System freeze/crash - Windows Kernel event ID 41 error

[EvilPeppard]

Windows Kernel event ID 41 error "The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first" in Windows 8.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2028504

This issue recently started on my game rig, and I cannot for the life of me figure out what could be causing it. I strictly monitor my temps. During gaming my CPU cores run 41-50 degrees Celsius. My GTX670s in SLI run 70 degrees Celsius or less, and I am running a Corsair HX1000W power supply, so power is not the issue.

So far this has happened two times, once on 8/27/2013, then again last night, 9/4/2013. On 8/27 my system totally shutdown and rebooted. Last night, my system just froze; everything was still on, just frozen in a still-screen, and I had to hold the power button down to reboot the machine.

Both times I was playing FFXIV: ARR. I built this rig almost a year ago, and game daily on it with no issues until recently.

The only things that are recently different are:
1. Instead of playing Rift, or other games, I am now playing FFXIV: ARR since it just released.
2. I am running several monitoring programs, such as MultiPing, Argus Monitor (paid version), HWMonitorPro (paid version), RealTemp 3.70, Moo0 System Monitor, and Rainmeter.
3. I installed BitDefender 2013 Total Security in lieu of the built in Windows Defender that comes with Windows 8.

My Windows System and Application event logs are totally clean. I have been constantly checking them, with the exception of the Event 41.

My main question is, is there any possibility that running several monitoring programs together could possibly make my machine crash? Again, my logs show no errors, but something has to be causing this, unless it is the FFXIV: ARR game itself.

Any insight or feedback would be much appreciated. Thank you.

Here are my game rig specs:
Case: AZZA Hurrican 2000
Mobo: ASRock Extreme6 Z77 LGA1155
CPU: Intel Core i7-3770K Ivy Bridge 3.5 GHz 8MB cache LGA1155 (BX80637I73770K)
CPU cooling: Corsair Hydro H80 high performance liquid CPU cooler (CWCH80)
RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600 MHz (PC3 12800) (CMZ16GX3M2A1600C10)
Over clocked: none
HD1: Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB SSD
HD2: SATA 2.0 Western Digital Green, 1TB
Raid: none
OS: Windows 8 Professional
Video card 1: EVGA GTX670 2GB
Video card 2: EVGA GTX670 2GB
SLI: Yes
Monitor 1: 28" Hanns G HZ281HPB LCD
Monitor 2: Viewsonic VA2703 27 inch Full HD 1080p Widescreen LCD Monitor
Sound: Onboard RealTek 7.1 surround
Power supply: Corsair HX1000W
UPS: CyberPower Intelligent LCD Series GreenPower UPS CP1500AVRLCD 1500VA 900W
Keyboard: Logitech G510
Mouse: Logitech G600 MMO gaming mouse
Headphones: Logitech G930 wireless gaming headset

 

[RyanCouch]

i had that error with rain meter. but id look into benchmarking your gpu's and see if they are ok

 

[ATMINSIDE]

Run Heaven benchmark a few times and see if it runs stable.

If you have an OC, remove it and see if the issue persists.

 

[RyanCouch]

Run Heaven benchmark a few times and see if it runs stable.

If you have an OC, remove it and see if the issue persists.

agreed thats really all you can do if issue still persists get rid of rain meter

 

[EvilPeppard]

I did just find this regarding FFXIV and crashes. I am still reviewing the thread to see if there is anything pertinent.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/67305-Freeze-Crash-BSOD-issues

I am still curious though if running several monitoring programs together could be a problem and potentially freeze or crash my machine?

Run Heaven benchmark a few times and see if it runs stable.

If you have an OC, remove it and see if the issue persists.

I can run Heaven all day long with no issues. I am running no overclocking whatsoever.

i had that error with rain meter. but id look into benchmarking your gpu's and see if they are ok

Hmm, Rainmeter. Ok, I will uninstall it and see if that affects anything.

Thanks for all the quick replies so far.

I am still curious though if running several monitoring programs together could be a problem and potentially freeze or crash my machine?

Any thoughts on this part while I continue to try and figure out what is going on?

 

[EvilPeppard]

My main question is, is there any possibility that running several monitoring programs together could possibly make my machine crash?

Any thoughts on this part, please?

I am wondering if running Argus Monitor, CPUID Hardware Monitor Pro, Moo0 System Monitor, RealTemp, and such all together could cause problems since they are all probing the computer at the same time.

Let me know. Thank you.

 

[ATMINSIDE]

I don't see any reason to run all that at once. Run only one and see if crashes still happen.

 

[Adragontattoo]

Try testing the system OFF the UPS. Crazy I know but try it.

Test your PSU voltages with a MULTIMETER. Do not rely on SW, test at idle and under load.

Test the Memory immediately after it BSODs to see if there is an issue due to RAM temps.

What are your temps at idle and under load?

Disable SLI and test with 1 GPU.

Test the OTHER GPU without SLI.

Test the WD Green.

Reset the BIOS to default, only adjust to fix boot sequence and time. Test at idle and under load.

