Vista and 7.3 Display driver atikmdag stopped responding error

hp_laptop_with_ati_x2600

I saw something on the ATI troubleshooting site that says they know about a Blue Screen issue when you have more than 2GB in your system. On closer inspection, it says its only for 64-bit Vista and I'm running 32-bit Vista, but maybe they aren't keeping it completely up to date. I have 4GB and I don't get a Blue Screen, but I do get a Black Screen, so I figure I'll try it. I removed one of my 2GB chips so I'm down to 2GB and my laptop hasn't crashed on the display driver yet. I'd say its too early to say this isolated it for me, but if it doesn't crash for a week, I'll put it back to 4GB and see if it starts crashing again.

737- 29308: Radeon™ HD2XXX Series : Blue Screen when more than 2GB installed after ATI Driver installed.

http://support.ati.com/ics/support/KBAnswer.asp?questionID=29308

thirtyandover

Umm, no, I meant I use Analog, not DVI
(never could get the DVI to work anyway.. lol)

hp_laptop_with_ati_x2600

Still crashes with only 2GB of RAM instead of 4GB. Also tried using VGA connector instead of DVI, and still crashes. Most recently, I've turned off Aero and that seems to have calmed things down for the past 2 days.

Karhis

Hello everyone,

Got my notebook from the service few days ago. They changed the graphics adapter to a new one, and expenses were covered by warranty. So far it looks really promising, I've just run Video Card Stability Test ( Video Card Stability Test - Stress Testing & Benchmark the speed of your 3D graphics video card ) for over 10 hours without a crash, whereas in my previous system I was able to run it for about two minutes before the whole system locked up.

So it seems it was a hardware problem for me, a faulty graphics adapter. Good luck for you all solving your problems.

goodfatman2

I just got a Gigabyte Radeon HD 2900xt and when I went to the new 7.9 Catalyst driver,and tried to play DOD:Source. After around an hour of playing, it fragmented and lines appeared. Then it rebooted. Later, when I tried to play again, the atikmdag error appeared and when I tried to play Counter Strike, the same thing happened. I thought it was a driver problem but when I reinstalled, it did the same thing. Any known solutions yet?

My Specs:
Q6600
P5k-E
2GB DDR2-800
Gigabyte 2900xt
Corsair 520w psu

vf-

Thats the million dollar question sadly!

goodfatman2

Should I just RMA the 2900xt for a new one? Does that possibly avoid the error?

thirtyandover

I was just wondering - has anyone here tried disabling ALL security features in Vista.
Meaning UAC, Defender etc.?
I did that and haven't had any crashes since...

I know it's not the way it's supposed to be, but might give an indication of what's wrong.

Another question:
Is it possible for the hardware, like my graphic card, to sort of normalize itself?
That is, IF it's a hardware failure..

CATALYSTCATCHER

"Security features" is an interesting concept and may contibute but it seems unlikely. (Even though it works for you.)

I wouldn't expect hardware to heal itself or get better if the TDR was due to a hardware failure. However, you might get that impression, if something like the PSU were marginal and/or dieing a slow death and affecting the power to the graphics card.

Dostoyevsky77

How's everyone doing over here? Just stopping by from the Nvidia forums.

I had my first TDR in several months over the weekend. My solution was to add chipset cooling (northbridge and southbridge). That's probably a suggestion that only applies to anyone overclocking, but heat is definitely an issue for me (my weekend TDR was caused by upping a voltage too high).

Also, a lot of people in the Nvidia forum claim that a great deal of TDRs come from Windows Update installing poor drivers. Some of the driver files can not be overwritten by a new install. One must manually delete these drivers. Take a look at this guide:
NVIDIA Forums -> TDR Back After 8/15 Windows Update

Cheers,

d

goodfatman2

Can anyone validate that this is a hardware problem? Has anyone gotten a new card and see the error not appear anymore?

Karhis

For me, the warranty replacement of graphics board helped, haven't had this issue since.

tehnad

edit: I forgot to mention that I didn't read all 17 pages of this thread. Just about 6 or 7 before it all sounded repetitive. If I have mentioned something posted in the previous 17 pages then I appoligize. I just thought that everything that I have is all brand new and built for Vista along with it being a laptop which I didn't see much of.

