random blue screens only with Valheim

[bitros]

For about 3 days now I've been randomly getting spontaneous crashes and reboots on my new machine. I logged about 700 hours of game time with my old computer, an AMD running Windows 7 with no issues. Since getting an 11th Gen Intel core i5 with Windows 10 I haven't been able to play the game and save progress before I see the sideways frowny face in white on blue and the system reboots too fast for me to read the error message.

I've tried updating drivers, disabling XMP, reinstalling, verifying game integrity, uninstalling Discord, moving maps to and from cloud save (which corrupted them), disabling cloud save and starting over, reducing graphics settings, nothing works.

[electricdawn]

My condolescence for your problems. The computer should give you enough time to read what the faulty driver/module was, after the BSOD.

Concentrate on that and get back with us. There is definitely an issue with your computer. Since you have a new CPU I assume you also have at least a new motherboard.

[Nefrarya]

If you can, take a picture of the bluescreen with your phone. I'm always too slow / panicked to read the message right.

[electricdawn]

Good tip!

[bitros]

The new machine was gifted to me as an entire system, board, cpu, ram, m.2 SSDs, video card, power supply, and case, complete with rgb and everything. I've had no problems running Lost Ark, Fantasy Grounds, or Discord separate from Valheim, so I doubt it's any component in the machine. In searching for similar problems, I've found several threads reporting the same issue. Blue screens and reboots that only happen with Valheim. The one time I found one that said [SOLVED] I could not try, because my motherboard doesn't have that setting in the BIOS.

After the very first crash I looked at steam, noticing it had downloaded a minor update that day for Valheim, and hasn't worked right since. It is currently not installed, with every associated folder deleted. I'm less interested in playing until the Mistlands is released.

[electricdawn]

Again my apologies, but the game works (mostly) flawlessly for 10000s of players every moment, so this does not seem to be systemic issue.

Valheim uses the Unity engine, which, again, is used in dozens, if not hundreds of games that all seem to work more or less.

Your problem could be related to a mass storage or GPU driver, or to something completely different. Yes, Valheim does have issues with Steam Cloud in conjunction with a bloated world save, but this doesn't affect all users.

I would make sure to
1. Reset your BIOS to default settings.
2. Not overclock your system.
3. Run driver verifier from Microsoft over your system to identify possible driver issues.
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-update/driver-verifier-tracking-down-a-mis-behaving/f5cb4faf-556b-4b6d-95b3-c48669e4c983

Make sure to read the whole post to understand what is going to happen!

Edit: The Steam "update" was just an update for the Vulkan pre-compiled shaders. You can turn that off, if it annoys you. It is not necessary to have this turned on.

[bitros]

Thanks for a suggestion I haven't seen before.

two blue screens each after running verifier twice were before windows finished booting, but slow enough to isolate a specific driver as the culprit.
WRfiltv.sys
Creative audio driver. I unplugged my soundblaster headset wireless usb dongle, and regedit'ed to purge mentions of it.
Additionally purged the registry of all Valheim entries, I'll see if a clean reinstall works.

Edit: It did not.

[electricdawn]

That's very unfortunate. Have you tried to reset your BIOS to default settings, just to make sure? Do you have any GPU overclocking software installed? Any other custom software besides the standard Windows OS and associated applications?

You might want to try driver verifier again. There could be multiple issues here. I also would disconnect any peripheral (including additional monitors) that are not needed to play Valheim, just to check it out.

[bitros]

I cleared CMOS by accident when I first got the machine, so I've been using default settings the whole time. I've never trusted overclocking to be stable so I don't try it, despite favoring motherboards that have the capability for it. Also I only have space on my desk for one monitor.

I ran driver verifier twice more, and got blue screens from gigabyte drivers, uninstalled the app center and all related motherboard tweakers. The gigabyte apps may have been the issue. I haven't just let the game run for hours, but I can play for a little while and logout and back in to save progress without any crashes. Twenty minutes at a time is tedious, but less frustrating than getting nowhere.

Edit: tried to make progress without logging out and in to force save, and got a blue screen in a burial chamber. again too fast to see any info, and without a .dmp file afterward.

[Oloferno]

Originally posted by bitros:

Edit: tried to make progress without logging out and in to force save, and got a blue screen in a burial chamber. again too fast to see any info, and without a .dmp file afterward.

Disable automatic restart after BSOD, https://www.tomshardware.com/how-to/windows-disable-restart-after-bsod

Also search for bug check in the event viewer under "Custom Views->Administrative Events" its like a folder tree on the left.

[Lil Puppy]

Clearly you need to update your motherboard drivers.
The two types of drivers that will bluescreen a computer for 'no reason' are GPU and Sound due to them being part of the directx pipeline in games.

uninstall both drivers - DDU can uninstall the GPU drivers, the sound drivers may not be the ones for the Creative dongle, your motherboard also has a sound chip - usually a realtek.

Go to the motherboard manufacturer's website and download the latest drivers for your sound card/chip - and preferably all the drivers - not the software, just the drivers.

Download the latest stable drivers for your GPU.

Clean out those drivers with DDU and the windows uninstaller for the sound chips/dongles.
follow the instructions for DDU or you'll have to do it twice.

Then reinstall the GPU and sound chip drivers.

[bitros]

I cannot update any drivers. The very first thing I did was update all the drivers I could. Everything's up to date. 22 drivers for the motherboard including the RealTek driver, plus nVidia 516.94 without the GeForce Experience software; drivers only.

I use the onboard sound for games, through an optical cable plugged into a 7.1 surround HiFi receiver. The Creative headset is only for voice communication: steam chat and discord. It has been unplugged and uninstalled for over a week.

[bitros]

Originally posted by Oloferno:

Disable automatic restart after BSOD, https://www.tomshardware.com/how-to/windows-disable-restart-after-bsod

Also search for bug check in the event viewer under "Custom Views->Administrative Events" its like a folder tree on the left.

This allowed me to see WHEA UNCORRECTABLE ERROR during the blue screen, and the machine had to be powered down to reboot. A search for fixes is no help for that either. "windows update will fix it" b.s.

[bitros]

Update: DDU removal and video reinstall with the recent Valheim public test patch also does not fix the WHEA UNCORRECTABLE ERROR

This blue screen stays at 0% "collecting information" on the crash so no information is available on the cause. It's always the same one.

[bitros]

Update: Lost Ark did this for the first time today. I still have no idea what the problem is.

[Oloferno]

Originally posted by bitros:

Update: Lost Ark did this for the first time today. I still have no idea what the problem is.

Damn that is bad, sounds like a faulty hardware since it happenes when your system is under load, even that blue screen means a hardware issue.