Area 51 R4 - 7820x x299 chipset -BSOD when doing anything demanding

The forum is not the psychic friends network.  There are 16.7 billion or more possible "blue screens". Which windows 10 version and which driver version etc are not trivial.  Windows 10 1511,  Windows 10 1607, Windows 10 1703, and now 1709.

STOP hal.dll  0x00000124
BCCode: 124 is a Hardware Failure though software such as BIOS, low level chipset drivers
This is usually heat related, defective hardware, memory or even processor

The WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR bug check has a value of 0x00000124. This bug check indicates
that a fatal hardware error has occurred. This bug check uses the error data that is provided by the
Windows Hardware Error Architecture (WHEA).


S  ntoskrnl.exe
DRIVER_POWER_STATE_FAILURE -- 0x0000009f -- ntoskrnl.exe
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/debugger/bug-check-0x9f--driver-power-state-failure

The forum is not free Adobe or Maxxon support.

https://www.maxon.net/en/products/cinema-4d

In particular QuickTime: Some versions cannot be used with Windows 10.

Some users have used Current version 7.7.9 with Windows and Cinema 4D & According to the Apple website there is no official support for Windows 10.

MAXON is not responsible for the compatibility of individual graphics cards with the OpenGL mode. Due to the large number and types of available chip sets, operating systems and driver versions Maxxon cannot guarantee the compatibility of all systems.

An overview of graphics cards that meet all requirements can be found here.

Adding another data point.

I just received an Area-51 R4 today with an almost identical build configuration, except instead of the GTX 1070 I have two GTX 1080Ti GPUs.

I am getting the BSOD with a WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR whenever I try to run Adobe After Effects or Premiere.

The computer just freezes when trying to run Photoshop.

I have not tried to run any other 3rd-party software apart from Google Chrome (which works).

I've installed the latest updates to:

- Windows Updates

- Alienware updates

- nVidia driver updates

I've also disabled:

- Intel Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0

- nVidia SLI

Hoping that someone can post a solution to this issue.

I was able to resolve my issue by changing BIOS settings.

• Disabled Intel(R) SpeedStep(tm)
• Disabled Intel SpeedShift Technology
• Manually set Active Processor Cores to 7
• Manually set Memory Frequence to 2666
• Set AVX2 Ratio Offset to 3
• Set AVX3 Ratio Offset to 4 

Disclaimer: I am not an expert and don't know what most of these acronyms mean or do, but I was able to get a working solution with some info on the Adobe forums, along with trial and error.

It appears as though the specific combination of x299 chipset with the i7 7820X has issues with Adobe Photoshop, Premiere, After Effects and Media Encoder.

Other people were reporting the same issues with Asus and MSI x299 boards.

The common solution is to disable Intel Turbo Boost 3.0 Technology in the BIOS, but the Dell Alienware BIOS doesn't have any reference to "Turbo Boost 3.0 Technology" in the BIOS, so I disabled both SpeedStep and SpeedShift.

Some people have found that updating their BIOS resolved the issue. Unfortunately as of Dell Alienware BIOS version 1.0.7, the issue has not been resolved for the Area-51 R4 with i7 7820X.

I'm hoping that Dell releases a BIOS that resolves this issue soon, so that we can use our CPUs to the full advertised capability.

You have an Intel TurboBoost driver, one wonders if disabling it in Device Mngr has an effect

You have a custom MSI motherboard, perhaps an MS-7A87, the GUI graphical interface will be eerily similar to the top MSI X299 motherboards, but most of the 'good' performance enhancing Bios options will have been stripped out of it. With a quick search of MSI X299 Bios on YouTube, you can at times find a 5-10minute overview of someone going through their MSI Bios, opening pages, going over settings etc, such a vid may reveal where the IntelBoost was 'supposed to be', as well as any other 'hidden settings' (those options which separate your board from a full retail board / options purposely hidden from you)

Since MSI will likely use the same GUI across most or all of their platforms, another trick is to dig into their retail offerings, find a user manual and explore it; for instance I downloaded the PDF for the x299 Gaming Pro Carbon, (Page 71 > https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/support/X299-GAMING-PRO-CARBON-AC#down-manual ) under the Bios Guide heading 'OC' (Overclocking), sub-heading Misc, we see mention of TurboBoost below the EIST you may have played with already. This option is also available in the entry-level MSI Raider, where we see MSI porting a one-Bios-fits-all approach to their x299's. How well the PDF manual comports with the real thing, I can't say, which is why cross-referencing with a Bios overview or overclocking instruction video may help (ex. MSI X299 SLI PLUS BIOS Overview > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PfwxOoNf2M ). Good detective work @NFB

When OC Explore Mode = Expert, see Misc Setting > EIST + Intel TurboBoost

Hi,

I also have an area 51 R4, with the i9-7980XE cpu and 64GB of ram + 2 x 1080ti (Zotac mini). windows 10 1709. system drive: m.2 samsung evo pro 512Gb + raid 0 dual samsung evo pro 1TB, regular ssd 512GB amd 2TB satas drive.

