CYBERCRASH 2077 TIMES (IS IT A WIN 7 ISSUE?)

[MacsenLP]

I've been having crash issues since purchase currently I've reached a part of the game where they have become extremely frequent, every few mins (Konpeki Plaza Main Quest Line). I purchased on GOG and have analytics on and have been sending crash reports since the 10th. I've played about 125 hours and ironically nearly had a crash per hour on average 124 according to the compressed amount in AppData/Local/REDEngine/ReportQueue. (Feels like more). I had to delete most of the non compressed files since they took up so many GB in space.

I'd say 90%+ of the crashes have been graphics card driver crashes with a kernel message if my memory is correct. Basically the screen goes black for a min or two before it recovers, GOG Galaxy often crashes as well. Once the driver has crashed I have to restart my PC, it won't run the game otherwise it then crashes before the intro every time.

My PC Specs are Win 7 (fully updated) Intel i7-3820 @3.6ghz 16GB Ram 1660ti gigabyte graphics card (460.89 drivers). 1920-1080 resolution. No overclocks. The game defaults to high settings on my computer but I've been playing mainly on low settings to try to prevent crashes. More recently I've nerfed crowd texture and field of view settings to minimums as well but I'm still getting frequent crashes. My PC temps seem fine about 70 max for the card less for the CPU.

I bought on GOG because I wanted to support CD Project Red, until now 99% of my purchases have been on steam. Also because I believe you have a 30 day money back guarantee which sadly I might be taking you up on... I've diligently tried to get through the frequent crashing, the games good if over-hyped and hollow/lacking in some areas and obviously released way before it should have been. At this point I've had enough and can play it no longer without a fix, my enjoyment of the game has been harmed too much. If I had to guess phone calls and scans are big causes of crashes but far from the only ones.

I'd be interested to know how other Win 7 users are faring. I know it's an out of date OS but CDPR didn't have to say they would support it... frankly I don't know if Win 7 is the cause of my problems or not. I've considered my graphics card may be faulty but no other game I've played this year has remotely the same issues certainly no kernel failure with any other game not even once. Had a couple games restart my computer on rare occasions and I fixed that by lowering settings in e.g. Civ 6 but I have never had that type of crash happen with Cyberpunk 2077.

If anyone that thinks they can help can respond that would be great, if you need more details please let me know; perhaps all Win 7 users are in the same boat possibly Win 10 is similar I don't know?

 

[BrokeMyNinja]

I am also a Windows 7 user, see my sig for full rig setup.

The crashes have gotten very minimal for me each day that goes by. Im crashing a lot less now, especially since I can narrow down what im doing that causes most of the crashes.

However your issue with the Kernel Mode Driver is fairly common with many 3D applications/games. This is a result of installing a new driver on top of the old. NVidia Drivers have this issue of not cleaning all of the older versions files out and leaves enough old files that can still be picked up and read by the new driver but causes conflicts in the process.

These steps, taken carefully as they are very straight forward will 99.9% fix your issue with the Kernel Mode Driver failure. This tool is used by professional Developers, IT users and Gaming Enthusiasts

1. Download your latest driver and save it to your desktop.
2.Google DDU (Display Driver Uninstaller); either the Guru3d or the official Wagnardsoft sites will have safe links for the file and save that to your desktop.
3. Install DDU, it will create a folder with the version number. Open that folder and launch the DDU exe.
4. When it launches, make sure that your Windows Driver Update is turned off, it will give you a button for that on the right. This prevents windows from installing a base NVidia/AMD Video driver when you uninstall your current video driver. If its already disabled it will say to set it to default (automatically install drivers).
5. Select from the drop down on the right your Video Card type (NVidia or AMD)
6. On the left select the Clean and Restart.
7. Let it go through its thing, your PC will reboot and come back to a LOW RESOLUTION login screen and desktop.
8. Now, install that new video driver you downloaded.

Repeat this every time you wish to install or update your PC with a new graphics card. Its just 5 minutes of your time to avoid these annoying errors.

Now for other issues to help your performance just a tad. Best to delete your config file, do a Verify/Repair so it will download a fresh default one. Dont modify the config files themselves as ive found that doing so increases the risk of crashes.