If this will help then I too am willing to post some info on the board to help with resolution. I have a couple of questions or concerns about what its going on with this driver issue that I will post after my computers background. I have an HP compaq 8510 with an ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2600 running Vista Business. I will either crash hard with the BSOD in a matter of a couple hours, recover from a driver failure within a couple of hours, or will not have any issues with my display until around 2 or 3 in the afternoon. I DO NOT game with this laptop at all. This laptop is strictly for work and does nothing but Web and DB management all day. It is mounted on a docking station allowing plenty of air flow underneath with nothing being warm to the touch.

I have a second display, HP L2045w, that is hooked up through the docking station and is used in dual mode with my top. When at work my second monitor is set as the primary with my laptop monitor doing nothing but displaying wallpaper. Sometimes if I power the computer all the way down, it crashes hard coming up and starts constantly going through a reboot cycle trying to recover from the display error that occured during the boot process. If I let it try recovering its self, well it never does. It will get to the portion of starting either IE or Aero and then fall on its face. If I reach up and hold the power button for about 10 seconds effectively shutting the machine down and then let the machine set a couple of minutes, it will restart as if nothing ever happened and usually I will not get any more display errors until several hours later in the day.

If there are any form of reports, screen shots, mini dumps, etc. that you would like to help bring resolution to this issue please feel free to let me know and I will provide them for you. If someone could please answer me this question it might help me to correct my issue. I keep seeing that many people have posted this issue with what they call version 7.3. If I am correctly looking at my drivers then I am using version 7.1 with Windows update, ATI , and HP update utility telling me that my system is up to date with the latest and greatest. If I navigate to the ATI site and try to get the drivers manually then I run into another issue. The ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2600 is not listed in the list of Mobility cards on the ATI site. There is however a plain Radeon HD 2600 listed with newer drivers. Can I install the plain version drivers with the mobility card and it run correctly or do I need to wait until ATI decides to launch driver access to the card that I happen to own by them?

Like I have said before, I am willing to help you guys with this anyway that I can. This is a production machine and is in need of stability and reliability. Thanks.

goodfatman2

Has anyone tried this solution and can validate that it works?

ATIKMDAG stopped responding has recovered

Rockmunky1990

Tried it, didn't work for me.

Oy Vey

Hi all - I've recently built a pair of systems for me and my wife, and so far have been unable to use mine for its intended purpose, gaming, due to the driver reset error as well as graphical corruption at the desktop under Vista. I brought over the ATI 800XL and x1950 Pro PCI-E cards from our previous rigs and had no troubles with them previously.

Basic configuration:
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750
Corsair XMS2 2GB

This is coming from Chaintech nForce4 motherboards paired up with DDR and A64 ~3400.

At any rate, the problems began immediately after firing up any game or demo. The reset will occur regardless of whether I'm playing in full screen or windowed mode. As far as I can tell, the problem is driver/WDDM related as I have done and verified the following:

Power:
Replaced a 380w Antec TruePower 380s (Seasonic) PS, +12v 18A with a Corsair CMPSU-450VX (Seasonic) +12v 33A. Additional cost, $80, no improvement

Temperature:
Core temp on the x1950 Pro is about 45C (idle) and peaks at about 70C (under load). Previously I was getting higher core temps under load of about 80C, but cleaning out the HSF shroud got that under control. I own an Antec Sonata (v1) case and have added a 120mm fan blowing directly across the card and the northbridge heatsink. For kicks, I added a northbridge fan, but that didn't really seem to do much beyond adding noise.
Additional cost, $9, no improvement

Drivers:
I've tried 7.1, 7.4, 7.8, 7.9. I also, last night, blew away the OS and installed a fresh copy of Vista. I installed the Intel chipset drivers, attempted to use the MS supplied default drivers and locked up my PC within about 10 seconds after launching Warcraft (easily reproducible).

Utilities:
ATITool was largely useless with the 1950, switched to using Riva Tuner. Pegged the fan at 100% (clock control is disabled) and charted activity and temperature. In every case of a driver reset the reported core temp was 5-10 degrees below the peak average temp. Every driver reset was accompanied by the fan speed resetting to the drivers' base speed 40%, ignoring the Riva Tuner setting.

Patches:
Driver resets occurred regardless of the operating system patch level

Video cards:
I have swapped my x1950 for my wife's 800XL. She's so far extremely happy with it, running Sims2 at max resolution/detail settings with many, many expansions and custom content with the same components under windows XP. No reports whatsoever of distortion, texture problems or artifacting. It remains to be seen as to whether I get it back or not... At any rate, all of the statements above apply as well to the 800XL, with the caveat that average framerates were 60-70% of the 1950 Pro and the temps were within 5-10C of the 1950 Pro.

