GPU Issues - Hardware or Software Problem?

[Chrispy]

Hi,

A friend and I were playing a game online last night and everything was fine until his PC crashed. When he re-booted his PC, it reportedly gave two or three short beeps. There was also no display port signal on his monitor. Eventually, he got back into Windows but: the GPU wasn't showing in task manager, the GPU was disabled in device manager (Error 22 and Error 31) and he was getting literally about 2 FPS in all games. Uninstalling and reinstalling the graphics driver from device manager and re-installing it via Windows update seemed to fix this but something tells me that's just a temporary fix. We ran into similar issues a few weeks ago and fixed it using the same method.

His PC specs are as follows:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600
MOBO: MSI B450M PRO-VDH MAX Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard
RAM: Kingston HyperX Fury 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory
SSD: Crucial P1 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive
GPU: MSI Radeon RX 5600 XT 6 GB MECH OC
PSU: Corsair TXM Gold 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX

I have three main hypotheses as to what might be wrong:

1. The graphics card is slowly dying - any problem we've had in the past seems to have been caused by the graphics drivers
2. The Windows install is corrupt somehow - perhaps its a driver issue or a corrupt registry. I'm hoping this isn't the case as I don't want to re-install Windows
3. RAM error - apparently the three beeps could indicate a RAM error though I'm not sure as I cant find out what they mean for his motherboard (or do they depend on the CPU? If someone could clarify, that would be great)

Before you suggest installing drivers from the AMD website, we've already tried that and it causes more problems as they conflict with the different version that Windows tries to in Windows update.

At the moment I’m thinking the best thing is to run DDU in safe mode, wipe the GPU drivers and reinstall them.

[Supafly]

Those beeps mean something is wrong. Need to know how many, long and short they are and then find out what the Motherboards Beep codes mean. For example, Beep codes for an older motherboard of mine were

AMI BIOS 1 short beep ：Memory Error
2 short beep：Memory parity check error.
3 short beep ：basic memory 64K address check error
4 short beep ：Real Time Clock malfunction.
5 short beep ：CPU error 6 short beep：Keyboard error
7 short beep ：CPU interruption error
8 short beep：Graphic card error
9 short beep ：Memory error 10 short beep ：CMOS error
11 short beep ：CPU cache memory malfunction

For now run DDU

Then proceed as normal. If it happens again have your friend pay attention to the beeps and make a note of them. Then find out what the beep codes for the board mean

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Perform a DDU Wipe in Safe Mode of all 3 GPU Brands. Tick box for "Disable Windows Auto Driver Installer"

Then reboot.
Do not uninstall or install GPU Drivers from Device Manager; use the official installer package from Intel / AMD / NVIDIA.

Reboot after it has been installed, then run a benchmark such as 3DMark, MSI Kombuster, Unigine Superposition.

Check GPU(s) with GPU-Z
Check CPU / Motherboard / RAM with CPU-Z
Check Drive(s) health with CrystalDiskInfo

If unfamiliar with the DDU app; here is a short to the point tutorial and the official download
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Master_Race_Geeks/discussions/0/1621724915801469252/

[emoticorpse]

you try actually reproducing the problem like running stress tests?

[Chrispy]

Bad 💀 Motha の投稿を引用：

Perform a DDU Wipe in Safe Mode of all 3 GPU Brands. Tick box for "Disable Windows Auto Driver Installer"

Then reboot.
Do not uninstall or install GPU Drivers from Device Manager; use the official installer package from Intel / AMD / NVIDIA.

Reboot after it has been installed, then run a benchmark such as 3DMark, MSI Kombuster, Unigine Superposition.

Check GPU(s) with GPU-Z
Check CPU / Motherboard / RAM with CPU-Z
Check Drive(s) health with CrystalDiskInfo

If unfamiliar with the DDU app; here is a short to the point tutorial and the official download
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Master_Race_Geeks/discussions/0/1621724915801469252/

If I disable windows auto driver it stops updating drivers for all components, not just the GPU, which brings its own set of problems. AMD Adrenaline stops working after some time as Windows installs its own drivers over the top. The AMD website itself says to uninstall AMD Adrenaline in this scenario.

Im familiar with DDU, I've used it on his PC before when it was crashing and freezing in-game and on desktop. I then installed the latest recommended driver from AMD Adrenaline. Then Windows came along and messed everything up and so I uninstalled Adrenaline using the built-in uninstaller, uninstalled the GPU and reinstalled it in Windows update.

That brings us to where we are now :)

[Chrispy]

emoticorpse の投稿を引用：

you try actually reproducing the problem like running stress tests?

Yeah by playing various games but no more crashes have been encountered yet. So it doesn't seem to be over heating but I'll have to check that once I'm around his house.

[Supafly]

Chrispy の投稿を引用：

If I disable windows auto driver it stops updating drivers for all components, not just the GPU, which brings its own set of problems. AMD Adrenaline stops working after some time as Windows installs its own drivers over the top. The AMD website itself says to uninstall AMD Adrenaline in this scenario.

Im familiar with DDU, I've used it on his PC before when it was crashing and freezing in-game and on desktop. I then installed the latest recommended driver from AMD Adrenaline. Then Windows came along and messed everything up and so I uninstalled Adrenaline using the built-in uninstaller, uninstalled the GPU and reinstalled it in Windows update.

