z70va crashing

I've had my z70va for about 3 months now, and just recently it has started crashing while I'm gaming. (Blue screen then just restarts)

When windows reboots it gives me the "system has encountered a serious error" message saying something about an unknown driver causing the error...

If anyone has any advice that might help please share, because this is very frustrating. (I'm pretty sure my drivers are all up to date, using Catalyst Mobile 6.13)

And it only seems to happen while gaming, which lead me to believe it may be a overheating issue, but I'm not sure.

 

Eeeeeek. Started happening after you upgraded your video drivers? I suggest trying the older ones, the catalyst 6.2's and see if the problem continues.

Could be some kind of driver conflict as well.

Overheating of course is of concern and maybe is the reason, but I doubt that since it just recently started happening. Which game in particular or does it happen in all games?

 

I heard some rumours about overheating Z70's.

So, check your temps, son

And you may want to check this forum, too. There's a guy there that milled his own costum heatsink

 

Z70's overheating? I dunno, never heard about that, these babies stay pretty cool even without tinkering with undervolting.

I believe the custom heatsink was done on a Z71 not a Z70.

Wow I didn't know flaxx was a mod over there, haha.

 

Heh.. Beats me, I dunno

 

I assume its an driver issue, although I am not a professional in this field.

I've had quite a similar issue with my desktop a year ago when playing Call of Duty.

When sorting out the cause of the problem I concluded my drivers needed to be updated. After I'd done that the problem was solved.

In your case, you might try, as mentioned above, to downgrade your drivers again and see what happens.

Furtmore, could you tell me whether it occurs with only one game or with all games? And did it started shortly after you changed something for instance, installed the new drivers etc...

 

I had similar issues when I upgraded the drivers on my M6ne, = z70. Tried going back to stock but still had issues, ended up getting the m/b replaced which fixed the issue. First things first I would go back to the stock ASUS drivers, if problems persist try a clean instal of xp, if still no luck take it back to the shop.
a

 

I have tried multiple video drivers, including the stock Asus drivers, but to no avail.

I can't remember if there was one certain thing that I did that seemed to trigger it, but I can't think of anything. The main game I play is WoW, but it has also happened during BF2, CS, WC3, and SC.

 

Bluescreen while gaming can be caused by bad ram which is the leading cause for blue screens.
http://www.memtest.org/download/1.65/memtest86+-1.65.iso.zip
1. Start Nero Burning-rom
2. In Nero go to "Copy and Backup" tab.

3. Select "Burn Image to Disk"

4. Under file types select all files and point to the ISO file you just downloaded.

5. Presto! After the image has been burned you can boot your computer with the cd. You have to make sure bios is set to boot from cd before hard drive.

 

Eeeeeeyah. So this happens in a lot of games eh?

Go along with what Eddie said above, try to find another set of ram modules you can test, or try the memtest like Eddie stated above.

Hope it's not bad ram so you have to spend money, unless it's still under warranty.

Heck, kind of a good excuse to get better ram, no?

 

I'm only using 1 stick of RAM, and I ran Memtest for over an hour and it found no errors.

I'm gonna try switching back to Asus' stock drivers again...just have a feeling that's the problem.

 

Alas...to no avail.

Uninstalled my Mobile Cayalyst 6.3 and installed Asus stock drivers, but I crashed again while playing WoW...sigh, how frustrating.

 

Very frustrating. Just for safe measure did you check your vents to see if anything is blocking them up?

 

Yea, vents are fine.

I talked to Rick at ISTNC (where I bought my laptop), and he said it's probably a software issue, and that if that's the case, I'll have to pay for shipping/labor costs, which doesn't sound very appealing. But if I send it in and it turns out to be hardware they would pay all costs.

Decisions, decisions...

Anyone have anymore advice they think may be of any relevence? Please share if so.

 

Try a fresh install of XP....it sounds identical to the problems I had, I still dont know exactly what the problem was, the store and ASUS couldnt figure it out either, but a new m/b fixed it. But if it is software than a fresh install is the easiest way to go back.
a

 

Yeup, to save yourself some money incase it is a software issue do as Underpantman says and reinstall windows.

Hopefully it's software related and not hardware related so you don't have to send in your unit.

Goodluck,
Mike

 

Show me the error message, as detailed as possible. Otherwise, it's a guessing game -.-" A shot of device manager and the error message (blue screen) would help a lot.

-Aphirat

 

As soon as it goes to blue screen my computer restarts, happens instantly.

But this time when it restarted Windows gave me some information.

