Hey Uber Team and Community! Since today I got a very strange error, which makes planetary annihilation unplayable. So let me explain my error: So I tried to play a multiplayer game as usually. I don't know the exact amount of players, amount of planets, but I think it doesn't matter on that error because it happened for me twice in a row on different games. So everything goes well until I'm able to build the first structures. After ~10 - 15 seconds the screen goes black (it showes no signal) and the cpu fan increases the speed There happens nothing, if I press ALT+F4 or things like CTRL+ALT+DEL. Also the power button doesn't do anything if I pressed it shortly. I really don't like the next step, but there was no way to prevent it: After some long waiting I decided to hold the power button to crash the whole system. After some seconds I restarted the computer. I got the "lenovo", the logo of the company. After the BIOS selected windows 8.1 the screen went black again (no signal). I waited some time again and after some minutes I saw the login screen (seems that windows changed something in the background - i think on the drivers ) Then I saw the expected things: After I logged I saw many squares with different colors on the top of the screen. After that I knew that it must be an error on the graphics card or on the drivers. I decided to download the newest amd 14.4 graphics driver (stable version) again. I installed it and restarted my pc and all was well agin (hopefully). Now the squares are gone and all seems to be fine till I try to play a game and have to start on step 1 again ... So that was the error explaination. I also created a dxdiag.txt before I intalled the drivers again to fix those stupid squares. I hope that there are some guys which can help me fixing this. I also looked for some log files but only found one which was too old for the erros. Anyway, I attached it too, because I saw about 2 or 3 errors in it. Also I want to say sorry for any possible erros in this bug report. This are not my normal english skills. I just wanted to write it today and it is currently very late in my country Thank you guys for your help!
I see really weird part in your DxDiag.txt: Code: --------------- Display Devices --------------- Card name: Microsoft Basic Display Driver Manufacturer: Chip type: DAC type: Device Type: Display-Only Device Device Key: Enum\ROOT\BASICDISPLAY Display Memory: 256 MB Dedicated Memory: 0 MB Shared Memory: 256 MB Current Mode: 640 x 480 (32 bit) (64Hz) Monitor Name: Generic PnP Monitor Monitor Model: E2351 Monitor Id: GSM5872 Native Mode: 1920 x 1080(p) (60.000Hz) Output Type: Other Driver Name: Driver File Version: () Driver Version: Any chance you have integrated graphics enabled?
As I wrote, this is the dxdiag before I updated the graphics driver. I will attach here the dxdiag after the new driver. Seems that pa breaks the whole graphics driver.
I seen it, but I never seen such glitched before in DxDiag or in general (e.g no signal message). I doubt game it's only what cause it so it's can be some hardware fault so what you can do: Check RAM using memtest or any other software. Run some heavy benchmarks, e.g Unigine in OpenGL mode: https://unigine.com/products/heaven/ https://unigine.com/products/valley/ PA using OpenGL so it's those benchmarks going to crash it too it's might indicate problem with GL driver. Check any other stress tests for CPU/GPU. Also can you say what power supply you have? I see you have pre-built PC (IdeaCentre K430), but your graphics card isn't listed on Lenovo website so I suppose you possible manually upgraded it. In this case if your PSU remain the same it's might not powerful enough to handle GPU when it's loaded. Such situation would be really dangerous and might cause hardware damage.
Hello, Your drivers are outdated: Code: Card name: AMD Radeon HD 7700 Series Dedicated Memory: 1006 MB Driver Version: 14.100.0.0 Driver Date/Size: 4/18/2014 04:42:54, 1343272 bytes Please download and install the latest beta drivers from the AMD website: http://support.amd.com/en-us/download/desktop?os=Windows 8.1 - 64#amd-catalyst-packages Scroll down to the bottom of the page to find the beta driver. As @SXX said, if you upgraded your graphics card, your PSU may not be strong enough to handle the GPU when it is loaded. You will want to upgrade your PSU in order to handle the load.
I would say if it's problem caused by PSU then it's have to be upgraded no mater what. When PSU isn't powerful enough it's not just PC can't handle game, but it's high risk of fried motherboard or CPU.
I've seen an error similar to this when my graphics card power plug was loose. Same thing happened, screen goes black with no signal, fans go mad and computer doesn't respond to any input. If you've done any upgrading, check the plugs and power specs.
Ok, thank you gys for the help! Yeah it's true. The system is prebiult and the graphics card is custom. I know also that my PSU is not that strong. I checked the PSU specs of the card and it should be still fine. It has a max. of 250W. So this could be the problem. But why should it happen after months of playing without any problems? I will try the tests for RAM, etc The strange thing is that I played pa with no problem. Since yesterday I experience this problems. Now I need to go to work and will get back to you soon!
It's hard to say why it's appear now, but: Most of cheap PSUs I seen was never able to handle their maximum load. E.g if it's says 250W it's usually mean 240 at best. PSU it's not CPU die or RAM stick which can work for decades in mostly any environment. PSU aren't complicated, but part it's built of have strict lifetime and usage restrictions. Depend on quality of your home electrical network, stability their lifetime and ability to handle load can be different. So PSU might mean that it's no longer can handle the load. PS : Even if your current problem is not caused by PSU you need to replace it as fast as you can with any branded 500W PSU and you'll be safe. Obviously you might be lucky and won't met any problem for years, but from my point of view you have really high chance to damage hardware. In past many of my friends have to replace mobo/GPU because they save on buying proper PSU so I personally recommend everyone to take it serious.
Ye I will do that soon. (thought about a "beQuiet" or "Coolermaster" PSU) On the PSU it says 280W <50°C and 250W >50°C so maybe it got too hot yesterday. (also we had a very hot weather yesterday - today too) I think too that this problem is caused by the PSU, but I will do the benchmarks too, just to be sure Thank you for your help again! I will write an answer regarding to the results soon
Ok, I started the benchmarks. RAM seems to be ok but not the gpu fan. It seems that it is kind of a bit blocked. It doesn't increase the speed to cool the computer after a certain speed level. Idle is fine, but if I start a benchmark then the temperature increased on more than 80°C. After that I stoped the benchmark because it was too risky for me. I think this is the reason for the error. So I need to buy a new gpu card or must hope for a replacement. Because of that I need a new PSU too for the increased power usage. Thank you guys for your help again, you brought me to the right path to find the issue!
