G73 and Cat 10.5 GSOD Debug Thread

After installing power4gear update and 10.6 cats i got GSOD while playing SC2 beta. So doesn't look like just updating power 4 gear is a fix.

Again plays stable on stock asus drivers.

 

Take a look at this thread.

This particular fix from that thread worked for me.

" Further thoughts:

Now, you should be stable at the stock speeds of 700/1000, but in the event you are not, you can use the AMD GPU Tool or if you updated to v3 vBIOS, CCC's Overdrive to overclock your GPU to gain some stability. (probably due to some powersaving option being disabled when overclocking) I suggest you first try 705/1100. For performance you can try 800/1100 (or 1200). One chap had further issues and needed to slightly underclock to 675/950. (I don't know why, but I think he had other issues and would need to RMA.) I would also suggest monitoring your temps for awhile when OC'ing to make sure you don't overheat and/or cause further instability issues."

Temps have not been a problem and 10.6 works fine for me @ 705/1100.

Cheers,

 

panzer06 thanks for the pointer!

I will try to see if changing the clock speeds has any effects for me. I guess I will first just try changing the clock speeds, and if that doesn't work i will try doing the entire setup that is there.

 

@ chastity, ya that should be good.
@ smile gerard - yes, without ccc, i get no gsod ever. it seems the ccc causes the gsod on my system. if i uninstall ccc and only use the device manager to update my drivers (radeon 5870) i dont get gsod or any glitches. but i need the ccc for programs i run, like adobe premier pro for example.
@ panzer - thanks ill try that out, is there any way to keep the 705/1100 clocked settings permanently? i havent read previous posts, but every time i restart they revert back to the 699/1000

 

Yes, look here(it's a direct link to Kalim's post#39):

http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus/488683-g73-cat-10-5-gsod-debug-thread-4.html#post6321213

Works great.

Cheers,

 

zack500: I had some weird CCC issues as well. I solved them by going back to the Asus 10.1, then overwriting the 10.6 package. Apparently whatever evil was going on was rectified by the Asus install.

 

CCC is a pretty finicky program. It's always a hit and miss. Asus should have had these problems sorted out before even releasing this computer, because they sure as hell knew people would be using CCC. GSOD should not happen in games at all no matter what version or drivers you have, and clocking the computer just to get rid of it is ridiculous. I emailed Asus support and they actually told me just to disable power play in CCC, and if that didnt work they just said to uninstall CCC altogether and disable any ATI services or start up items. Weird eh?

 

SO basically, give ATI apps the bird?

 

Well basically Asus tech support didn't know to do so he told me to uninstall all ATI drivers and devices is disabling power play didn't fix it lol. Some help that is.

 

Give the techs my links

 

The techs wouldn't even understand your links. You should make up a new thread explaining all this in lamen's terms.

 

How much more basic do you want it? He's spelled it out with enough technical terms that they can identify the problem. Any more "lamen's terms" and it'd sound like "uh, the thing with the stuff needs to be changed with the videocard bios".

Really. It's a fairly well written explanation and if the tech has ever used a computer, they'll "get" it.

 

Maybe the techs are Mac users

 

At the end Chastity, What is the best configuration to stay stable in 10.5/10.6 for normal people (we, the ones who still in stock with NORMAL vBIOS)?

 

well, just follow the guide. It still applies to stock vBIOS. If you need to OC for stability, you can setup AMD GPU Tool to boot with profiles to set it automatically. This part is mostly trial and error. Use AMD tool to try settings until you are satisfied with the results, then setup your profiles.

If it's still unstable, then I can only suggest you try the v3 vBIOS. This guide is an accumulation of trial and error on my part and feedback of others here.

 

Currently using ccc 10.6 and got GSOD 15 min into sc2 with 705/1100, which proves these aren't stable. what next?

 

First off, that proves nothing ... I mean, if it wasn't in BETA, perhaps. Does it GSOD on other games? if so, then you *may* have "proof" enough.

Try underclocking to 650, try asus stock drivers (9.12).

 

If it's not stable for you, it's not stable at all??? Can't understanding your logic. 10.6 runs stable at many G73. Before posting proof of something make sure, that same issue occurs with others.

 

I'm not sure maybe you want to experiment a little, ur post gave me an idea of what if the 10.1 asus drivers are installed first, then uninstall just the display driver and then you install the 10.6 drivers with the 10.1 ccc installed. Cuz since drivers alone works for you then perhaps the problem isn't the drivers but the ccc? I know ati tray tools work well as a ccc replacement on the desktop but not sure on notebooks. So why don't u give that a try? Then perhaps let us know if there's any positive results

 

I got my first GSOD and BSOD today . Happened one after another, sigh...
It's fine now, though... So I'm not gonna change anything yet

 

Ya, it seems that the problem is the CCC. 9.12 didn't work, 10.3 - 10.6 didn't work. Just becoming a pain in the uninstalling and reinstalling every time this happens because it's such a hit and miss type of problem. This was Asus' advice:

"Dear Valued Customer,

Thank you for contacting ASUS Customer Service.
Please try to update the latest BIOS, I suggest you use the winflash utility to update the BIOS in the windows mode. Please firstly download the winflash utility and the latest BIOS, install the winflash utility, run it and then set the path to the BIOS, then flash. You can download the utility and the BIOS from the following website:

BIOS: ASUSTeK Computer Inc.-Support-

Winflash: ASUSTeK Computer Inc.-Support-
Please make sure that the power not cut during the operation.After that access bios by pressing F2 while the asus logo appears and load manufacture default, then press F10 save and exit."

