Kernel power 41, SLI

OriaRend · December 31, 2016

Hi all. I'll try to be as detailed and informative as possible.

I bought a new PC about 3 weeks ago. Specs: Intel Core I7 6700K CPU, Corsair Hydro H90 CPU cooling, Asus SABERTOOTH Z170 MARK 1 motherboard, HyperX FURY 2x16GB DDR4 2400MHz memory, 2 x Asus GTX 1080 TURBO 8GB GDDR5X, Western Digital Caviar Black WD2003FZEX 2TB hard drive, HyperX Savage SHSS37A/480G 480GB SS. Corsair 850W 80+ Platinum HX850i power supply, Corsair 500R Carbide Black Mid-Tower Case. OS is Windows 10 64 bit, nothing is overclocked to the best of my knowledge. My monitor is dell 27 inch 4k screen with 60hz refresh rate. My drivers are up to date (according to driver booster and nvidia geforce experience).

The problem: I am getting rebooted during gaming. It doesn't show an error or a bluescreen or anything, it simply reboots. This happens ONLY IF SLI IS ENABLED.

The error shown in the event viewer is kernel power 41, guid {331C3B3A-2005-44C2-AC5E-77220C37D6B4}, keywords 0x8000400000000002.

I ran memtest and it didn't find any issues. I ran furmark and 3dmark and passed with flying colors without any issue. GPU temps are fine (rarely go above 70c).

I took the PC to the store I bought it from twice - and twice they told me that they couldn't find any issue. Went there myself to play World of Warcraft, and played for about 15 minutes (not nearly enough time) there at the store without an issue. Came back to my place, and sure enough, it rebooted after a while of gametime. The guy at the store said that something is wrong with the electrical wiring in my house. Maybe that's true. Maybe not. I want a second opinion.

A very important thing I noticed: vsync (aka frame capping) seems to have fixed it in most games. For example, in world of warcraft without vsync I can go to really high fps, and it rebooted. But after activating vsync, I can't go above 60, and since then, WoW hasn't rebooted me.

But another game, rise of the tomb raider, reboots me even after vsync. But when I cap the frame rate to 30 rather than 60, it doesn't happen in rise of the tomb raider. A similar thing happens with witcher 3.

At any rate - it seems the error is somehow connected to my frame rate. Also going from full screen to windowed mode seemed to help with the issue. Resolution doesn't seem to be a big factor, as even with the lowest possible resolution, I was rebooted in WoW (had like 400 fps).

But I don't want to play in 30 fps. I want to play in 60. And my PC is strong enough to handle it so it should be fine. Yet I still get rebooted in rise of the tomb raider and witcher 3.

Could anyone please try and help me understand why is this happening and fix it? Does it seem plausible to you that there is something wrong with the electricity in my house? never had any problems with any other electrical appliance. Is it possible somehow that my monitor is whats causing the reboots? because at the store they had a different monitor.

The_Dylmyster · January 1, 2017

The issue is due to stressing your GPUs. Get a GPU load monitor and try games that require a lot of GPU load and if it is at 100% it should reboot. Try with lowered settings and if it is at 80% or under i don't think you will have this problem. Also there is no way your house wiring could cause it because even if it was bad your PSU would be correcting it. Also if the problem can't be fixed try investing in a device that can see how many watts your pc is drawing from the wall and if it is above 850 while playing games with no VSync that is definitely the problem however this would be unlikely.

OriaRend · January 2, 2017

I will try to trigger a reboot while monitoring GPU load and post the results.

Just a question though - If this really is about stressing my GPUs, why does it only happen in SLI? Doesn't it make sense that if I'm running a game with 2 1080s, then each of them is under less stress than if i would run it on just one?