nVidia kind of sucks at writing drivers...

[SPL Tech]

So I have had a few driver related problems with all my nVidia cards going back several years that have never been solved. I have had similar problems with 50+ different versions of the driver, going all the way back to the 100.xx series drivers, as well as with the 8800s, 265s and my 660s. I have had the problem on Windows 10, 8.1, Vista and XP. I have had the problem with different mother boards, hard drives, CPUs, cables, and RAM chipsets. The only hardware I havent ever changed is my case and PSU.

In short, I will sometimes get random Windows error messages that the driver has failed and has restarted, which typically will crash a 3D app if one is running. Sometimes my computer randomly wakes up at night for no apparent reason (the screen shows the home page or desktop in the morning). Often (about 1 out of 3 times), I will wake my PC up from sleep and I will get no output to the monitor. The computer is running, but there is no display. I do a hard reset and everything is instantly fine.

The frequency of these problems have varied from platform to OS to driver version and so on and so fourth, but the above problems have existed for about as long as I have been building custom PCs for myself which leads me to believe that nVidia just doesent really know what they are doing.

 

[ATMINSIDE]

Does this happen at stock speeds?
Does this happen with one GPU instead of two?

 

[Witchdoctor]

I don't think nVidia drivers are end all by any means, however compared to the ATI / AMD drivers it is hard complain

If you have the same PS since the original GeForce you are back in Win98 territory
you may want to consider replacing it.

 

[EarthDog]

The only hardware I havent ever changed is my case and PSU.

I'd look here first at this point...

Nvisit drivers are, by in large, better than amd. But to have problems like you are describing... doesn't scream driver to me.

 

[JrClocker]

Agree with ED...

The waking up part seems like there is a "wake on activity" set in BIOS for the USB and/or Ethernet connection.

The only one that sounds remotely close to driver related is 3D games crashing the driver...but that could be so many other things (bad power supply, other hardware problem, borked Windows install, etc)

 

[Zantal]

The only hardware I havent ever changed is my case and PSU.

This reminded me of a little problem I had with an old pc I had.

Basically I bought a cheap a** PSU, and from time to time my computer would start on it's own, (and the radio plugged in nearby) whenever I would turn on a light in my room.

I seriously don't know what the hell was going on and I still think about it to this day trying to find a good explanation.
I am pretty sure no external signal on the power line to the psu could trigger the motherboard to suddenly turn on, am I right?

Anyway, that psu died a month later and after that everything was ok (apart from the radio still turning on when switching on the lights)

It didn't have to be the bad PSU causing the problems, it might as well been bad electric cabling all throughout the house, or the energy company.

 

[TaCoSwInDeZ]

I remember back in 2008 with an upgrade I went with an AMD Phenom Black Edition and an ASUS Motherboard with nice Corsair Memory. Along with that same upgrade I purchased a GTX 260 Core 216 (which I still have and works to thise day) and a Xigmatek 750 watt 80 Plus Certified power supply. I lived with that same driver error for a total of one year. Tried everything from reinstalling windows, downclocking cpu/memory, increasing voltages, reinstalling drivers, different versions of windows....I chased my tail for a year because mine would crash at least once a day and a lot time even more so. Gaming on this machine was useless, couldn't do it.

Then after a year I said to hell with the AMD system and literally threw the CPU MB and RAM in the trash I was so mad and kept the graphics card and got an I5 750, new G Skill Ram, and put those in a nice MSI P55-GD80 MB. Never again did I have a driver crashed failure unless I was pushing the GPU clock.

Moral of the story is, sometimes you get lucky and all your hardware works great together and sometimes it's a nightmare. Although in your situation a PS upgrade might be in order. Im still running the Intel system I mentioned but have since upgraded to a GTX570 a couple of years ago and still havent had any driver issues unless pushing GPU clocks.

Now I have an I5 4690k and ASRock z97 Extreme 4on the way to upgrade my aging system for more CPU horsepower. Next will be a PS upgrade to an undetermined fully modular unit. All I can do is hope that all these pieces mesh well together and I do not run into any snags.

 

[SPL Tech]

I don't think nVidia drivers are end all by any means, however compared to the ATI / AMD drivers it is hard complain

If you have the same PS since the original GeForce you are back in Win98 territory
you may want to consider replacing it.

No, I was using XP at the time. I am using the Corsair CMPSU-750TX, which is 750W and it's a good PSU. I think PSUs can last 10+ years, no? I dont think I have ever replaced one at work and we service about 600 desktops. The only time I've had to replace PSUs have been on large routers and servers which use 4 or 8 PSUs.



I havent tried only one GPU in the mobo, but I have tried using SLI disabled in nVidia control panel. I have tried stock speeds.

 

[EarthDog]

The TX line was their low end/budget at the time. Plenty serviceable, but not close to their HX line as far as quality goes.

We are not saying the wattage isn't enough.

They code last 10 years, sure. That doesn't mean they all will.

 

[tachi1247]

^^Or that this psu didn't have something out of spec or a bad capacitor etc from the start. Some defects are more pronounced/significant than others, it isn't an all or nothing proposition whether the psu works.

Have you ever tried an amd card to see if that solves your issue? I find it slightly odd that you think this is driver related yet you bought 3 nvidia cards in a row.

 

[Witchdoctor]

No, I was using XP at the time. I am using the Corsair CMPSU-750TX, which is 750W and it's a good PSU. I think PSUs can last 10+ years, no? I dont think I have ever replaced one at work and we service about 600 desktops. The only time I've had to replace PSUs have been on large routers and servers which use 4 or 8 PSUs.





I havent tried only one GPU in the mobo, but I have tried using SLI disabled in nVidia control panel. I have tried stock speeds.

I have never gotten 10 years out a a power supply, However not saying one would not last that long, I simply am stating 10 years would be beyond my expectations. The age of this unit and assuming it was used regularly would lead me to believe the aged capacitors are affecting it's ability to operate effectively