[Judas]

Recently i ran into an interesting issue..

I have been purchasing monitors with HDMI input and of course building many machines for the last while with hdmi output via the intel i3 or better on the motherboard..
Previously i was setting up the 1156 chipsets with the hdmi ...... all was well... a lot of people were liking the single cable for video/audio solution (without bulky speakers to screw around with)...
anyways.. i have recently been using the Asus P8H67-M Pro .... imo awesome motherboard.. specially for the price... all the right features.. even 2x pci-ex slots...
However the first monitor i sold with the first build used dvi due to her monitor choice which didn't have hdmi... and was going to be using external speakers.....
the 2nd one i built uses hdmi...

Instant problem.

The moment you start installing windows .... (goes to show the setup screen after the little logo on the black screen has been glowing a bit)... BSOD

odd... hmmm

Setup with dvi.. get windows installed no problem..... get everything setup... make sure it's all working..... flawless....... move to hdmi.... BSOD..

well wtf..

This time i left the dvi plugged in and in windows instead of starting it up after plugging things in..

The MOMENT i plug any HDMI cable in with any display device attached... the screen on the dvi connected monitor repeatedly flashes, black and back into windows.. and shows the message "Intel display driver stopped responding and has recovered" over and over and over again... i didn't have the sucker plugged in more then 3 or 4 seconds.... and it gave about 15 messages that were all quered up.

Well that's strange....

Seeing as i keep everything updated.... i checked to maybe try an older driver... but i didn't think that would work as it seems that even using the windows supplied driver causes BSOD too...... well doesn't hurt to check..

Same thing.

OK now i'm possitive after thorough memory tests and checks and hardware swaps... that the HDMI on the board is toast..... maybe i have to replace it...
I called up the previous build i did with this board.... asked if they had attached hdmi device yet.... no not yet..
I inquired if they would mind if i could test something really fast..... (they live in town).... they agreed.
Went over and tried (they had a older driver at the time that i hadn't tried...)

SAME results...

ok bizarre, maybe it's limited to that specific motherboard..... odd asus would screw up like that.... naw i can't see that being the case.. hdmi is quite huge.
Did a little googling between..... seem this problem is widespread irriguardless of the brand, specific chipset (anything within the sandy bridge lineup...)
There are reports and complaints even on the intel forums about plenty of people that have actually attempted to use the intel HDMI connection even on the Dell and compaq and other prebuilt computers.
Everything stated thus far seems to be intel saying a driver fix will occur.. but they haven't solved it for anyone in the last 4 months since the revised sandy bridge chipset launched.

I phoned my supplier and asked about the issue.. they said they haven't been setting up their customers with hdmi.... but i insisted they try a few different boards and see if they get the same results..... they got BSODs as well. So now i'm almost positive this can't or isn't avoidable on any the boards at all.

So just a word of warning..... I know most people are using a add-in card for any enthusiasts that might be using HDMI..

I think this is a critical flaw that intel is avoiding considering how long they've been "aware" of the issue. It should be made public.. but i haven't seen any news articles or any thorough articles made about it.

By the way, i've tried some of the "solutions" be it specific driver versions that people have said worked.... still BSODed.....

[Tipstaff]

Good to know. I've been building systems with the P8H61-M LE or the Gigabyte GA-H67M-D2-B3, GA-H61M-USB3-B3, or GA-H61M-S2V-B3, all of which don't have HDMI ports, so I've yet to encounter this. I'll have to keep an eye out for whenever I do try it though.

Thanks, Judas.

[Judas]

your welcome..

I would really like to know "HOW" something like this made it through QA and still isn't resolved.

If intel can't fix this with a driver, that would mean another recall or something.. specially considering that each board made has to pay for the hdmi port unlike the other connections.....

[Veridian3]

Just tried it on a Z68 Pro 3 (ASRock) and i7 combo. No HDMI problems at all. This was plugged into an ASUS VG236 so it def not all Sandy Bridge motherboards.

I'm also pretty sure I used that config on the Gene-z and a couple more boards without issues.

[Judas]

i'm quite curious as to what's causing it because the number sheer number of different motherboards.. and manufacturers seems to be so significant.

[gaetan]

Thanks for the head's up, although it is strange, just as for your SSD issue, I'd like to know as well.

(with the patenting issues with apple and HDMI maybe the secret service has installed a chip to disable all the HDMI connections remotely in case their plan went wrong, so HDMI would be an actual codename ... going paranoid ... just ignore me )

[Veridian3]

Originally Posted by Judas

i'm quite curious as to what's causing it because the number sheer number of different motherboards.. and manufacturers seems to be so significant.

I'd start with what all your systems have in common and work from there.

[gaetan]

Originally Posted by Veridian3

I'd start with what all your systems have in common and work from there.

Good thinking, you should change your name, Sherlock seems to fit better

[Veridian3]

Nah, Craig is Sherlock... I can only aspire to that level of investigative thinking...

