AMD drivers causing hard-locks on Win10 with RX Vega 56; suggestions?

[stryk]

I'm in the process of putting together a new rig, and getting hard lockup/freezes (ctrl+alt+del does nothing, it just locks up, have to cut power to reboot). Here is currently what is connected to the system (it's in the test-for-POST stage, sitting on the mobo box):

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 1700X
• CPU Cooler: [air] CoolerMaster MasterAir MA610P RGB fancy thing that sucked to install because the wiring for the fans is almost unreachable when you have non-presidential man-sized hands.
• Mobo: MSI X370 Gaming M7 ACK (latest BIOS as of time-of-post installed) -- WiFi card that came with the mobo is not installed at this point, for troubleshooting purposes I did a fresh install without the WiFi module installed to eliminate the need for Windows to install drivers for it, in case that may have been the root cause.
• Memory: 4x 8GB Corsair LPX 3200MHz (these modules are on the QVL for this motherboard)
• GPU: Gigabyte RX Vega 56
• PSU: Corsair HX750 Gold (the semi-modular model)
• Storage: Boot drive is a WD Black 512GB M.2 NVME, and an ADATA SX7000 512GB M.2 NVME is in the other M.2 slot

So, a fresh barebones install of Windows 10 x64, I'm talking downloaded the ISO from microsoft, flash it to a USB thumb drive and installed (luckily with USB 3.0 and M.2 NVMe this only takes about 5 minutes, because I've done it 6 or 7 times at this point). Absolutely no other software installed other than the latest AMD drivers and whatever drivers Windows installs by default. I'm getting hard lockups/system freeze shortly after logging in to windows 10. Hard lockups - the whole thing just freezes, no ctrl+alt+del, no nothing. I have to cut power either by shorting the Front Panel power pins on the mobo or turn off the PSU.

 

Event viewer, to my knowledge (navigating those logs is a goddamn mine field), isn't reporting anything substantial -- unless I'm looking in the wrong category (I've checked System Events, and the general Critical one -- i forget what they call that). The only thing it reports is the unexpected shutdown, at least that I can find. May need some tips & tricks for where to look in Event Viewer as it's not user friendly in the least bit.

 

Troubleshooting done so far:

• I let Memtest86 do an 8-pass RAM torture test last night, it reported 0 errors, so I don't think it's bad memory modules.
• Burned about a half an ounce of very good weed contemplating how I'm going to explain to my old lady that the $850 graphics card I bought doesn't work, and that I may not be able to use it, and Newegg may fight me about returning it. I might be homeless next week, in which case none of this will matter.
• I booted to an Ubuntu 17.10 Live image and it functioned fine, idle and under a load, for 3 hours without freezing. This leads me to believe it's a software issue -- either Windows 10 shenanigans or with the AMD Windows drivers.
• Currently I'm letting it idle after a fresh install of win10 BUT NOT installing the AMD drivers, to see if I still get a lockup. So far (almost 6 hours and counting) it seems to be OK. No freezes or lockups. Having an $850 video card with no drivers is pretty pointless, though.
• Currently the connected display is a big beast of a monitor (HP Omen 32), connected via DisplayPort. During troubleshooting I've tried connecting it via HDMI instead, and tested having freesync both on and off. Also tried a totally different display that does not have Freesync. Nothing had any effect, still locks up with AMD drivers installed.
• Via the process of elimination this is leading me to the conclusion that the AMD drivers for vega are... well, shit. Or they're just buggy. But, they could be shit.

Now look, I'm OK with Linux, as a matter of fact that's my OS of choice, but this is supposed to be a gaming machine -- I paid thru the nose for the damn card. unfortunately for gaming -- if you want to play the newest titles, Windows is your only option realistically. I say this as a somewhat experienced Linux user and fan of that OS, but for gaming it's just not the best choice (hopefully this changes more quickly with the advent of Vulcan, etc.).

 

I'm curious if anyone else has had any issues with the x64 Win10 AMD drivers & AMD RX Vega?

 

And if the GPU drivers are indeed the problem... what is the end-user recourse here? There isn't another option (at least on Windows) is there?

 

If anyone has any advice, troubleshooting tips, commands to run, logs to look at (event viewer tips would be appreciated, I am not well versed with that tool), etc. ANYTHING ... I'm listening, and it would be very much appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Edited March 22, 2018 by stryk
typos & clarification & I'm high as shit

[DrMacintosh]

Use the Windows video driver supplied through Windows update.

[stryk]

3 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

Use the Windows video driver supplied through Windows update.

Which is who knows how old? No thanks, I didn't pay $850 to do that.

[DrMacintosh]

You came looking for help. I tried to help. 

 

I’m trying to get the system stable with some form of driver before you try anything but if you would rather not do that it’s your decision. 