 

[EvilPeppard]

I don't see any reason to run all that at once. Run only one and see if crashes still happen.

I had most of them off yesterday except RealTemp 3.70, MultiPing, and the Windows Task Manager, and I got Event 41 yesterday afternoon while playing FFXIV: ARR.

I will stop using those and see if there is any change.

 

[EvilPeppard]

Try testing the system OFF the UPS. Crazy I know but try it.

Ok, I will try it.

Test your PSU voltages with a MULTIMETER. Do not rely on SW, test at idle and under load.

I am not exactly sure what you mean here. Could you elaborate and help guide me, please?

Test the Memory immediately after it BSODs to see if there is an issue due to RAM temps.

My machine has never BSOD'd. Not once. It simply totally locks up. Of the three times it has happened, the first time my computer completely shutdown and rebooted on its own. The second and third time the system completely froze. Everything was on, but zero functionality. I had to hold the power button down to reboot my computer.

Every time I was playing FFXIV: ARR. My CPU temps were running ~41-50 C, and my GPUs were running ~70 C, or less. They normally run around 58-70 C during game play, depending on the zone.

What are your temps at idle and under load?

While I am typing this, with no load on the system, my CPU is ~35-40 C. GPUs are sitting at 48 C for GPU1 and 45 C for GPU 2.

Disable SLI and test with 1 GPU.

This crossed my mind. I was going to try disabling SLI and see how my system runs.

Test the OTHER GPU without SLI.

By this suggestion, I assume you mean only have one GPU in the computer at a time, test one and see how the computer functions, then swap and put the other one in and see how it runs?

Test the WD Green.

Test the WD Greed hard drive how?

I should further add, my game rigs specs were not quite up to date. Here is my current hard drive layout.

HD1: Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB SSD (C Drive for OS)
HD2: SATA 2.0 Western Digital Black, 1TB (Misc. data such as Acronis images)
HD3: SATA 2.0 Western Digital Green, 2TB (Games are all loaded here and run off this drive)

Reset the BIOS to default, only adjust to fix boot sequence and time. Test at idle and under load.

I will do this, but basically the boot sequence and time are the only changes I have made in my BIOS.

 

[EvilPeppard]

One more thing. I have had some people tell me to disable the Intel Speed Step option in my BIOS to see if that helps. It is on by default.

Any thoughts on that, and as to why they would make that suggestion?

 

[Adragontattoo]

Ok, I will try it.


I am not exactly sure what you mean here. Could you elaborate and help guide me, please?

Do you own a Multimeter?
See http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=732157&highlight=test+voltages+multimeter

Also, look at http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=712717&highlight=test+voltages+multimeter It is the same error from last year.

My machine has never BSOD'd. Not once. It simply totally locks up. Of the three times it has happened, the first time my computer completely shutdown and rebooted on its own. The second and third time the system completely froze. Everything was on, but zero functionality. I had to hold the power button down to reboot my computer.[/QUOTE]

If you havent changed it, the system by default is set to do a small kernel dump and reboot automatically. You can change the setting to have it not auto reboot, but it is basically doing a BSOD and immediately rebooting (Assuming it ever gets to the BS, before you reboot it)

Every time I was playing FFXIV: ARR. My CPU temps were running ~41-50 C, and my GPUs were running ~70 C, or less. They normally run around 58-70 C during game play, depending on the zone.


While I am typing this, with no load on the system, my CPU is ~35-40 C. GPUs are sitting at 48 C for GPU1 and 45 C for GPU 2.


This crossed my mind. I was going to try disabling SLI and see how my system runs.


By this suggestion, I assume you mean only have one GPU in the computer at a time, test one and see how the computer functions, then swap and put the other one in and see how it runs?

Yes, disable SLI, and test, if it fails, remove the second GPU completely from the system and test. If no failure occurs, put the second GPU back in in place of the existing one and then test. If that passes, try having both installed and see what happens.

Test the WD Greed hard drive how?

Ok, go to Piriform.com, download Defraggler, it is free and works without issue. Install it as you normally install programs and then run it. highlight the NON SSD drive and click the last tab which is Drive Health, click that tab and then analyze. You can also/instead download the Data Lifeguard tool from Western Digital to test your drives. You need to look at the SMART info.

I personally do not trust WD Greens for anything, I have seen too many that either begin corrupting data, outright fail or cause more issues than they are worth. I would NOT use them as a primary drive even for games and such.

I should further add, my game rigs specs were not quite up to date. Here is my current hard drive layout.

HD1: Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB SSD (C Drive for OS)
HD2: SATA 2.0 Western Digital Black, 1TB (Misc. data such as Acronis images)
HD3: SATA 2.0 Western Digital Green, 2TB (Games are all loaded here and run off this drive)


I will do this, but basically the boot sequence and time are the only changes I have made in my BIOS.

 

[EvilPeppard]

Do you own a Multimeter?
See http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=732157&highlight=test+voltages+multimeter

Also, look at http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=712717&highlight=test+voltages+multimeter It is the same error from last year.

Yes, I own a multimeter. I will review these links. Thank you!

