Help solving ASUS g73sw problem?

Sorry in advance for the length - but its complicated!

Hi I have been having some problems recently with my ASUS G73sw. After installing a game on Steam (Company of Heroes) I tried to play it and about 5 minutes into the game the sound crashes (starts stuttering and then stop all together) and then almost a second later the screen freezes (with a still image of the game on the screen) and ctrl+alt+delete dont work, nor do the windows key or shift + tab for steam. The only way to get out of it is to do a force restart.

This happened every time for COH so I decided to go back and play another game on Steam - Left for dead 2. This is a game I had had no problems with and had played for over 40 hours. But then after playing for about 5 minutes again L4D2 now freezes as well. I tried other games in my library and all have the same freezing issue at slightly varying times (all usually with 5 - 20 mins of game play). So I tried a game that wasn't on Steam and got the same results - another freeze that I had to force restart out of.

I tried reinstalling drivers (doing a clean install) and also using backdated drivers as well. After this had no effect I reformatted and it worked fine. I installed L4D2, COH, ect. ect. - No problems, then I go and install a new game - Red Faction Armageddon - and the process has started all over again! affecting all the games on my computer.

I nor ASUS tech support can figure out what is wrong - they suggest a faulty GPU and want me to replace it - but then why does it work for so long after a reformat and then only happens when I install a new game. I'm convinced it must be a software/driver issue but I cant figure out what.

BIOS and drivers are all up to date and the lap top is running cold - no over heating. I've tried running it on various GPU settings and using Direct X 9,10, and 11 - same problem.

Any help from some who knows how to fix this, or has had a similar problem would be greatly appreciated!!!

Thanks and sorry for the lengthy post!

 

skellig44: Can you go to the Computer Management of Windows 7 by typing it in the search box upon clicking the Start menu? Go to Event Viewer/Windows Logs/System. Click "Filter Current Log" on the actions at the right side and check the Critical, Warning, Verbose and Error check boxes then hit OK. Look for the logs that last happened before the game freezes/crashes and let us know.

One thing I could suggest is you try to install the latest Realtek Audio Drivers and see if it solves your problem.

 

Hi JehutyZeroshift, thanks for your response, I tried uninstalling the realtek drivers and playing the games both with them uninstalled and after I had installed them again via the ASUS website - no luck unfortunately. The Event log doesnt supply much clues either unfortunately.

The only Critical, Warning, Verbose and Error events logged are: "Error - The previous system shutdown at 00:15:00 on ‎13/‎01/‎2012 was unexpected." and "Critical - The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused if the system stopped responding, crashed, or lost power unexpectedly." But nothing is logged beforehand to indicate why it froze and I had to do a force shut down.

It's really strange! I can't get my head around what's causing/triggering it off so many weeks after a reformat.

Any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated

Thanks!

 

I don't recommend obtaining your Realtek Audio Drivers from the Asus Website. Get it from the Realtek Website. Ver. 2.67 is the latest, get the " 64bits Vista, Windows7 Driver only (Executable file)" for faster download assuming that you're on Win7 64bit. Also, get the " ATI HDMI Audio Device" Ver. 2.67 and uninstall your previous version and update to this one.

By the way, the error that you have posted was caused by the hard reset that you have done when the freeze/crash occured.

 

Tried updating the drivers from the Realtek webite - My lap top is the SW version so it has a Nvidia 460m card not an ATI. So I downloaded the equivalent from their site as well. No progress unfortunately.

 

Also could it be something to do with the TurboBoost technology on the i7 and the way Windows 7 will dynamically adjust the clock speed based on demand to save power and some setting in Power4Gear Hybrid -that would make sense if the computers trying to ramp up the performance itself within the first minutes of game play. Because there are no effects when trying to do anything else (internet, ect.). I'm going to do a stress test and see if I can get it to crash doing that. Might help narrow it down.

 

Yeah, the furmark GPU stress test froze up about the same time as the games, forcing a restart. So that narrows it down a bit - to what I'm not sure! Any ideas?

 

Ooops, my mistakes about the ATI HDMI Audio Drivers =)

 

It would be more useful if you can post your GPU and CPU temps while under load. Also, are you overclocking?

If you want, we can also RMA the unit to me and I can check it out. If you want this, PM me your personal info and your serial number.

Case: 1635539