- Disable Chromatic Aberration, Motion Blur, Film Grain.
- Put SSR (screen space reflections) on Low (the difference between Low and Ultra is so minuscule its not funny). Psycho is another story.
- Fog Resolution to Low, Fog Volume Medium/High.
- Shadows all to medium. (dont know why this eats up so much frames but it does)

 

[MacsenLP]

Hi BrokeMyNinja thanks for your advice. I downloaded the program must admit the warnings on it are pretty intimidating. I've previously done a clean installation with the nvidia software and I use Ccleaner but I've had 3 graphics cards with this machine (2 previously amd) so it could potentially be the issue.

I think I'll use the software at some point but at the moment I don't even feel like playing the game. I might wait for the next patch or try a few other things maybe even get Win 10 but we'll see. If I use it and it works or not I'll post again, thanks.

 

[Shoklen]

Running Win 10 here and I've only had two game crashes with about 150hr+ gametime.

This is a tough one but I do believe they mentioned win 7 is no longer officially supported by windows and while it may run the game the OS is very old now and just not updated. It could be that windows 7 handles memory differently then 10 when it comes to this engine. Could try different memory compatibility modes; but all will be older (being sub windows 8).

You never know, I once found the crashing issue for a friend running EQ2 (back in 2012) where the engine didn't like the memory installed on that one system.. So a System / OS / Engine issue.. That was fun to diagnose.. Ugh.. But they never crashed after. I'll I'm saying here is that you never can really know what could be causing the crashing issue.

I have to ask though, why windows 7 still? The current version of 10 is stable and "zippy" and (at least I've) never had an issue with it. You can make it look the same as 7, boot right to desktop, replace the start menu if you want... It's also free to download and install, and use (fully) but you will have a watermark in the lower corner of the desktop (no other real limitations). You may still be able to even upgrade for free (which was offered years ago). You can also easy make an USB installation stick, so no needs for installations CDs or drives.

If it's the older system your worried about, I just retired using my i5 3750 a month ago, and win 10 ran fine as well.

It just might be time to go to windows 10. heh.

 

[NettiWelho]

I have to ask though, why windows 7 still?

Personally I have not moved onto win 10 is because I find the privacy policy utterly objectionable, I am absolutely not ok with microsoft scanning my local text documents for wrong-think and uploading them to microsoft servers without my permission, if anyone tried that in person I'd be within my rights to use physical force to stop it, nor am I ok with microsoft deciding when it is ok to shut down my computer or begin a software installation procedure that locks up parts of my system I might want to be accessing, I have plenty of negative experiences from windows 10 from my work machine I have to use win 10 on due to workplace policy

perhaps all Win 7 users are in the same boat possibly Win 10 is similar I don't know?

I was able to mostly fix GPU related crashes in cyberpunk on my windows 7 machine by downclocking my RAM back to stock speeds and upping the stock voltage by few notches, this despite the RAM appearing stable in memtest, prime95 etc and not causing issues anywhere else

 

[MacsenLP]

Why not Windows 10... lots of reasons I want to keep my Win 7 install, but it's on a 250gb samsung ssd sticking two operating systems on it isn't going to work space wise. My 8 year old motherboard only has 2 SATA 6GB slots I think 4 3GB so I only really want two hard drives and since I have a 3TB mechanical as well for storage that uses up all my 6GB slots. None the less I am tempted to buy another ssd for putting Win 10 on but that means spending more money on an old computer when I should be saving up for a new one and I'm poor anyway so spending money on anything is an issue.

Also another good reason perhaps the best is CDPR said the game should work on Win 7 despite it being old and out of date, and they should keep to their word. Now it might be a problem on my end that's causing many of these crashes I don't know... but I'm certain it's not entirely.

Also Win 10 isn't without issues from what I gather, adverts etc.

EDIT I wrote most this before NettiWelho's post, yeah I agree what he said in regards Win 10

The RAM angle is interesting why would it be that and not the VRAM though if it's a graphics card driver issue???