Clock speeds:
I'd tried underclocking the memory, the GPU and both at the same time without noticing any improvement. Neither card has been overclocked at any point in time.

RAM:
I've swapped memory, to no avail. I've run Prime95 torture tests for hours at a time with no reported errors.

Random:
Disabling the second processor core did not help. I have an x300 and a 6600GT lying around, but what would be the point?

At this point I'm out of ideas. I'm looking at shelling out another $140 for XP Pro (my license got moved to another machine that I'm loathe to rebuild or inflict Vista upon if this is the norm), and want to make this work, if at all possible. I've been building and maintaining PCs since 1992, and have never had an experience this frustrating. I'm an enthusiast, not a fanboy, and bottom line, I expect a system that I build to *work for its intended purpose*.

neural

I have been following this thread since about page 3 or so with no answer to my problem. What was noticeable to me was that my problem was definately getting worse. The graphic corruption and "lines" persisted in spite of upgraded power supply and improved cooling. The only driver that seemed to not give me as much graphic corruption was the Microsoft WDDM driver which at least allowed me to use my PC for minor word processing, e-mail and Internet, but gaming was virtually impossible.

I eventually started noticing that on a reboot, or even a cold restart, I was getting spotting and graphic corruption and realised that this was not a windows driver problem, but a hardware problem. It seemed if my Radeon X1900GT had gradually "died" over a matter of a few months. Not overclocked, ever.

On wednesday I returned it, they confirmed it was dying and replaced it with a Radeon X1950PRO. The techie gave me the idea that they had had quite a large number of this particular card returned with the same type of problem. In my experience, if you have tried everything like me, return the card and get a new one. It is now running perfectly at max settings on any game. Thankfully, problem solved...

CATALYSTCATCHER

I can tell from your post that you have read this thread, and checked or tried all the things possible. Also that you know exactly what you are doing. Excellent summary as well.

If possible you should try the suggestion posted by "neural". Although there are cases where a driver has resolved the TDR condition, there are far more cases where the source of the problem turns out to be bad hardware.

Glad to hear a replacement card resolved your problems.

Excellent observation, on the change in severity. If a problem is getting worse over time and nothing else is changing, then the problem is very likely failing hardware. Drivers do not spontaneously mutate, where as something like failing memory can cause the driver to be eratic. Visual corruption particularly in any kind of regular pattern usually indicates flaky memory.

smclay

Hey guys

I would just like to say that ive been with ati all my life like any of the ppl posting before me, when the new nvidia 8 series came out i thought to myself maybe its time to try nvidia. So i upgraded to Vista Ultimate and for dx10 put in a 8800 GTS and what do you know the drivers stopped responding everytime i ran a vista raiting test, played games. I tried everything to fix this problem nothing worked so i sold the card stuck my old ati x700 in and guess what same error dif manufacturer. I have to say that the ati cards have been better with vista compaired to the 8800 i tried as i seem to get the error less often (i can actualy run the vista raiting test now).

I think the problem lies somwhere with Vista itself and through testing all i can think of is the vista update system. I manualy removed all updates and the problem instantly seemed alot better i readded the updates and the error was back to how it was.

I would like someone to check this out on their system and get back to me.

PS my system config is (ive tried many combanations):

CPU: Core2Duo E6320
Motherboard: Gigabyte 965P-DS3 rev 3.3 / Asus COMMANDO P965
RAM: 2Gb Elixar / 2 Gb Kingston
Graphics: ATI X700 / Nvidia 8800 GTS
Sound: Onboard / Soundblaster PCI 32 / Soundblaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer
HDD: 160 Gb Maxor Dimond

forgot to say i tried all drivers for each card including betas

PcFusion

Hi Guys

I've had the 'atikmdag error' for 9 months now!

Finally fixed it yesterday after about a week of trying just about everything going - when I say finally fixed I am maybe jumping the gun as I should really give it a week before confirming that it is fixed.

But for example Neverwinter Nights 2 which for me was the worst example of the 'atikmdag error', after loading a game within 3 mins I would receive the error and then it would happen ever 2 - mins after that, in other words the game is totally unplayable. After the fix I done yesterday I played the game solid for 3 hours without any error!

I made several changes yesterday, I think 2 of the changes made a big difference.

1) I set my ram up properly - instead of leaving things on auto - I set the voltage to the correct setting - I set the DRAM timings to the correct setting (this made a huge difference in the performance of my PC!) glad I found this info out

2) My card which is a HIS ICEq3 1950 pro turbo card is basically an overclocked card. I loaded ATI tools and just dropped the VPU clock from 621Mhz to 600Mhz (after apply it set it to 594Mhz) This I believe is what done it for me - this simple change eliminated the error.