 

I really wouldn't advice using the Winflash nonsense, using easy flash in the bios is the way to go.

 

When you guys are talking about tweaking the GPU clock speeds, I don't see anyone mentioning voltages... Doesn't the voltage need to be decreased/increased when you're changing GPU clock speeds, or does that have more to do with CPU clock tweaking? Just curious.

By the way, I'm using BIOS 209 with the ATI stock GPU drivers (10.1, right?) and I have never experienced a GSOD while gaming. I'm about to try out 10.5 because someone mentioned that they might be stable with the new BIOS, but after reading all the problems you guys have been having, I'm not so sure now...

 

Voltages increase are used only for insure stability for extreme overclocking. In our case it is not needed. Give a try 10.6 they give nice performance increase in many games. If you will have issues with these drivers you can always revert back for stock ones, that are stable for you.

 

Hey everyone, first to introduce myself. I am Mongo. Now that thatis settled.

I purchased the best buy version of the G73 about a month ago. While playing mostly games based on cryptics engine I experienced no problems, except in extremely dense environments I would get a black screen, have sound, and the system would lock up requiring a hard shutdown. This led me to upgrade my graphics drivers/ccc, big mistake. As soon as I got back up and playing the same thing would happen, but now it was way more often and in areas that had never seemed to have caused the lock ups before. I reverted to the oem drivers/software after booting in safemode and running driver cleaner. This fixed the black screen lock ups except for the rare occasion mentioned above. After, countless searches of different forumns I found the pearls of wisdom here that work for some. I have not tried them yet. What I did try was reinstalling the newer driver/ccc and turning off dynamic lighting. No issues after many days of game play on different games. While this might only be my scenario, I am wondering how many people are playing their games with dynamic lighting turned on when they are getting the random lock ups and crashes. ATI has had issues in the past with this and their z-buffer and they do still show there face in this card. (Note: I am not tryign to start a ATI/Nvidia debate or anything else of the sort.) I will continue to play and try to get the lock ups to occur, but as stated above with dynamic lighting off I haven't seen them since the switch.

 

Well, my endeavors was to get things working without having to turn off features, or disable options. You may wish to check my last sig link for newer information.

 

I've notice that the powerplan influences the rate of GSOD I get, I get almost none at High Performance, and plenty on the others

 

The OC trick causes the ATI drivers to disable all powersaving features, and gives a small voltage kick.

 

I just installed 10.7 and I get GSOD all the time, at time the vertical lines appear for a few seconds and than disappear, I get occasional flickering during games (not all) so I know a GSOD is approaching, the funny thing is that it feels like the lottery, at times I can play for hours without a GSOD, at others I have to reboot even twice per match (online game ~50 minutes per match)
sometimes the screen shuts down but I can still hear the music, at others I get vertical lines and a buzz sound in the speakers, I hard reset in both times,
didn't have any of these problems under stock drivers, might revert back to them

 

Rorage: after much debate with the techs, it will be neccessary to redo the thermals on the GPU. See my blurb in the 10.7 driver thread for more info. Asus has been monkeying with the timings in the drivers which is why they are stable, but run hot. Redoing the paste and pads will allow for the ATI supplied driver setting to work as they should. So if you want a fix, you need to do it. No software mod/clock setting will fix it, just make it less likely to crash, but it will inevitably.

 

So maybe ordering it with IC Diamond 24 Carat Thermal Compound in the first place instead of the stock compound maybe fixes the problems since the supliers needs to add it again.

 

in a month (when I get back home) that;s the first thing I will do, than I will tell you guys how it went

 

Based on the video I found on Youtube, G73JH disassembly looks like a huge pain. I'm kinda scared to even consider it, much less give it a whirl. I have good thermal paste on hand, as well as the right size screwdrivers, but I'm still intimidated. I don't want to ruin my laptop.

Can ASUS fix it with an RMA? Do we trust them to replace the thermal grease and pads at our request?

As an aside, I've noticed that my spacebar doesn't always actually work and I end up backspacing to add spaces more often than I should. Is there anything that can be done about that?

 

Disable touchpad in bios to prevent missing keystrokes. Alternative is to uninstall the synaptics drivers and use the PS/2 mouse driver windows installs. Just disabling it in windows wont help and if you uninstall synaptics you wont be able to disable it in windows anymore besides loosing most of the nice functions you have now.

 

Sending your laptop for RMA is like lottery look this post http://forum.notebookreview.com/6569221-post497.html
But you can try, maybe you will be lucky one.