Game is crushing my PC.

[shushNMD.832]

Game is crushing my PC.

First of all my specs are:

• Intel i5 2500k
• 8GB Corsair DDR3 RAM
• Gigabyte Radeon R9 280x Vapor-x 3GB GDDR5
• Asus P8H61-M LX motherboard
• Windows 8.1
• I use 2 monitors, but they are pared to a different devices. Onboard and Vcard.
• Nothing is overclocked.

I bought the game on GOG recently. And over all it runs very smooth even with all settings maxed out (including ubersampling), but my problem is that this game keep crushing my PC. Once in a while during gameplay my rig would just halt into black screen and require a hard reset, nothing else works. The timescale for this is always different, sometimes I get about 30 mins of gameplay, other times I could be playing for hours. Sadly the outcome is always the same.
I didn't use any mods that came with the GOG version of the game.

Things I've already tried:

• Reinstalled the game on different HDDs/Drives numerous times.
• Turned off ubersampling, SSAO, VSYNC, nothing helped.
• Checked my Windows for errors with sfc /scannow command. In vain.
• Reinstalled my drivers repeatedly.
• Checked my temperatures and everything is ok there. (I have a Kulo heatsink which is water based)

Please, is there anything else I can do? Or should I shelf it? I'm new to Witcher series and this is kinda dissapointing.
Is there any know fix to this?

 

[GuyNwah]

This game is one of the most brutal tests of computer stability out there, and a few computers that are stable in ordinary tests and other games will fail on it.

On reviewing the BIOS history for your motherboard, I see 8 "system stability" updates out of 10. I don't know how to put it politely, but a bottom-end motherboard model that has needed 8 updates in 3 years entirely or mainly for system stability, well, is suspect.

First, review the BIOS version, and if it's not the latest (4601, dated 2014.05.22), update it.

 

[shushNMD.832]

Thanks for a quick replay, Guy N'wah

I'm currently updating everything that is motherboard related (You were right about my BIOS being out of date). I will post results.

---------- Updated at 09:00 PM ----------

Hi again, Guy N'wah,

Unfortunately BIOS (as well as rest of MB drivers) update did not resolve my issue with the game. I managed only a solid 15 minutes of gameplay this time around. I was monitoring my temperatures and on point of crash my GPU was at 48C and CPU at 42C, so overheating is definitely ruled out...

And Windows EventViewer doesn't help me to pinpoint the problem... The only error I get there is a crash log: "The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused if the system stopped responding, crashed, or lost power unexpectedly."

 

[GuyNwah]

Always try the cheapest fix first, unfortunately, it didn't pay off. The next suspects in line are the power supply and the graphics card itself. Next, what is your power supply (make, model, how old)? The R9 280X is a heavy load, 250 W at full load, more for a factory overclocked card like yours.

 

[shushNMD.832]

PSU model is Cougar 700CM (700 W). And it's about 2 years old.
The GPU is not overclocked. All is stock.

 

[GuyNwah]

PSU model is Cougar 700CM (700 W). And it's about 2 years old.
The GPU is not overclocked. All is stock.

Any way of borrowing and substituting a known good power supply? "Cougar" is HEC's line of counterfeit Enermax look-alikes. They have terrible regulation and can cause hard-to-pin-down problems.

 

[shushNMD.832]

Any way of borrowing and substituting a known good power supply? "Cougar" is HEC's line of counterfeit Enermax look-alikes. They have terrible regulation and can cause hard-to-pin-down problems.

There's a way, but it might take a while. Is the game THAT heavy on a system that it even concerns a PSU? I mean I don't really get any performance issues, just a random and total system crash. What is more weird is: I have my second monitor hooked up to an onboard integrated chip, and when the system crashes, my main monitor goes black, but the second one still shows a portion of desktop (no it's not responsive) and can do it indefinitely, till hard reset of course.

 

[Sardukhar]

. What is more weird is: I have my second monitor hooked up to an onboard integrated chip, and when the system crashes, my main monitor goes black, but the second one still shows a portion of desktop (no it's not responsive) and can do it indefinitely, till hard reset of course.

That is unusual. I feel your pain, having spent days getting my new video cards to work in my system.

Isolate, isolate, isolate.

Here's the software process I generally use, before playing hardware games:

[Edit: Oh and try it with just one monitor. I had a vid card issue displaying certain games with more than one monitor. It was something to do with the plug for the second monitor on my card. Card went back, new card is fine.]

1) Check if the problem is occuring in other applications. Check thoroughly. Run Furmark and/or Futuremark for an hour or so, see if you can crash your system that way. Idea is to isolate it away from the Witcher. If the crash ONLY happens in the Witcher 2, no other software, that does make it a bit harder to narrow down, ironically.

Temperature monitors can be accurate, or less so. Check the VRM temps using GPU-Z sensor tab. You can see reasonable GPU temps and meanwhile, your VRM is shooting up above 120 C. Even so, if you have a hardware issue, your otherwise reasonable temperatures can still be causing crashes.

2) Of course, you probably tried this, but proceeding on the idea it's a video issue, try rolling back drivers. You're probably fully up to date, but try older ones.Pick one a few months old - you can find many at guru3d.com.

3) Guy already had you check and update your BIOS - also consider declocking your GPU and your CPU.

4) This may be obvious, but have you tried a New Game? Start a new game in Dark mode, ( For MEN! Or women, if you're one. I suppose.) and muck around for a couple hours fighting, see if you can crash it. Alternatively, get a save from someone here and try that. No, you can't have mine. It's Precious! Get away!