 

[NettiWelho]

The RAM angle is interesting why would it be that and not the VRAM though if it's a graphics card driver issue???

from what little testing I have done, if I push my 2666mhz rated RAM to 3400mhz I can still boot my machine but it begins to fail silently (errors crop up in memtest, no hard system lockup) and If I do a 3dmark benchmark at those speeds 3dmark thinks theres a CPU timing problem despite problem lying with RAM not being quite able to keep up, if I drop speed to 3333mhz all synthetic stress tests pass with flying colors but cyberpunk crashes, and when I drop speeds even further cyberpunk crashes drop dramatically

 

[MacsenLP]

My RAMS pretty dated 2 sticks of 8GB DDR3 1600 MHz corsair vengeance no over/under clocking. I bought the second stick on the cheap last year. I don't really know how RAM works does it only use 1 stick up until the 8gb is reached before the next? It occurred to me when it's using over 8gb if the second ram stick was faulty it could be an issue???

 

[NettiWelho]

My RAMS pretty dated 2 sticks of 8GB DDR3 1600 MHz corsair vengeance no over/under clocking. I bought the second stick on the cheap last year. I don't really know how RAM works does it only use 1 stick up until the 8gb is reached before the next? It occurred to me when it's using over 8gb if the second ram stick was faulty it could be an issue???

separately bought RAM could cause issues, even if they're the same model they might have components from different manufacturers in them since they were not paired as a kit, do they have the same version numbers listed on them? Memtest86 is a free piece of software you can boot off an USB stick to see if the memory has any obvious problems

does the problem occur if you play with only one stick?

 

[MacsenLP]

Same memory sticks, version numbers, manufacturer etc. Not tried with one stick but perhaps I should

 

[MacsenLP]

Got a tiny bit to update on my issues getting this game to work consistently without crashing. Uninstalled the game and deleted the user settings. Then reinstalled and did clean installation of nvidia drivers again haven't used the recommended de-installation program yet still considering it.

Tried to continue off with the Konpeki Plaza storyline where I left off a few days ago, yesterday used med settings with things like crowds anti wotsit and shadows lowered to the minimums. Managed to play 20-30 mins before I had a system restart crash which I'd never had before in 125+ crashes. I think the restart crash occurred when I was saving the game because the last file was corrupted (think quick save). Never had that happen before either.

Today I decided to remove the second stick of ram I bought a year ago see if that was the cause of the issues played the game on low settings this time lasted about 20 mins until I got my usual graphics card driver crash; had just starting a phone convo.

Think I'm gonna try taking out my original 8 year old RAM next and place the newer ram in it's slot on its own see if that does anything. Though I'm doubting it's a RAM issue at this point more likely PSU/Graphics Card/Hard Drive/Drivers or just the game I don't know frankly...

 

[MacsenLP]

I tentatively think I've found what was causing the crashes on my system with Cyberpunk; turns out checking event viewer is a pretty good idea. I had critical errors in there with an id and when I googled that it suggested it was related to audio drivers... Audio drivers crashing a graphics card is not something I'd ever contemplated. I have an old soundcard (Xonar something) in my computer its final driver update released was back in 2012. I deleted the drivers (haven't removed the sound card yet) and installed nvidia audio drivers and geoforce experience which I hadn't used before.

I've played roughly a couple of hours since then without any crashes, it's not the longest I've gone without a crash but I've upped my graphics settings with geoforce optimization tool and got an fps counter as well. FPS is 40-50 on average with current settings which I'm fine with. Turns out game looks quite nice with higher settings and not crashing often makes a big difference to enjoyment. My sound now sucks a bit though.

Perhaps I should have waited 'till e.g. 10 hours played without crashes before posting this update but yeah I'm confident my problems solved. Game actually feels like it's running smoother as well somehow. Thanks guys.

Post automatically merged: Jan 7, 2021

Looks like I was too confident just had a kernel crash. Event viewer Display ID 4101. (Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered.)

