the CPU underclock solved the issue) and turned the GPU clock speed up to normal. BSOD the very next match!
No joke.

[chulito4596]

Originally posted by roflwaffles:

Originally posted by chulito4596:

Oh I'm not implying server capacity increase had anything to do with not BSOD'ing. I'm just using that as a point of reference for what patch seemed to make things noticeably more stable.

Ah...got it. Sorry for the assumption.

Originally posted by chulito4596:

I've heard there can be issues with underutilization yeah. When looking at metrics on average my GPU usage is approx. 56-60% with similar CPU utilization. Given that I find it strange that if they're not being used at full capacity how does underclocking help? Logically wouldn't doing so further reduce the total usage of both components?

You are understanding underclocking correctly.

For me the problem doesn't lie with total utilization. It lies with single core and thread utilization. In my experience the game is overusing certain cores/threads, overheating/thread locking and crashing part of the system. This is where underclocking becomes important. Because a single core was being abused at max boost the temperature on that one small section of CPU goes way up. The rest of the CPU is fine but the temperature spikes around that area and more than likely causes the crash.

My CPU was at less than 50% utilization and had temps over 80c. Saw a single core maxed and figured that's the issue. My CPU never goes that high...ever. And now it doesn't again.


The GPU was harder to identify since all the parameters were fine.

My GPU is a 5700xt
It's utilization wasn't at 100% either, but I still was having driver errors. Temperature, usage, drivers, you name it - all fine. Turned the graphics all the way down and still was having the same problems (BSOD). I underclocked my GPU to close to the base clock and wouldn't you know...finally no more BSOD.


Haven't had a BSOD since underclocking all my gear - played 20 hours+ (played more today/yesterday too).

Since it was going so well I decided to test the GPU (hoping the CPU underclock solved the issue) and turned the GPU clock speed up to normal. BSOD the very next match!
No joke.

Ohhh so like how many triple A ports lately have terrible optimization as far as using all available cores or hyperthreading usage? Like Star Wars: Jedi Survivor for example being infamous for that. Thanks for the explanation. I've never had any temp issues that would get me anywhere near a TJ max for any game as I've had liquid cooling for years. But I'm going to check if there's uneven distribution of core heating and maybe try what you suggested even though I haven't overclocked anything. Also heard another person mention somewhere that 'pinning' your CPU's can help with this issue? I've never heard of the concept until yesterday but supposedly the concept is that with some basic 3rd party software you can force certain processes to stick to a core. Possibly also manually assign parts of those processes to said cores. I'm a bit skeptical because those two BSOD errors supposedly imply something up with RAM or hard drive errors but fingers crossed when I get home from work tonight.

[roflwaffles]

I have liquid cooling as well. Never any temperature problems before. I was wondering if it was time to replace my thermal paste but other things run within normal parameters.

Even though my CPU and GPU were stock clock speeds - they still do not operate properly with this game and ONLY this game.

I am of the opinion that the HD and RAM errors are because the system is malfunctioning at a basic level because of corruption to system processes due to overheat in core components that manage those processes.


Definitely have a look at your resources and see what's happening though.



As far as pinning - I am not sure I would want to limit how many cores the game runs on given the utilization it has on each one already. At ~50% util on each core (normal for me during gameplay) - with 16 cores if I take away just 1 core it's adding another 3% util to each other core. I can't see that helping overheat.


On another note:
I have also heard bad things about the games graphic settings, like the frame limiter, vsync, motion blur, aa and global space illumination. Though I don't think these settings (maybe the frame limiter or vsync) would cause a BSOD, I play with them all off - even though I got a BSOD with these settings when I put my GPU clock back to stock. Hence my harping on underclocking.

edit: I play with AMD control panel graphic settings enabled (frame limiter and vsync)


Sorry for all the extra info....I hope my opinion and experience can help you play the game. I know from experience how frustrating it is to not be able to AND be worried about my hardware.