Entire computer freezes frequently

I have this very annoying problem where often while playing gw2 my entire computer freezes. What happens is that the entire screen usually turns yellow and nothing happens anymore. The sound also gets kinda stuck and I only hear some robotlike humming noise from the speaker. Sometimes it also turns black and my computer randomly restarts. This only happens in gw2. This happens very often (for example I played like 5 hours today and it happened 4 or 5 times). Most commonly it happens when an instance ends (for example at the end of a story mission) or at the end of a fractal (when getting teleported back into the lobby). So I guess mostly during loading.I already got a corrupted HDD because of this about a year ago (because I have to force shutdown, since nothing else works), so I had to buy a new HDD, then I stopped playing gw2 because it was so annoying (and because I was frustrated that necro is so weak but w/e). How can I find out what causes this?? If I remember correctly this problem started occuring after one of the bigger win 10 updates, but not sure anymore (maybe I'm confusing it).

@"desu.3104" said:I have this very annoying problem where often while playing gw2 my entire computer freezes.

So, you have a hardware problem, or possibly a driver problem. GW2, like any regular application, literally cannot cause the system to freeze like this without one of those existing. (It may be triggering the problem, even if nothing else does, but that doesn't mean it is the cause, just the thing that happens to cause the bug to occur.)

I already got a corrupted HDD because of this about a year ago (because I have to force shutdown, since nothing else works), so I had to buy a new HDD, then I stopped playing gw2 because it was so annoying (and because I was frustrated that necro is so weak but w/e). How can I find out what causes this?? If I remember correctly this problem started occuring after one of the bigger win 10 updates, but not sure anymore (maybe I'm confusing it).

So, I'd suggest you look at the possibilities of issues coming from these things, in roughly this order:

• power supply to the GPU / CPU being inadequate under full load
• overclocking of GPU (including factory overclocking)
• overclocking of the CPU
• cooling issues for either GPU or CPU coincident with the load
• memory issues - http://www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-memory-diagnostics-tool-in-windows-7

I'd bet on one of those being the cause, with power supply being the most likely cause because you describe a "things go really strange, then we power cycle, and sometimes other things are corrupted as well" sort of situation, which maps to not getting quite enough power ... which can cause all sorts of odd effects on components, corrupt data in flight because the drive loses too much power during the write, etc.

@"SlippyCheeze.5483" said:

• power supply to the GPU / CPU being inadequate under full load
• overclocking of GPU (including factory overclocking)
• overclocking of the CPU
• cooling issues for either GPU or CPU coincident with the load
• memory issues - http://www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-memory-diagnostics-tool-in-windows-7Thanks for the reply.
  • How do I check if the power supply is inadequate?
  • My gpu is factory overclocked, what should I check about it?
  • Cpu isn't overclocked.
  • Gpu cooling might have something to do with it, since one of the fans in my computer does weird sounds and I suspect it is the gpu fan. However I play other games where my gpu is constantly at nearly 100% and I never had such issues. CPU cooling shouldn't be an issue since when a gw2 crash killed my HDD a year ago I bought a new cpu cooler and it didn't fix the problem.
  • I will check for memory issues.

@desu.3104 said:

@"SlippyCheeze.5483" said:

• power supply to the GPU / CPU being inadequate under full load
• overclocking of GPU (including factory overclocking)
• overclocking of the CPU
• cooling issues for either GPU or CPU coincident with the load
• memory issues -
  http://www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-memory-diagnostics-tool-in-windows-7
  Thanks for the reply.
  • How do I check if the power supply is inadequate?

GPU-Z will give you whatever power stats are available via the driver. Watch for things like power level dipping under load, such as in big groups or cities.

You can also do the basic "is it reasonable" math: work out the maximum power consumption of your CPU and GPU, then check your power supply is rated for 25 percent more than that. That gives room for storage devices, etc, without having to work too hard at it. If the power supply isn't rated that far above, consider talking to someone who can advise if there are potential issues there - a local tech savvy person, basically, if you can.

I'd also suggest you just try unplugging and replugging the power leads to the GPU, if you feel comfortable with that. You don't have to, but it helps ensure they have not worked loose and started to have problems because of that.

• My gpu is factory overclocked, what should I check about it?

If it is an NVIDIA card, the "NVIDIA Control Panel" application should have a "debug" menu, which will let you disable that overclocking.

For AMD, I'm not aware of any equally simple out of the box solution.

You can also use more or less any "overclocking" tool to "underclock", which is to say, to reduce the speeds and stuff below the factory levels, and see if that helps. All the NVIDIA debug thing does is underclock from what the BIOS on the card says to the NVIDIA default levels, it just has a one-check-box solution, which I'm always fond of.

