[PC] NVIDIA Kernel crash "fix"

[Goofrette]

[PC] NVIDIA Kernel crash "fix"

Hi guys!

Even though I was not particularly affected by crashes playing TW3, they occurred from time to time. Windows kept saying it was caused by the "Nvidia kernel which had stopped working". It also crashed using Chrome... After several inconclusive clean installs of Nvidia drivers (using DDU, no Gefore Experience, no audio drivers etc.), Chrome, Adobe Flash and a full re-install of The Witcher 3, I tried to find another reason.

It turned out it was MSI Afterburner / Rivatuner which were causing the crashes. Disabling them completely stopped the crashes, using Chrome and any other game as well. I feel dumb I didn't find it earlier.

It is of course a work around dedicated to Nvidia cards. You may not even be facing crashes caused by Afterburner but I hope it will help some of you ^_^

PS: I didn't find any other thread mentioning that trick, sorry if there is actually one I didn't see.

 

[Ivasik_Karasik]

Played 200hours with MSI Afterburner, and no crashes.
I use it for fps limit, cuz with game lock i have stuttering.

 

[Goofrette]

I think it depends on the card model, the Nvidia drivers version and the MSI Afterburner/Rivaturner version as well. In my case (and many others I just found on Reddit), turning the later off was the only viable solution.
There may be something Windows-related causing the crash, but I am not motivated to reinstall the OS at the moment. Waiting for Windows 10 :lol:

PS: The kernel used to crash about once every two hours, so it may not concern people reporting frequent crashes of The Witcher 3.

 

[digitalray]

instead of using MSI Afterburner or Rivatuner (Overlay) it's better to use NV Inspector for overclocking (gives you the possibility to create a desktop icon to OC your card to specific settings), it runs for 3 seconds then shuts down itself, so this does NOT run in the background.

For Frame Limiting you can either use the in-game limiter or NV Inspector to set the Frame Limit in the corresponding NVidia Driver Settings for the Game's EXE, so NV Inspector does not need to run either for Driver Frame Limiting.

It's even better to use RivaTunerStatisticServer Standalone! (RTSS)
It's the same tool you would run when using MSI Afterburner, but without MSI Afterburner.

on x64 systems you can't use the overlay, but you can still use the RTSS Frame Limiter which is a lot better than driver or in-game frame limiter and completely eliminates frame time problems and stutter as long as you can keep the minimum framerate you have set.

Turn off On Screen Display in RTSS even if it doesn't work on x64 systems as it's activated on default.

this will keep the game from crashing while making you able to OC the game and use the RTSS Frame Limiter to eliminate Frame Time Stutter.

 

[Goofrette]

Wow, I didn't see your post @digitalray. Thanks for the heads-up. I actually already ended up using Nvidia Inspector to lock the framerate @50fps (no more stuttering!) and disabling MSI Afterburner if I want to play for several hours straight.

So far so good :w00t:. I hope Windows 10, next Nvidia drivers or next Afterburner versions will allow to monitor temps back though!

 

[getomafia]

That's really good to know. MSI Afterburner is my favourite tool for overclocking and monitoring but I may try to disable it and see how is it going.
I still can keep my GPU clock even if I disable Afterburner.