5)Sound issues. We looove these. Update your sound card drivers, probably motherboard based. May have to try an earlier driver as well. Consider diabling the onboard sound in your BIOS as well.


These are your most likely culprits, short of -ugh- hardware issues. Hardware could be mainboard, power supply, a particular RAM stick gone off, etc.

Irregular delays in an app crashing generally mean either heat issues, voltage issues or RAM/HDD issues as the data gets stuck in/accessed from a bad place eventually.

One other fast-ish trick I've used is, pull the drive W2 is on and plug it into another machine. Don't forget your save games. If that works, you've narrowed down a couple things, (probably a messed up HDD) that just uninstalling and reinstalling W2 might not fix.

 

[SanktGero]

2) Of course, you probably tried this, but proceeding on the idea it's a video issue, try rolling back drivers. You're probably fully up to date, but try older ones.Pick one a few months old - you can find many at guru3d.com.

Hi,
I played The Witcher 2 smooth on my AMD-System (FX-6300, Radeon 280) and got the same System-Shutdown-Problem after installing the new Catalyst-Omega-Driver. Switching back to Catalyst 14.9 solved the problem for me.

 

[shushNMD.832]

Hi,
I played The Witcher 2 smooth on my AMD-System (FX-6300, Radeon 280) and got the same System-Shutdown-Problem after installing the new Catalyst-Omega-Driver. Switching back to Catalyst 14.9 solved the problem for me.

Yes, I've tried. Sadly, I fried my video card, or rather the game fried my card. I had to return it back to the store. (luckily the damned thing was on warranty still).
So I have another one right now, and I am wondering if this is a time for round 2, or should I just avoid it like plague?

 

[Sardukhar]

Yes, I've tried. Sadly, I fried my video card, or rather the game fried my card. I had to return it back to the store. (luckily the damned thing was on warranty still).
So I have another one right now, and I am wondering if this is a time for round 2, or should I just avoid it like plague?

Ahhh..the game fried your card? That's not really possible. To deliberately fry a video card, you'd have to force an overvoltage situation, drive the temperatrue up crazy high or...something else truly complicated. Needless to say, video games can't really do this.

What can happen is either a) you have a really idiosyncratic system where any serious demand made on the video card was enough to crash it, by any software source or most likely b) you had a faulty card waiting to crash on you.

Bet on b. If Witcher 2 could fry video cards - or any other piece of electronics - someone would have noticed that feature by now. That incredibly-difficult-to-create feature. Hackers would love to know how to do that, for example.

That said, it depends on why your card died. If you do have a system-wide issue, it can happen again. The power supply and motherboard would be the culprit and pretty much any graphics-intensive application will start killing the card.

But again, I seriously doubt it. Odds are, it was a bad card and you are good to go now.

 

[shushNMD.832]

Ahhh..the game fried your card? That's not really possible. To deliberately fry a video card, you'd have to force an overvoltage situation, drive the temperatrue up crazy high or...something else truly complicated. Needless to say, video games can't really do this.

What can happen is either a) you have a really idiosyncratic system where any serious demand made on the video card was enough to crash it, by any software source or most likely b) you had a faulty card waiting to crash on you.

Bet on b. If Witcher 2 could fry video cards - or any other piece of electronics - someone would have noticed that feature by now. That incredibly-difficult-to-create feature. Hackers would love to know how to do that, for example.

That said, it depends on why your card died. If you do have a system-wide issue, it can happen again. The power supply and motherboard would be the culprit and pretty much any graphics-intensive application will start killing the card.

But again, I seriously doubt it. Odds are, it was a bad card and you are good to go now.

Of course I dont seriously believe that the game can fry my vcard
What I believe though is that it did push it to the limit, where that faulty piece of hardware just give away.

So far the the new one performs without any issues.

 

[Sardukhar]

Of course I dont seriously believe that the game can fry my vcard
What I believe though is that it did push it to the limit, where that faulty piece of hardware just give away.

So far the the new one performs without any issues.

Great! Just keep an eye out for any errors. Like I said, it was probably the videocard, (I had to send one back a few weeks ago myself, a Powercolour 290x card. Get what you pay for, I guess), but just watch your system for oddnesses, especially when anything is drawing heavily on it.

 

[Vincentdante]

I would seriously consider replacing the PSU as Guy suggested, cheap PSU's are known to fry expensive hardware. I wish you luck in finally getting to play this awesome game.

 

[shushNMD.832]

Don't want to start a new thread, so I'll just post here again.

Is this a well known thing that the game crushes after alt-tab?

 

[hyperionx]

Don't want to start a new thread, so I'll just post here again.

Is this a well known thing that the game crushes after alt-tab?

I have the same problem, when I alt + tab does crash and returns to the desktop.

Also the game crashes during gameplay i guess due to the omega driver who stops working and then windows fixes, but the game meanwhile is crashed.

I have a cooler master psu mII from 1000w
a r9 290x tri-x sapphire
I7 3820
16 GB quad channel ddr3
ASUS sabertooth x 79
840 pro SSD samsung
OS. Windows 8.1 pro (x 64)

in my opinion, amd has created omega drivers using the a.s.s., which is why many games have problems, but perhaps you know a solution?

 

[GuyNwah]

Many games don't survive being alt-tabbed reliably. In general, applications that take over the screen and exclusive use of the GPU are going to have trouble when they have to release them. My experience is this game is fairly reliable but not totally so in that respect.