Help with multiple BSOD!

[JoeHard]

Hello everyone!

Recently my computer has started to crash randomly with multiple BSOD. I haven't installed any new hardware since I bought it (6 months ago) and I don't have any "strange" app installed.

Usually they're not very frequent, but today my pc has crashed 5 times already. The first few crashes happened while I was playing Left 4 Dead 2, but the next crash happened while watching a youtube video and after that the computer was completely idle when crashed again (I had just logged in, left the room for five minutes, and when I came back the computer had rebooted).

I have attached the dumps from today's crashes.

My computer is running Windows 7 x64, Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550, 4GB ram, Gigabyte EP45-UD3P, NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT.

If you need more information to help me please let me know.

Thank you for reading!!!!

dumps.zip

[Mexxi]

You should have attached the specific error messages instead. They give a good hint which part of your setup failed. I doubt anyone here can make sense of the mini dumps.

[Tripredacus]

Minidumps are usually missing information. Let's start with the actual error codes, then if we need to you'll have to create a full memory dump. Info on that is here:

[JoeHard]

Sorry for uploading useless information, I didn't know what would be useful to troubleshoot BSOD's.

I have attached a screenshot of a utility that (hopefully) contains the error codes.

If somebody has a clue about the problem please let me know! Thanks!

[Tripredacus]

Ah fortunately, this is an easy to understand error! Well sort of. This error, IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL is a problem with a driver file, or with another program misusing the driver. The driver it calls out, nvlddmkm.sys is part of an nVidia video driver package. So things you can try: update the video drivers. You can try the one from nVidia or the one from Windows Update. One on WU showed up in Novemeber that fixed an issue I was having, but not the same as this. Also you can try turning Aero off if you have it on. My computer at work can't use Aero... it turns on but Windows locks up or gives errors.

Also I noticed you have another error listed caused by cdrom.sys. You can try updating your chipset driver for that, but the only reason why I bring this up is because of that virus (can't find the actual name) that hides in the cdrom.sys. I battled a system late last year with a virus hidden in cdrom.sys, so just pointing that out.

[JoeHard]

Thanks for the help Tripredacus.

I followed your advice and updated the nvidia drivers, but unfortunately I had some more BSOD's. But this time I noticed that when it happened I was playing Left 4 Dead 2 and the fans were making a lot of noise, like they were running at full speed. Can it be possible that my computer doesn't refrigerate properly and it shows BSOD because it shutdowns to prevent further damage?

It's only a wild guess, I don't know if this is a possible explanation or it can't really happen.

Thanks again!

[Tripredacus]

If your computer has a temperature readout in the BIOS of the system temperature, you can run your game enough to hear the fans, then quickly exist the game and reboot to see what the temperature is running at.

Anyways, it seems strange that you have other dumps recorded besides the nVidia ones.