I must add that I still use the fan control setting in ATI tool and set it to Dynamic based on GPU temperature with the following setting:

above 0c 55%
above 65 c 100%

I will try some games without the fan control and I'm hoping I won't get the error!

I have a little article on my site which I will update if this is the fix

Article about the atikmdag error

Hope this info helps!

*small update*

I ran the game without using the fan control settings and I kept coming back to the desktop to check the card temp - I notice the card temp getting very high - the good news was still no atikmdag error - but in the end I have set the fan control settings to keep the card temp down to reasonable levels

Oy Vey

I went looking for a guide on my board specifically, and the first step (disable EIST) seems to have fixed the "Driver not responding" situation. I checked against my wife's computer and found that that was enabled by default.

I'm still having heavy artifacting on the desktop after awhile, but it doesn't seem to be temp related. I still have the 800XL in my machine, and core temp has been steady at 46C for about 15 minutes when it starts up. Pegging the fan at 100% only brings it down by 2C.

Rockmunky1990

It would appear as though i've fixed it.

I slightly underclocked my card, and swicthed my theme to windows classic.

Haven't had a single error yet

I hope it all works out for everyone else, as i know how frustrating it is!

vninja

I have been following this thread and feel the frustration so many have had trying to troubleshoot this problem. I have been encouraged by the knowledgeable posts from ATI expert, so wonder if posting here will be more productive than trying to get help from ATI support. My system functions quite well for office apps. or web browsing, but as soon as I use Media Center or Media Player, the atikmdag crashes start happening every few minutes. Sometimes the screen totally blacks out, sometimes just momentarily freezes, then gives the recovered from driver error message and keeps working for a few more minutes.
I have a running ticket with ATI for weeks now and find it very annoying that they obviously don't even read what I respond and just keep pasting pat responses, often things already tried with no improvement.
Based on their instructions, I have tried Cat 7.1, 7.2, 7.3, 7.8, 7.9 drivers as well as the default vista driver...no change (apart from the original error being an R300 one).
I flashed a new BIOS and updated motherboard chipset drivers...no change (apart from having to call microsoft to reactivate vista)
Disabled a bunch of settings in BIOS.
Then there was the long list of registry changes to purge...still no change.

By then I had enough...the computer was unusable. So I went out and bought an nvidia 8500GT. The install went smooth, and I haven't had a single crash or error message since.
Anyway, I conclude there is nothing wrong with my system, just this card. I have repeatedly asked them to RMA the card, but they keep saying I should try it in another system and get new memory and power supply, etc. I say all symptoms point to the video card. After POST when the screen blacks out, or rather, should black out, there is an uneven line about an inch long of mostly yellow pixels. Is that not an indication of bad memory on the card?

Any comments would be appreciated.
My system is a core2duo, asrock motherboard, hauppage hvr1600 tuner, ati 800xl pci-x, 2 G kingston ram.

CATALYSTCATCHER

Please provide more details on your issues.

For example, more specifics about what exactly you are doing in media center when the crashes occur. Pick a problem scenario where the crashes are a) most consistant, and b) the simplest to achieve. And describe it as briefly but accurately as possible. One you have done that, add some additional notes that indicate Media player also crashes, etc. This will allow us to duplicate the scenario as easily as possible.

Also, it is very helpful to get as many hardware specifics as you can easily compile. Things like model numbers for you mobo and graphics card. Even PSU details are good to know. PSU problems can be extremely elusive and weird. Same on the software side with versions. A list of software running in the background is also useful. Virus scanner, messenger programs, network gaming apps.

I understand that this is a little painful and frustrating, but we don't stand a chance of replicating an issue without lots of details.

Thanks for your help.

Steve (aka CC)

tehnad

The easiest fix to the ATI issue that I found was to turn the graphics acceleration off. I have not had a BSOD in four days now. I was getting 2-3 a day before this. Looks like ATI is also having issues with the Mac world as well.
New iMacs having graphics pains? | Tech news blog - CNET News.comhttp://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-979...=2547-1_3-0-20

Looks like ATI owners are possibly in for a long haul on this issue.

