Numerous Crashes/BSOD's... info inside

[3p1ph4ny]

PC Specs:

AMD Athlon FX-55
Asus A8V-Deluxe motherboard
Graphics Card(s): GeForce 6800GT (also tried Radeon 9800 Pro)
RAM: 2GB Kingston in 4x KVR400X64C3A/512 modules
HDD's: 2x WD Caviar 250GB 7200 RPM models (and an older WD IDE model) in a RAID0 configuration using the Promise FastTrack 378 controller.
Windows XP x64 Edition
PSU: CoolerMaster Real Power RS-450-ACLY ATX12V 450W

I use the onboard soundcard, and have no PCI cards installed.

For starters: I built this machine about two and a half years ago, and it has been rock solid for the last two and a half years up until about a week ago.

Here's my issue: I started getting various crashes, everything from DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_EQUAL to NTFS.sys or fasttx2k.sys (the onboard RAID controller of my motherboard's driver) to no BSOD and just random reboots.

I've got a fair bit of PC building experience and extra hardware laying around, so I decided to troubleshoot the problem for a bit myself before asking for help. I've cleaned all the parts with compressed air, and all the contacts of the RAM cards and my video card, but still no luck, the system still crashed.

I started by running memtest for a night, and it got through 8 passes on all 2GB of RAM with no errors. Kingston is usually quality RAM, so I didn't really think this was the problem.

Then, I unplugged my HDD's from the RAID controller, and stuck in an old IDE HDD I had laying around and formatted it to a new copy of Windows XP. The system still crashed.

After that I tried booting the new install with an old Radeon 9800 Pro that I had laying around, but it still crashed.

Now, I'm stumped. It's obviously not driver corruption, since it still crashes on a fresh install of XP. It's not the video card, since it still crashes with a different video card. It's not the HDD's or the RAID controller, because when I took those out of the equation it still crashed.

The only things left are the memory and the motherboard. I've swapped the memory slots around, run it with 1GB of memory and was still getting crashes.

Attached are my last three minidumps from the clean format with the 9800 Pro drivers installed. Any help/suggestions would be very much appreciated.

TIA!

3p

 

[Route44]

Okay, this is what I found:

Your first two Minis point to driver fault with tcpip.sys which is a file essential for a Windows based machine machine to use tcp/ip protocols (use Networking or the Internet).

There was also this warning that ntoskrnl.exe was unabled to be verified by checksum; therfore there is the possibility it could be either corrupted or missing.


* Microsoft has information on errors with tcpip.sys


Third Minidump - amdk8.sys which is an AMD Processor Driver required by motherboards supporting AMD Athlon processors.

In all three minies you will find them pointing to either X64_0xD1 errors (the first two) or X64_IP_MISALINGED (third one).

I know you did a fresh reinstall of XP, but the dumps are pointing to faulty drivers as the issues. Could it be your CPU???

By the way, I know several people who have the same motherboard and they all say the same thing, "Rock Solid."

 

[3p1ph4ny]

I know you did a fresh reinstall of XP, but the dumps are pointing to faulty drivers as the issues. Could it be your CPU???

That's an interesting question. The machine seems pretty stable in safe mode though. How would I go about trying to see if it was the CPU?

EDIT: Here's a few more minidumps from today, with the GeForce 6800GT installed again.

 

[3p1ph4ny]

To elaborate a bit more on the safe mode thing: I did a 35 GB copy to a USB drive today in safe mode while surfing using Firefox today with no problems, but the machine won't stay stable for more than a few minutes when I boot into non-safe mode. What stumps me the most is that this is on a clean install of Windows XP x64.

It seems like one of my onboard devices is dead, but that's only my uneducated guess.

As always, any help is appreciated.

 

[Route44]

Okay, here is what I have found:

First 4 Dumps - They all repeat the same information that it is a driver fault, specifically with nv4_mini.sys which is a Nvidia driver for video cards. It seems a number of people have the same issue with their Nvideo video cards. i read where some have done a complete reinstall with their OS and they still receive issues.

Your DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL (d1) - also in the first 4 dumps - is usually caused by drivers using improper addresses.


Dump #5 - usbuhci.sys which is a USB driver and it is recommended that you check out VIA's website for patches.

I'd like to know if you rectify the problem and how you went about it because I have seriously considered getting this mobo.

 

[peterdiva]

Uninstall the CPU driver (amdk8.sys) via add/remove programs to see if it makes a difference. Windows will install it's own driver when you reboot.

The times that I've seen Arg3 with a value of 8 it's been a software problem (should be 0 or 1).

Arg1: fffffadf478f9dfe, memory referenced
Arg2: 0000000000000009, IRQL
Arg3: 0000000000000008, value 0 = read operation, 1 = write operation
Arg4: fffffadf478f9dfe, address which referenced memory

 

[3p1ph4ny]

I tried uninstalling amdk8.sys as suggested, but the system still crashed. Here's the attached minidump.

Also, I'm posting this from safe mode. The machine seems to be totally stable in safe mode, so I'm confused as to what's happening. My gut says that the motherboard is going, but I can't say for sure. This system has been totally stable since December of 2004 when I built it.

I noticed a slight flickering line about 3/4 of the way up the screen (I'm using an LCD display, so it's not my monitor). I'm nearly positive it isn't the video card though, because the crash occurred with a different video card in the motherboard as well.

 

[peterdiva]

The CPU driver is still installed.

BugCheck D1, {0, 9, 8, 0}
Unable to load image nv4_mini.sys, Win32 error 2
Unable to load image amdk8.sys, Win32 error 2
Probably caused by : nv4_mini.sys ( nv4_mini+65f19 )

 

[3p1ph4ny]

Interesting, it must be the default windows one then. If it's not, how do I go about uninstalling it?