• Gpu cooling might have something to do with it, since one of the fans in my computer does weird sounds and I suspect it is the gpu fan. However I play other games where my gpu is constantly at nearly 100% and I never had such issues. CPU cooling shouldn't be an issue since when a gw2 crash killed my HDD a year ago I bought a new cpu cooler and it didn't fix the problem.

GPU-Z also shows thermal stats, and "thermal throttling" on the card. If those seem to be trending higher in GW2 than other things, that might be the cause. Different games have potentially very different usage patterns, and that can mean some will show an issue that others shrug and never experience. Oh, which reminds me:

Also, on the front page of GPU-Z, check that your PCI-E connection is 16x, not 1x. If it is 1x then your graphics card isn't seated in the PCI-E slot properly, which could also be what is going on. Should have thought of that earlier, sorry. Good luck. (If it says 8x or 4x, that is unusual but not the same sign of trouble that 1x is.)

• I will check for memory issues.

I wouldn't expect them, but it is cheap enough to check, so yeah, hopefully it turns up nothing.

I have a 520W psu and my cpu and gpu together require around 300W:

Checked in GPU-Z and it says 16x

Checked memory with windows memory diagnostic and no error was found

Turned on debug mode in nvidia settings and played gw2. At the end of a story mission, when I left the instance, my computer screen turned black and then after a few seconds it restarted automatically.

I had GPU-Z running and logging in the background, pastebin etc wont let me paste it because it's too much so I uploaded the txt file: https://www.file-upload.net/en/download-13134009/GPU-ZSensorLog.txt.html

I will unplug and replug my gpu tomorrow, when I'm at my computer again

Darn. That all sounds pretty good, which is annoying ... and by "annoying" I mean, I don't have anything else to suggest. I'm sorry. I hope you can get to the root cause of this, and I'll be watching the thread to see if you ever do post the resolution.

Just as a small update: I replugged my gpu and also checked pretty much every other cable. After some playing again my computer froze. As I said it usually happens during loading (e.g. when entering an instance or leaving one or when entering a map), if that helps narrow it down.. that's also what makes me wonder if it is even a gpu problem, since it almost exclusively crashes during loading.Is there like an official technical support where I can write a ticket? Or does anyone have any suggestion what I should do now? I would prefer not to lose another HDD because of having to force shut down every day.

@"desu.3104" said:Is there like an official technical support where I can write a ticket?

https://help.guildwars2.com/hc/en-us

Or, you could be out of memory. Leave Task Manager running at all times, so you can see visually if you're running out of memory.

Graphics cards with external PCI 6/8-pin connections often draw more power than usually expected. It takes 75w for a standard graphics card (no external connects) as it's the power taken from the mobo. Chances are, you may have underestimated your total power draw. This has happened to me -- often other cases, you can run into other scenarios.

Also note that other peripherals, such as USB connections, memory, HDD, optical drives -- will add to the total power requirement. If you've added a few components and suddenly find your system going into random restarts, your PSU might be overdrawing. You will need to upgrade it. This was my case, but it might not be for you.

Have you added anything recently before the system started its symptoms?

@"desu.3104" said:I have this very annoying problem where often while playing gw2 my entire computer freezes. What happens is that the entire screen usually turns yellow and nothing happens anymore. The sound also gets kinda stuck and I only hear some robotlike humming noise from the speaker.

Yellow screen = very unhealthy. Sound loop = not good, either.

In addition to what has already been said:

• Are you frequently undusting your PC's insides (including the GPU and the CPU fans)? (You need a brush and a compressed air spray for that.)
• Is there still enough heat-conductive paste on your CPU? (When was the last time it has been applied?)
• Is everything wired/connected properly? (Maybe something isn't and is thereby causing power fluctuations.)
• Have you exchanged the PSU? (If it is damaged, it can damage your other hardware.)
• Are there any unhealthily high hardware temperature readings?
• You said this only happens in GW2. Aren't you ever running any other CPU-heavy 3D applications? (Because if you are not, then saying "This only happens in GW2" is meaningless.)

@Ashantara.8731 said:

• You said this only happens in GW2. Aren't you ever running any other CPU-heavy 3D applications? (Because if you are not, then saying "This only happens in GW2" is meaningless.)

FWIW, @Ashantara.8731, GW2 uses the PCI-E bus way more heavily than many games. Inefficiently, basically, by sending textures to the card repeatedly then discarding them, rather than holding them in GPU memory, or possibly just by having enough different textures that caching them there has a low hit rate. Regardless, this is one of the reasons that GW2 and a few other games will show up a bad PCI-E connection (eg: 1x rather than 16x due to misseated card) as super-slow stuff during play, while other games do just fine except for slow loading.