 

[BrokeMyNinja]

I tentatively think I've found what was causing the crashes on my system with Cyberpunk; turns out checking event viewer is a pretty good idea. I had critical errors in there with an id and when I googled that it suggested it was related to audio drivers... Audio drivers crashing a graphics card is not something I'd ever contemplated. I have an old soundcard (Xonar something) in my computer its final driver update released was back in 2012. I deleted the drivers (haven't removed the sound card yet) and installed nvidia audio drivers and geoforce experience which I hadn't used before.

I've played roughly a couple of hours since then without any crashes, it's not the longest I've gone without a crash but I've upped my graphics settings with geoforce optimization tool and got an fps counter as well. FPS is 40-50 on average with current settings which I'm fine with. Turns out game looks quite nice with higher settings and not crashing often makes a big difference to enjoyment. My sound now sucks a bit though.

Perhaps I should have waited 'till e.g. 10 hours played without crashes before posting this update but yeah I'm confident my problems solved. Game actually feels like it's running smoother as well somehow. Thanks guys.

Post automatically merged: Jan 7, 2021

Looks like I was too confident just had a kernel crash. Event viewer Display ID 4101. (Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered.)

Interesting. I have the Xonar D2, using the Community Drivers that were released after the last ASUS Official driver release. Ill have to check the event log on my end on the next crash.

Post automatically merged: Jan 7, 2021

Oh if you are interested in the UNi Xonar Drivers which were upkept by the community (unofficial drivers), the last and likely final update was in 2016. I havent had any issues with these drivers.

UNi Xonar Drivers (UnOfficial)

 

[MacsenLP]

Hi BrokeMyNinja just had another crash not sure if you saw my merged edit:

"Looks like I was too confident just had a kernel crash. Event viewer Display ID 4101. (Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered.) "

Probably not sound card I'm thinking now after all, found a guide for "Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered. " errors so trying some things on there. Your program or an equivalent is on there as well so once I've gone through the rest rest of the items if none work i'll be trying it. Changed my windows theme and upped my power settings and pci setting see if that works next.

EDIT Just realized I got 94 of those errors since 10/12/2020 none before are showing up (C2077 Release day) no coincidence. Not solved yet but hopefully getting closer. Thanks for the driver link.

 

[MacsenLP]

Think I've got things to where they are good if not perfect. Not sure if I've solved crashing 100% but it's a heck lot less. Got fed up of trouble shooting during a key part of story so started a new game. In about 10:30 hours. Had 4 crashes (all graphics kernel) only. After 2/3 crashes decided to swap out my display port lead for hdmi on my monitor had 1 or 2 crashes since then but not for about 6 hours play. When it does crash I don't have to restart my computer to get back in to the game unlike the display port lead.

May be a combination of things that has reduced my issues broken display port on graphics card/monitor/faulty sound drivers/some windows settings at this point I've tried so many things I'm not sure what it is but somethings certainly helped. Graphics settings are okay too though FPS has dipped a bit to around 36 (with some dips under 30) with the setting one under geoforce experience optimal recommendation. FPS I mentioned before was near start with nomad.

Future patches definitely need to take a look at phones bugs wise, FPS really dips there and crashes are much more likely. Even had a physical copy of the first fixer appear on top of me while on the phone to her.

Thanks for your help, BrokeMyNinja.

 

[MacsenLP]

Bit of an update:

Patch 1.1 didn't help possibly even slightly increased crashes though hard to tell. I think my FPS is better with the same settings and even raising textures to highest setting on top. Loading a save within a save with 1.1 actually caused very low fps and trying again even a crash outside mox's early in to a new game; don't recall having similar happen before.

So I with 1.1 not solving things I decided to finally bite the bullet and try DDU which "BrokeMyNinja" recommended.

Unplugged internet restarted computer to get into safe mode couldn't get F8 or F11 to work so used msconfig. Turns out I had two or three GPU drivers installed or remnants installed. 000 was my old AMD R9 Strix card 001 was low on details (poss old 7870 card I had but it didn't say that) but an entry was there and 002 was my current 1660 ti. Used the AMD uninstall and it actually got rid of first two entries.

Decided not to delete my Nvidia current drivers using the program, I instead went back in to non Safe Mode to see if computer was still working, it was and did a clean install of the lastest nvidia driver there. Opened DDU the latest nvidia driver is now the 000 option. Then reconnected internet and posted on here.