My power supply is the one think in my machine that I have not changed in a while. This particular power supply is almost 3 years old now. It will be 3 years old in November.

My machine has never BSOD'd. Not once. It simply totally locks up. Of the three times it has happened, the first time my computer completely shutdown and rebooted on its own. The second and third time the system completely froze. Everything was on, but zero functionality. I had to hold the power button down to reboot my computer.

If you havent changed it, the system by default is set to do a small kernel dump and reboot automatically. You can change the setting to have it not auto reboot, but it is basically doing a BSOD and immediately rebooting (Assuming it ever gets to the BS, before you reboot it)[/quote]

I see what you are saying. I understand that even if I am not seeing a blue screen, essentially the computer is still blue screening.

Yes, disable SLI, and test, if it fails, remove the second GPU completely from the system and test. If no failure occurs, put the second GPU back in in place of the existing one and then test. If that passes, try having both installed and see what happens.

Understood.

Ok, go to Piriform.com, download Defraggler, it is free and works without issue. Install it as you normally install programs and then run it. highlight the NON SSD drive and click the last tab which is Drive Health, click that tab and then analyze. You can also/instead download the Data Lifeguard tool from Western Digital to test your drives. You need to look at the SMART info.

I personally do not trust WD Greens for anything, I have seen too many that either begin corrupting data, outright fail or cause more issues than they are worth. I would NOT use them as a primary drive even for games and such.

My Argus Montior has a S.M.A.R.T. tab for monitoring hard drives. I assume this is the same thing as the Piriform Defraggler software? I don't mind downloading and seeing what Piriform is reporting, I was just curious if it sounded like the same thing.

Currently my Arus Monitor shows all my drives as 'status: OK'. Argus Monitor lists several things, about 19 different things, on the drives it is checking when reporting the status.

 

[EvilPeppard]

Well, it happened again last night. Windows Kernel event ID 41 error "The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first" in Windows 8.

I was playing FFXIV: ARR for 4 hours, then my machine froze for about 5-10 seconds, then rebooted.

I've been taking small steps to eliminate what may be causing the issue. The first step was to uninstall Rainmeter and stop running so many monitoring programs together. That didn't seem to make a difference, so I am on to the next steps.

Next step is disabling SLI, which I have done. I will be gaming today for most of the day, so we'll get a good test scenario in and see if my machine remains stable, or if I need to take another step.

For the record, the thread on the official FFXIV forums is up to 17 pages now of people with the same issue: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/67305-Freeze-Crash-BSOD-issues?p=1261544#post1261544

 

[ATMINSIDE]

Sucks that is happening, but its good to know its not just you.

If disabling SLI fixes it, try running it on the second GPU instead of the first. Might be that one of the cards isn't stable.

 

[EvilPeppard]

Sucks that is happening, but its good to know its not just you.

If disabling SLI fixes it, try running it on the second GPU instead of the first. Might be that one of the cards isn't stable.

I will. Good troubleshooting idea to figure out if I do have a bad card.

If I find that disabling SLI fixes it, I think I'm going to stop using SLI setups. For as long as I have been running SLI setups, they almost seem more trouble than they are worth. I just need a good single card with two GPUs in it, like a GTX690 or something.

 

[EvilPeppard]

Next step is disabling SLI, which I have done. I will be gaming today for most of the day, so we'll get a good test scenario in and see if my machine remains stable, or if I need to take another step.

For the record, the thread on the official FFXIV forums is up to 17 pages now of people with the same issue: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/67305-Freeze-Crash-BSOD-issues?p=1261544#post1261544

Well, good news!

I played FFXIV: ARR for just over 9 hours straight yesterday with SLI disabled, and I did not crash. Everything ran perfectly.

The only thing I noticed was my main GPU was running constantly at 98% utilization and 75C - 76C, which is still way under the 97C max operating temp for a GTX670.

When I was in SLI, the cards shared the load, so I guess it is expected that one card's load would ramp way up.

Anyway, I will run this way for the next week or so. If my system remains stable, I will swap cards to see test the other card. Ultimately, I will leave one of the cards out of my rig all together and only run one card in future builds.

I will keep you all posted.

Thanks again to everyone for all their support and feedback.

 

[EvilPeppard]

Just wanted to provide another update. I stopped playing FFXIV a couple weeks ago because I lost interest.

Our gaming group went back to LOTRO. I re-enabled my SLI and can run LOTRO for 12+ hours with zero issues, as I am accustomed to with my game rig. I have not had one issue with my game rig since leaving FFXIV, and all my computer settings are just as they were before I started trouble shooting. My wife and I just had four days off and we were in LOTRO for 9-14 hours each day without a single computer problem.

I truly feel there was something about FFXIV that was making my computer unstable, which also sent me on a turkey hunt for computer problems that actually did not exist.

For the record, as of this update the post on FFXIV's official technical forums has grown to 27 pages of people experiencing the same thing as I did. http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/67305-Freeze-Crash-BSOD-issues/page27

Hopefully the problems will get resolved for those folks still playing FFXIV.

Thanks again for everyone's help and suggestions here.