[stryk]

Just now, DrMacintosh said:

You came looking for help. I tried to help. 

And I thank you. However that isn't really a solution to the problem, nor it is ideal for a gaming machine.

[DrMacintosh]

Just now, stryk said:

And I thank you. However that isn't really a solution to the problem, nor it is ideal for a gaming machine.

Read my reply again

[stryk]

1 minute ago, DrMacintosh said:

Read my reply again

Didn't see the edit. But it is stable, at this point, with the default windows driver. in the original post, under 'troubleshooting done so far':

Quote

Currently I'm letting it idle after a fresh install of win10 BUT NOT installing the AMD drivers, to see if I still get a lockup. So far (almost 6 hours and counting) it seems to be OK. No freezes or lockups. Having an $850 video card with no drivers is pretty pointless, though.

 

[DrMacintosh]

Just now, stryk said:

Didn't see the edit. But it is stable, at this point, with the default windows driver. in the original post, under 'troubleshooting done so far':

 

Are you on the default Windows driver or are you not running drivers? 

[stryk]

Just now, DrMacintosh said:

Are you on the default Windows driver or are you not running drivers? 

..... how can you have a display without any drivers running? That doesn't make sense.

 

Let me rephrase: It's currently on a barebones absolutely fresh install of windows 10 x64. absolutely nothing installed outside of whatever windows drivers are installed by default. The issues stated (hard lock-ups) arise after installing the latest drivers from AMD. I thought that was pretty well documented in the OP?

[DrMacintosh]

7 minutes ago, stryk said:

how can you have a display without any drivers running? That doesn't make sense.

Usually the display will look like its running in 480p.....

[stryk]

8 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

Usually the display will look like its running in 480p.....

That's not how this works... you need something driving the display. If there is picture on your screen, there is a driver running on your operating system (be it windows, macos, linux, whatever). Even on the default installation there is still a display driver running. It may be a generic one just to get the system booted, but it's still there. The system has to know how to interface with the GPU somehow, that's what the driver does. Without a display driver there would be no display (unless we're talking about 1960's/70s VT terminals).

 

My issues are (i think) being caused by the latest, up-to-date drivers from AMD. I don't know exactly what, yet, but until then I have an $850 fancy PC gaming graphics card that can't play any of the games you would buy an $850 card for, because it's only stable on the default windows (old & probably generic) display driver.

[DrMacintosh]

Hope someone else tries to help you!

[TheBlackPanther]

Im having the same issue im a newbie to building pcs and i get hard locks too,

ive done the latest bios updates for the MSI x370 and ive got a ryzen 1600x

 

Fresh install of windows and then installed chrome and avg antivirus and the issue still happens.

 

Ive changed everything apart from my cpu and powersupply.

 

What would you recommend i do?

[raphidy]

Man, I would try earlier AMD drivers. DDU first, to clean install graphics drivers.

[TheBlackPanther]

6 hours ago, raphidy said:

Man, I would try earlier AMD drivers. DDU first, to clean install graphics drivers.

in the process of getting a refund for amd im moving back to intel, one i dont have to look for drivers n mess about installing them 2 i weill have a better cpu  and 3 i just want it to work.

 

For me to go back a few drivers just to have it working is just stupid, onwards and upwards.

 

[raphidy]

16 minutes ago, TheBlackPanther said:

in the process of getting a refund for amd im moving back to intel, one i dont have to look for drivers n mess about installing them 2 i weill have a better cpu  and 3 i just want it to work.

 

For me to go back a few drivers just to have it working is just stupid, onwards and upwards.

 

Sorry, i have no idea what you are talking about. OP has a GPU problem. Unlike you, you have a CPU problem. CPU generally don't have drivers, they just work. Only chipset has drivers. Please post in another new thread if you want help.

[porina]

When it is stated that "AMD drivers" are installed, is this the GPU and/or chipset drivers? If you don't already, install the chipset drivers. https://support.amd.com/en-us/download/chipset?os=Windows+10+-+64

Note the driver package interface is rubbish and fails to adequately distinguish between chipset and GPU driver versions. It's been a while since I did it, but when it checks versions on install, I think you have to pick "this package" or some similar wording option. It may claim a newer version is installed when it isn't, as it is reading the GPU driver version. If in doubt, install the chipset driver, then re-install the GPU driver on top. Alternatively, if you're up for yet another reinstall, do that then chipset drivers, then GPU drivers.

 

If the above doesn't help, run the hardware as "safe" as you can. No OC on CPU. Run ram at basic speed (2133), not XMP. Yes, it sucks, but it'll help rule that out. memtest alone is not sufficient in checking ram stability. In global wattman, check the preset is on either "power save" or "balanced", not "turbo" or "custom".