Time to test the game now. Going to feel pretty dumb if that's been the cause of my crashes, wasn't expecting the AMD drivers etc to show. Guess normal deletion wasn't enough. Intimidating warnings on DDU have put me off from using it.

I'll prob play 10 hours without crash before I post again or straightaway if I get a crash. Next step is maybe using DDU on the nvidia drivers/patch 2.0 or installing Win 10. Hopefully with BrokeMyNinja's good advice the problem is fixed now, crossing fingers.

 

[Goodmongo]

I've posted this in other threads but I'll also add it to this thread. The reason Win 7 crashes is because of DX12. Now before someone gets to being Cptn Obvious or saying something they don't know let me say this. DX12 was not officially supported under Win7 from Microsoft. However, back in spring of 2019 Microsoft allowed game companies to create a version of DX12 for their games. For example a version was created for WOW.

Now in the Microsoft site they say that the game companies are responsible for how DX12 is handled under Win 7. They can create the files or a wrapper that handles DX12 instructions. So CDPR would be the primary responsible party here.

Many of these crashes happen when looking in a mirror or various cut scenes that use a DX12 instruction. The vast majority of these can be gotten past by setting your maximum FPS to 20 under the video option in the menu.

Now CDPR requires DX12 but they also said it would run under Win 7. So the onus is on CDPR. Either fix it by creating a good DX12 file or state that the game won't work under Win 7 and requires Win 10 or later.

The only things Win 7 users can do is to lower the FPS to 20 for certain spots of the game, update to Win 10 or wait till CEDPR gets their damn act together and fixes the DX12 calls.

 

[MacsenLP]

Driver remnant deletion didn't fix my issues if anything seems the game crashes more now. 30 mins 4 crashes. 1st crash doing nothing much in lizzes bar frame rate mid 30's to 40's. GPU crash but not a driver kernel message. Tried to get back into game caused driver kernel crash had to restart computer to get back into game. Not had that happen since I swapped out display port cable for hdmi but now that's a thing again. Then had graphics card kernel crash in sit down dialogue on main quest also another kernel crash trying to get back into game without a computer restart.

I think Goodmongo is right it's a DX12 issue some Win 7 computers may be more prone than others but ultimately it's CDPR releasing a product before adequate testing/over-promising. If 1.2 doesn't fix this problem they need to offer Win 7 users refunds or they deserve to be sued.

 

[BrokeMyNinja]

I've posted this in other threads but I'll also add it to this thread. The reason Win 7 crashes is because of DX12. Now before someone gets to being Cptn Obvious or saying something they don't know let me say this. DX12 was not officially supported under Win7 from Microsoft. However, back in spring of 2019 Microsoft allowed game companies to create a version of DX12 for their games. For example a version was created for WOW.

Now in the Microsoft site they say that the game companies are responsible for how DX12 is handled under Win 7. They can create the files or a wrapper that handles DX12 instructions. So CDPR would be the primary responsible party here.

Many of these crashes happen when looking in a mirror or various cut scenes that use a DX12 instruction. The vast majority of these can be gotten past by setting your maximum FPS to 20 under the video option in the menu.

Now CDPR requires DX12 but they also said it would run under Win 7. So the onus is on CDPR. Either fix it by creating a good DX12 file or state that the game won't work under Win 7 and requires Win 10 or later.

The only things Win 7 users can do is to lower the FPS to 20 for certain spots of the game, update to Win 10 or wait till CEDPR gets their damn act together and fixes the DX12 calls.

Whats crazy is I have even called the DX12on7 a wrapper becuase thats what it is and knew it wasnt directly made by Microsoft, yet I got blasted for it by one member and who claimed it was a true DX12 version ported to Win7 by Microsoft.

Also there is one other thing that causes crashes that I noted in one of my previous posts. Reloading saves multiple times, even if it was loading a save once after you started playing, causes from drops and eventual crashing. The memory keeps stacking causing a memory leak as its not being purged correctly if at all from the previous active session before the reload.