[Judas]

actually the 2 new systems the only thing in common is the motherboard for myself... 2 different Intel cpus (one i3 an the other i5)..

the other components were completely different... different hardrives, different ram, different psu's, different optical drives.

Really not much else to change except for the motherboard.

Reason i thought perhaps the P8H67-M Pro boards were just all faulty.... but then that's why i phone the supplier and asked them to try out a few and sure enough... other motherboards with different configurations were all producing the same result.

And looking online.. seeing some of the reports from dell or prebuilt computer manufacturers.. the few that have tried to use HDMI have ran into the same issue..

Even trying to look at the different Intel Drivers doesn't work.. be it the windows supplied ones, or almost every single one throughout the lifespan and support for the intergrated video.

The reason i don't think this is getting much notice is:

1: HDMI is not all that common yet, specially for what most people use the computers for, and almost all companies aren't shipping systems with the monitors attached with hdmi either...

2: Most aren't hooking up their computers that are purchased in this style to their tvs.... they continue using their dvi/vga connected monitors....

3: I'd say probably 95% or better of the people that intend on using HDMI already have purchased a Add-in card such as nvidia or ATI... completely avoiding the potential problem.

4: Considering that these boards now are coming with Display port, i wouldn't be surprised if a number of them are investing in a new monitor with displayport connections at the same time IF they were going to continue using the onboard graphics.

Overall, if most of all the purchasers aren't ever touching the hdmi connection from the get go, then there would be a lack of people reporting such a problem because far as they are concerned there is none until they happen to plug in which could be never OR much later down the road. Such an example would be well known to me now as people buying a computer, using it as the average joes do, then years later buying a new one and moving the old one to another room or most recently to the living room at which point they plug in to the tv.... which if you have HDMI.... makes life easy (unless of course intel hasn't fixed the glitch OR the motherboard/cpu is indeed faulty)

[Veridian3]

You forget a lot of laptop based SB have HDMI out rather than anything else and thats a huge chunk of consumers. I've just tested 2... both fine.

I'm not saying everything is fine btw, just that there is probably something which sets off the bug rather than it being an issue for everyone.

[Judas]

Originally Posted by Veridian3

You forget a lot of laptop based SB have HDMI out rather than anything else and thats a huge chunk of consumers. I've just tested 2... both fine.

I'm not saying everything is fine btw, just that there is probably something which sets off the bug rather than it being an issue for everyone.

Well i know it's not strickly software level.. and i keep the motherboards up to date..

but being that right from the get go, starting the system with the HDMI plugged in and then starting the installation of windows 7 x64 home premium and pro produces the same BSOD nearly emediately.

Now i know tons of laptops use it.... personally haven't had much problem with that aside from many of the intel i3 machines i've sold for asus, and numerous people that have come into the store trying to get their hdmi to work (produce video not audio, or vice versa) seems to still be quite glitchy reguardless of the manufacturer, software installed, or what devices the HDMI is being attached too.

Still, the numbers are quite low... and i know many across the country in canada at least and many from other countries i frequently talk to generally don't find a high usage of HDMI connected laptops.... it's still all self contained or quite frequently using the VGA out to projectors at most.

[Veridian3]

Originally Posted by Judas

Well i know it's not strickly software level.. and i keep the motherboards up to date..

but being that right from the get go, starting the system with the HDMI plugged in and then starting the installation of windows 7 x64 home premium and pro produces the same BSOD nearly emediately.

Now i know tons of laptops use it.... personally haven't had much problem with that aside from many of the intel i3 machines i've sold for asus, and numerous people that have come into the store trying to get their hdmi to work (produce video not audio, or vice versa) seems to still be quite glitchy reguardless of the manufacturer, software installed, or what devices the HDMI is being attached too.

Still, the numbers are quite low... and i know many across the country in canada at least and many from other countries i frequently talk to generally don't find a high usage of HDMI connected laptops.... it's still all self contained or quite frequently using the VGA out to projectors at most.

Just to clarify my earlier post about Z68... the test i did today was a complete new install. Built from scratch for this specific issue. HDMI at all times, no BIOS tweaks other than enabling AHCI and no windows tweaks other than disabling UAC.

BIOS update>Windows install>Chipset Driver>AHCI driver>Management Engine components>Display Driver....and then normal use without issue.

(Razer mouse, Gigabyte Keyboard, HDMI 1.4 cable, Crucial memory, Agility 3 SSD, Win7 64bit Ultimate with all patches and SP1)

[Judas]

Mine are always

Bios update ~> Windows Setup ~> During windows setup load latest AHCI driver ~> Chipset driver ~> Rapid Storage controller Software ~> Management Engine Components ~> Display Driver ~> Audio Driver ~> other dodads and such

But in this recent case, Bios Update ~> Windows Setup ~> BSOD....... with an HDMI connected display attached.