That brings us to where we are now :)

But it often installs old drivers. Last time I let Windows install drivers, to make a point, it installed drivers between 3-11 months old. That was after a fresh wipe and OS install. I had the latest downloaded at ready so reinstalled the latest myself. Last reinstall was 6-7 weeks ago. When I allowed it to install what it deems the most updated GPU driver it installed 472.xx I still have old drivers and can see 472.12 was released November 2021. I have 9 more drivers since that one and that's not every driver released.

If you want the latest drivers get them from the manufacturer and install them yourself. Been having GPU issues all year so multiple GPU driver installs

[Bad 💀 Motha]

No, turning off the Disable Driver Installer Feature only stops WinOS from auto downloading+installing drivers from Windows Updates without your permission. That's all it does.

[Chrispy]

Supafly の投稿を引用：

Chrispy の投稿を引用：

If I disable windows auto driver it stops updating drivers for all components, not just the GPU, which brings its own set of problems. AMD Adrenaline stops working after some time as Windows installs its own drivers over the top. The AMD website itself says to uninstall AMD Adrenaline in this scenario.

Im familiar with DDU, I've used it on his PC before when it was crashing and freezing in-game and on desktop. I then installed the latest recommended driver from AMD Adrenaline. Then Windows came along and messed everything up and so I uninstalled Adrenaline using the built-in uninstaller, uninstalled the GPU and reinstalled it in Windows update.

That brings us to where we are now :)

But it often installs old drivers. Last time I let Windows install drivers, to make a point, it installed drivers between 3-11 months old. That was after a fresh wipe and OS install. I had the latest downloaded at ready so reinstalled the latest myself. Last reinstall was 6-7 weeks ago. When I allowed it to install what it deems the most updated GPU driver it installed 472.xx I still have old drivers and can see 472.12 was released November 2021. I have 9 more drivers since that one and that's not every driver released.

If you want the latest drivers get them from the manufacturer and install them yourself. Been having GPU issues all year so multiple GPU driver installs

I don't necessarily need the latest drivers, just ones that work lol. Does it matter if they're a few months old?

[Chrispy]

Bad 💀 Motha の投稿を引用：

No, turning off the Disable Driver Installer Feature only stops WinOS from auto downloading+installing drivers from Windows Updates without your permission. That's all it does.

I might do this but the trouble is, if he buy's a peripheral or component that requires a driver installation, hes not going to know how to do it. In this case, its a lot more convenient to have automatic driver installations.

[Heretic]

Chipset and graphics drivers should be installed manually from either AMD, Intel or Nvidia. You should disable Windows driver updates completely.

The fact that issues arise during POST suggests an issue with the hardware or configuration, which you'll have to identify. This is before the OS and drivers have loaded and if there's a hardware fault then the drivers will fail to load, as is the case.

[Supafly]

Chrispy の投稿を引用：

Supafly の投稿を引用：

But it often installs old drivers. Last time I let Windows install drivers, to make a point, it installed drivers between 3-11 months old. That was after a fresh wipe and OS install. I had the latest downloaded at ready so reinstalled the latest myself. Last reinstall was 6-7 weeks ago. When I allowed it to install what it deems the most updated GPU driver it installed 472.xx I still have old drivers and can see 472.12 was released November 2021. I have 9 more drivers since that one and that's not every driver released.

If you want the latest drivers get them from the manufacturer and install them yourself. Been having GPU issues all year so multiple GPU driver installs

I don't necessarily need the latest drivers, just ones that work lol. Does it matter if they're a few months old?

Depends. Old drivers could have security flaws or bugs that have been fixed in later versions. New GPU drivers are also tailored for newly released games for better performance. newer drivers can also have added features you just won't get with old drivers.

FYI I've used GPU drivers that are a year old before. But thats my choice. MS make out they are installing the latest when they are not which means users could be missing lots of stuff and getting sub optimal performance, not exactly what a gamer wants.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Chrispy の投稿を引用：

Bad 💀 Motha の投稿を引用：

No, turning off the Disable Driver Installer Feature only stops WinOS from auto downloading+installing drivers from Windows Updates without your permission. That's all it does.

I might do this but the trouble is, if he buy's a peripheral or component that requires a driver installation, hes not going to know how to do it. In this case, its a lot more convenient to have automatic driver installations.

What does that have to do with anything?
You do not want drivers from Windows Updates. You have to download + install them.

[Chrispy]

Bug の投稿を引用：

Chipset and graphics drivers should be installed manually from either AMD, Intel or Nvidia. You should disable Windows driver updates completely.

The fact that issues arise during POST suggests an issue with the hardware or configuration, which you'll have to identify. This is before the OS and drivers have loaded and if there's a hardware fault then the drivers will fail to load, as is the case.

Thats interesting. He got another beep code this morning: 1 long beep followed by 2 short beeps. Is that a motherboard failure?

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Chrispy の投稿を引用：

Bug の投稿を引用：

Chipset and graphics drivers should be installed manually from either AMD, Intel or Nvidia. You should disable Windows driver updates completely.

The fact that issues arise during POST suggests an issue with the hardware or configuration, which you'll have to identify. This is before the OS and drivers have loaded and if there's a hardware fault then the drivers will fail to load, as is the case.

Thats interesting. He got another beep code this morning: 1 long beep followed by 2 short beeps. Is that a motherboard failure?

Either the RAM is not inserted into the slots all of the way, or you have an actual memory failure.