Oy Vey

Back to square one - I replaced the x800 with a new x1950 Pro, and the desktop corruption is as prevalent as ever. World of Warcraft is happy, with a solid 60FPS and some texture flashing, but no driver resets. GRAW2 seems ok, but I really haven't played it all that much. Supreme Commander (demo) is simply unplayable as the driver resets immediately after starting a skirmish. Through all of this the core temp ranges between 45-67C.

vninja

Hi and thanks.
This one is easy. Watching live TV, recorded TV, anything on media center.(windows vista ultimate) Within 5 minutes guaranteed to have the driver recovery error. And every few minutes after that over and over. Ussually the screen momentarily freezes and then the error message pops up as vista recovers. Sometimes the screen totally blacks out first. This happens even if doing nothing else on the computer. Full screen or in a window no difference either. First indication of a problem was the blue menu windows got jaggy diagonal lines through them and the even blue color became increasingly pixelated.
In windows media player (version 11.0.6000.6336) it is less frequent, but again it happens while watching an avi or mpeg file. Same message after momentary screen freeze.
The machine dual boots between windows vista ultimate and win xp pro. I rarely use xp anymore, but the last time was while gaming at a LAN party and Age of Empires III totally froze up and the machine had to be rebooted.
Lastly, should the blank screen after POST be totally black? Mine has an uneven horizontal line about an inch long of mostly yellow, some red pixels slightly above the middle of the screen.

Intel Core2duo e6300 @1.86GHz (not ever overclocked)
2 x 1G kingston value RAM PC2-5300 CL5
Asrock 775Dual-VSTA motherboard
ATI radeon x800 XL crossfire pci-express video card
Hauppauge winTV HVR1600 tuner
ultra 600-watt power supply

all parts are less than a year old, and work without problem with the nvidia 8500 gt card I now have installed on the system.

associated problem report with one of the crashes
need anything else?
-------
Product
Windows

Problem
Video hardware error

Date
20/09/2007 10:18 PM

Status
Solution Available

Description
A problem with your video hardware caused Windows to stop working correctly.

Problem signature
Problem Event Name: LiveKernelEvent
OS Version: 6.0.6000.2.0.0.256.1
Locale ID: 4105

Files that help describe the problem (some files may no longer be available)
WD-20070920-2218.dmp
sysdata.xml
Version.txt

Extra information about the problem
BCCode: 117
BCP1: 858EB510
BCP2: 8C140A82
BCP3: 00000000
BCP4: 00000000
OS Version: 6_0_6000
Service Pack: 0_0
Product: 256_1
Server information: 4aa0f9fa-df7b-4675-b99e-ce4151dbed6f

CATALYSTCATCHER

Problems in both OS, even though different, would indicate a HW issue. If everything is OK with the NV card in the system, then that implicates the X800. Although a little corruption on the black screen is common, it may also indicate some kind of problem with the GPU memory. Only a small amount of GPU memory is directly used for the display image. Bad memory in this region shows as screen corruption, the bulk of GPU memory is used during video or 3D rendering and may contain commands for the GPU or other rendering info. If this is corrupted you won't see it directly but the the end result is the GPU having a siezure. This results in the crash, hang , TDR whatever as is usually much worse than a few bad pixels. Have you /can you check GPU temps and system temps in general? If the GPU is running hot, check for dust in the heat sink and fan and try cooling it externally to determine if heat is the problem. You know, cover open, big fan approach.

vninja

I have a large, well ventilated case with side port above the video card and 2 extra case fans. There isn't much dust in the fins. I could put the card back in the system to check temps, but am thinking I would be best to RMA the card. When they are returned, I am assuming they go through a bunch of tests that would reveal any hardware/memory issues, right?
The card already went back for repairs 5 months ago after major artifacting in windows. It seemed good after the repair, but maybe this card is a lemon and has another/recurring problem.

CATALYSTCATCHER

RMA, may be best, but you must remove the card to do so. During that procedure pay close attention to items like poorly seated cards, loose connectors or wires interfering with fans. Also do a good visual inspection for dust and possible damage to the graphics card and anything else on the mobo.

As you have already removed the card, any additional action to check temperatures is completely up to you. But monitoring temperatures is always a good idea. I usually start when the system is working properly and determine what appears to be normal. If temeratures increase over time, (weeks or months) you know that something is changing and usually for the worse.

Yes the cards are tested during an RMA process, cleaned and certainly should work when you get them back. If an RMA'd card, suffers form the same problem you originally sent it in for you should seriously look into other causes for the problem. Not saying that the card you get back may still be a problem occasionally. It does happen, but usually the returned card functions correctly. So keep an open mind.

Hope the RMA fixed you up.