Here's the error report from Microsoft's website:

Error type Windows stop error (A message appears on a blue screen with error code information)
Solution available? Yes
What does this error mean? You received this message because a device driver installed on your computer caused the Windows operating system to stop unexpectedly. This type of error is referred to as a "stop error." A stop error requires you to restart your computer.
Cause A video adapter device driver
Computer symptoms A message appears on a blue screen with error code information:

STOP 0x000000EA THREAD_STUCK_IN_DEVICE_DRIVER
- or -
STOP: 0x100000EA THREAD_STUCK_IN_DEVICE_DRIVER_M

Tells me the solutions are to install the most current driver for my video card. (Tried ATI's and Asus' most current drivers, still get the rror with both)

OR

Manually decrease Hardware Acceleration for your video adapter.

That doesn't sound like a very appealing option...I'm a fairly hardcore gamer, and I would imagine that turning my hardware acceleration off as it suggests would serverely hamper my performance in games.

If anyone has any info, please share. (Also emailed Rick form ISTNC with this new info, hopefully he gives me some good news)

 

U dont seem to want to do a fresh instal, so here is some alternative advice, go to driverheaven, do a seach there, there is a heap of info on notebook driver issues. They will most likey suggest using driver cleaner to remove all traces of your video drivers.
a

 

Oh this looks good actually. Seems like a device driver issue.

I've had this happen before. You should be able to get rid of this by reinstalling windows, which is the easy way out, or the hard way by trying to figure out the driver conflict.

I say uninstall every single driver on your system and then reinstall them. Your video drivers should be uninstalled and then use driver cleaner pro to make sure everything is gone. Then reinstall them.

I strongly believe there is no hardware problem now. Hope I'm right.

Edit:: ****, I take that back, your heatsink could be misplaced, but I don't think so, since laptop heatsinks are straight forward and don't have much room for error.

 

I have already uninstalled every driver, wiped with Driver cleaner, and reinstalled.

Still crashing.

I currently don't have the means do to a clean Windows install, so...

 

Aiya, get yourself a copy from a friend or something, before you do the painful return of your unit.

If it really is a software conflict you are going to be pissed off once you get the bill for it from Asus.

 

Didnt you get ASUS restore discs with your laptop???
These will give you a clean install of XP
a

 

Yes, plz use the driver from the CD first. If you download it from online, sometime not all the package arrive and it could cause error during installation. It seems like the driver you installed have some missing instruction and cause an infinite loop of calculation to start. Where did u get the drivers from?

 

I must admitt, your problem is identical to the one I had, my gut feeling is that you will have to get the m/b replaced. But before you do this, you will need to have restored to orginal ASUS config, and have a simple method for demonstrating the problem...eg running 3Dmark.
I think in my case it was the installing of omega drivers which may have altered the stock clock settings on the gpu maybe??, which inturn caused stability issues with the gpu, much like overclocking the cpu....damage may have been done and thus no matter what driver.. problems persisted.
I hope for you a clean instal will solve the issues.
Not that I want to advocate downloading/stealing but there are plenty of ways to get hold of a copy of XP...to at least try and solve your issues.
a

 

I don't know where my discs are....my family lives in New Orleans, and I was helping move stuff around (from Hurricane Katrina) and my discs got lost in the mess. =(

What can I do?

 

Oh no. Hope your family's okay.

I guess you could contact your reseller and let them know your situation with the cd's. Maybe they'll send you another copy for 5 bucks or something.

Goodluck,
Mike

 

You can download the whole thing off of Asus website. Just type in z70va search on their support page.

 

If you're in college now, then I suggest asking around if your school is in agreement with microsoft to use their softwares at a much lower price (not sure if high schools have some form of program like that). That is what I did and I got my Windows XP pro cd for 18 buck shipped (Free, If I had downloaded the whole thing off of the site) and that's what I used for my z70va. FYI, that's completely legal cuz my school has this contract with microsoft.
I know how you feel about blue screens. Way back in 2002 when I first got my lappy, I got those blue screens every time the computer warmed up. I looked all over the internet for the cause nd the two main ones I can remember off the top of my head that caused blue screens were

1. Incompatible drivers
2. Loose hardware somewhere

Unfortunately, the people I bought it from were jerks and ripped me off (which is another story in itself). But getting off track here.

Anyhow, I suggest if you opened your lappy up before, check for loose hardware that you may have accidently loosened. If not that, then yes, a clean install of XP is the best bet. If its still blue screening after the clean install, then its most likely hardware problem. Good luck with your problem man. Hope you can get it fixed soon.

_Sonny