So, even if it is the only thing showing this, and other 3D games work fine, it can still reveal issues because it uses the GPU differently than other things do.

Thanks for all the replies.

@Daddicus.6128 said:Or, you could be out of memory. Leave Task Manager running at all times, so you can see visually if you're running out of memory.

Well I have 8gb.. but I will see if I can log memory usage while playing.

@altermaven.7385 said:Have you added anything recently before the system started its symptoms?

No. Is there any way to check/log the total power consumption of the computer?

@"Ashantara.8731" said:

• Are you frequently undusting your PC's insides (including the GPU and the CPU fans)? (You need a brush and a compressed air spray for that.)
• Is there still enough heat-conductive paste on your CPU? (When was the last time it has been applied?)
• Is everything wired/connected properly? (Maybe something isn't and is thereby causing power fluctuations.)
• Have you exchanged the PSU? (If it is damaged, it can damage your other hardware.)
• Are there any unhealthily high hardware temperature readings?
• You said this only happens in GW2. Aren't you ever running any other CPU-heavy 3D applications? (Because if you are not, then saying "This only happens in GW2" is meaningless.)

• I undusted it a while ago, but without compressed air. It's not super clean but also not very dusty.
• I already bought a new cpu cooler after I lost an HDD due to a gw2 crash and there I removed the paste and applied new one (like a year ago or so). So I had this problem with my old paste and now with new cooler and new paste it is still there, so I doubt it has anything to do with cpu cooling.
• I checked every cable recently and everything seems fine.
• No. I only have this psu. If I had another one I would try that but I don't really feel like buying another psu if I don't even know for sure that this is the cause of the problem.
• Not really. Gpu and the sensors on the cpu and motherboard were around 70 °C when I checked a few days ago while playing. Afaik that is kinda normal under "heavy" load.
• Probably you are right. But I've ran cpu "stress testing" software in the past (this was some years ago though) and it didn't crash, but maybe because it wasn't long enough.

@"desu.3104" said:

• I checked every cable recently and everything seems fine.

Well, it might be an issue with the order in which things are attached (too many chained up on one cable, for instance).

• No. I only have this psu. If I had another one I would try that but I don't really feel like buying another psu if I don't even know for sure that this is the cause of the problem.

It is true that PSU problems are the hardest to pin-point, but if it broke your HDD it is reasonable to assume that there is something wrong with the power destribution or voltage. Maybe try a different power socket, if your PSU has any available? (I don't know, if I were you, I would probably get a new PSU just to be on the safe side. This can help you determine how powerful your PSU must be for your system - then add another 50-100 Watt, just in case.)

@desu.3104 said:Thanks for all the replies.

@Daddicus.6128 said:Or, you could be out of memory. Leave Task Manager running at all times, so you can see visually if you're running out of memory.

Oh, and keep track of what you change. You might want to put some back some day.

@Daddicus.6128 said:

@desu.3104 said:Thanks for all the replies.

@Daddicus.6128 said:Or, you could be out of memory. Leave Task Manager running at all times, so you can see visually if you're running out of memory.

Citation needed, as the kids love to say?

@Daddicus.6128 said:8GB isn't enough nowadays

Well gw2 is from 2012 though. But I will try playing on lower settings.

@desu.3104 said:

@"Daddicus.6128" said:8GB isn't enough nowadays

If main memory is the issue, and see my comment above for my opinion on that, then changing graphics settings will not help: they will reduce GPU memory use, but not core memory use. You should, instead, see if you are actively paging during play, which will tell you for sure if this is caused by lack of main memory. (Which, given this is about freezing, it is almost certainly not.)

The full documentation is at support.microsoft.com, but the relevant section is:

Performance Monitor is the principle tool for monitoring system performance and for identifying the location of the bottleneck. To start Performance Monitor, click Start, click Control Panel, click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Performance Monitor. Here is a summary of some important counters and what they tell you:

Memory, Pages Output/Sec: This counter shows how many virtual memory pages were written to the pagefile to free RAM page frames for other purposes each second.

This is the best counter to monitor if you suspect that paging is your performance bottleneck. Even if Committed Bytes is greater than the installed RAM, if Pages Output/sec is low or zero most of the time, there is no significant performance problem from insufficient RAM.

@SlippyCheeze.5483 said:

@Daddicus.6128 said:

@desu.3104 said:Thanks for all the replies.

@Daddicus.6128 said:Or, you could be out of memory. Leave Task Manager running at all times, so you can see visually if you're running out of memory.

I've done the analysis myself. IRL I am a computer performance expert (among other things).

But, if s/he leaves Task Manager running as stated, s/he will know whether memory is an issue or not. The graph will show yea or nay.

@desu.3104 said:

@"Daddicus.6128" said:8GB isn't enough nowadays

First, check Task Manager's memory graph (on the Performance tab). If you're over 3/4 full, memory is an issue.

Then it still remains to show how the problem is occurring. It can be caused by either flat out usage, in which case the settings will help.

But, if it's a situation where memory usage rises over time, eventually getting unusable, then there could be a memory "leak".

To test this theory, look at the size of used memory (same graph) after you've been using your computer for a few days, but have everything shut down. Then, restart the computer.

If when you get back up, memory used (before anything is brought up) is substantially less than what it was after a few days (but still idled down), then there's a leak.

If there's a leak, you're into nightmare territory. The difference between the startup memory used and the steady-state memory level is "dead" memory. It can't cleared except by the program that created it, or a system restart. (OK, that's false; with the right tools you can clear it.) So, I just restart the computer when dead memory gets too high (10-20%, for my system).

@Daddicus.6128 said:

@SlippyCheeze.5483 said:

@Daddicus.6128 said:

@desu.3104 said:Thanks for all the replies.

@Daddicus.6128 said:Or, you could be out of memory. Leave Task Manager running at all times, so you can see visually if you're running out of memory.

Sure. Could you maybe give me some hints for replicating that? After playing for hours, and standing in a very busy PoF map, I can't push the memory of the 64-bit client above 4GB. How can I get it to consume more?

But, if s/he leaves Task Manager running as stated, s/he will know whether memory is an issue or not. The graph will show yea or nay.

Which graph? Do you mean the "memory composition" display?

First, check Task Manager's memory graph (on the Performance tab). If you're over 3/4 full, memory is an issue.

On an 8GB system that would be literally 2GB of memory used for caching or unoccupied, in order to hit your target. That is a ridiculously over the top estimate for what needs to be instantly usable. Heck, on busy systems 100MB of memory is usually considered more than enough to handle short term memory demands without significant issue, and a desktop system like you would run GW2 on? Dang, that ain't got nothing that is going to need 2GB instantly.

If there's a leak, you're into nightmare territory. The difference between the startup memory used and the steady-state memory level is "dead" memory. It can't cleared except by the program that created it, or a system restart. (OK, that's false; with the right tools you can clear it.) So, I just restart the computer when dead memory gets too high (10-20%, for my system).

... this is ... heck. Lets do this the easy way: what are the "right tools" to clear this dead memory? What is any one of them? Y'see, I get the strong impression that you are a "computer performance expert" in the same way that I'm a Charr ... which is to say, not even remotely. You keep using these technical terms, just ... wrong. Like you heard them somewhere, or read about them a bit, but didn't grasp the underlying meaning.

You appear to be measuring the wrong things, wildly over-estimating the required resources, making vastly overblown claims about what is required for a baseline system, and generally leading people down a very, very bad path, which will do nothing to help solve real problems.

I'm open to the idea that maybe I'm missing something, though, so now you have two different ways you can demonstrate that there is some actual technical knowledge behind what you are saying. Please, it'd be a welcome experience to have to apologize to you for being wrong about you.

The symptoms you describe could be indicative of hardware failure. They also remind me a lot of graphic driver crashing and being unable to recover.You could download latest drivers, reboot into a safe mode, uninstall the drivers, reboot, and install drivers to see if that could help.

I would also check your system event logs to see if they can give you any clue of what errors could be happening. I haven't seen this mentioned yet.

Also I agree with the previous people that just because other stuff works and only GW2 doesn't is not proof that it is a GW2 fault. Every program uses hardware in its own manner.I would also isolate the odd fan noise you were hearing, and try to get that fixed.

I have the same problem and only with Guild Wars 2. Currently running 32g of system ram, game runs on 970 evo ssd (uninstalled and installed on secondary 7200 regular old HDD and still same freezing sound loop issue), nvidia 1060 with 6gb on card, 8th Gen Intel Core i7-8750H 6-Core Processor. I play other games with no issue whatsoever including ones that on my performance and temperature monitoring tools are more taxing on the system. I have tried doing a clean driver install for the gpu twice now.

I normally would agree that it is the computer that has some issue that the game is revealing yet not even running benchmark programs pushing everything to the limit have this effect. I really do suspect the game itself might have some conflicts with the drivers on some particular cards or something that is creating a freeze/audio looping freeze. Sad part is my dinosaur of an old laptop runs the game smoothly with no issues lol.

And SlippyCheese, i believe you might be right about Daddicus...

My dinosaur of a laptop is old but it was a good one when i bought it so it has 16g system ram, 3g dedicated on nvidia 560m card, i7 (forget rest of info for proc) running on regular ssd. I call it a dinosaur because it is from 2011 and in laptop years that is a dinosaur lol!