I get blue screen all the time. 6 or 7 times a days. When rendering with V-Ray or after effects. Photoshop seems to be ok in my case.

I changed the motherboard, didn't help.

I changed the ram,: didn't help,

I reinstalled windows in pure uefi mode,: didn't help.

I disconnected all usb except mouse and keyboard and wacom: didn't help.

I disabled intel turbo boost (in my bios, v 1.0.3) the turbo boost is called turbo something else...just to confuse people): didn't help

I am waiting for a replacement for the entire computer but it's taking time and I have some contract jobs to finish asap. So I am looking for a temporary solution.

and NFB_VM, where did you get that new bios version, it's still at 1.0.3 when I go to the alienware support wensite (in canada)? Do you have any links for the discussions you are tlaking about where the common solution is to disable turbo boost. just curious to follow if some people could have came back saying finally it doesn't work. Cause at first I thought I was having less bsod when I disabled turbo boost but it came back quickly. It's a hard problem to diagnose.

Did you get any blue screen since you did those changes?

I never had so much problems with a computer, normally I build my own systems from parts and never had such problems. I thought buying a pre-built system would save me some time.... I was sooooo wrong!

@NFB_VM I'm also very curious to see how it impacted your performance. Using only 7 cores must be really disapointing...

Disable advanced C states Sleep in bios.

Source:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/975530/en-us

You can disable the Advance Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) C-states by

using a BIOS option on the computer.

Clicking/Buzzing Noise From CPU Area After Windows 10 Anniversary - Microsoft Community 

If the BIOS does not include this option, a software workaround is available.

You can disable the ACPI C2-state and C3-state by setting a registry key. To do this, follow these steps:

1. At a command prompt, run the following command:
   reg add HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Processor /v Capabilities /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0007e066
2. Restart the computer.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Services/Processor
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Services/Intelppm

Dump File         : 020717-6890-01.dmp
Crash Time        : 2/7/2017 10:03:30 PM
Bug Check String  : 
Bug Check Code    : 0x00000124
Parameter 1       : 00000000`00000000
Parameter 2       : ffffe000`00f03028
Parameter 3       : 00000000`be000000
Parameter 4       : 00000000`000c1152
Caused By Driver  : hal.dll
Caused By Address : hal.dll+35cdf
File Description  : Hardware Abstraction Layer DLL
Product Name      : Microsoft® Windows® Operating System
Company           : Microsoft Corporation

A "stop 0x124" is fundamentally different to many other types of bluescreens because it stems from a hardware complaint.
Stop 0x124 minidumps contain very little practical information, and it is therefore necessary to approach the problem as a case of hardware in an unknown state of distress.(overclocked too many cores)

For those that need a quick refresher, turbo mode is a set of over-clocked P-states that exceed the normal power limits of the silicon. If normally run in this P-state, the silicon would over heat and potentially burn up. Turbo is possible because these normal power limits are computed based upon every core running at maximum performance. There are many situations where the entire power budget is not utilized. In these cases, the power management SW can allow a temporary overclocking.

https://software.intel.com/sites/default/files/managed/f4/a0/pwr_mgmt_states_r0.pdf 

Speestep: instead of writing with huge font size, can you put your font size to 0. thanks.

One strange thing is that since I reinstalled my system in UEFI pure (no oprom legacy stuff) I can't see intel turbo boost anymore... O maybe because I reinstalled windows and didn't intall the intel turbo boost software. But anyway I still get blue screen so that's not the culprit. I will try your setting excpet putting the core a 7... Another solution would be just to keep the computer shutdown..

No.  Font size is that way intentionally cuz I'm old and Blind.

I'm not doing anything.  If you want to press control and use mouse wheel to zoom smaller more power to ya.

Ok lol!!! Maybe you can just increase your windows font size instead. Or press control and use mouse wheel to zoom on text. that way all the text will be bigger for you not just your post.

Ya ya ya...

@Strob Sorry to hear about all the issues you're running into. I expect more from a pre-built system as well.

My Area-51 R4 shipped with BIOS v1.0.7 

I just received it two days ago, so perhaps Alienware is shipping with the latest and the support website hasn't been updated yet, although it is odd that it's still at 1.0.3 on the website.

I haven't received any BSOD since making the changes to the BIOS.

The i7-7820X only has 8 cores, so I'm assuming that setting "Active Processor Cores" to 7 is enabling all the cores.

I'm guessing that this isn't very energy efficient, but at least I'm able to access all the performance available.

Here are some links to the relevant threads on the the Adobe forums:

Intel 7820x Core CPU (Turbo Boost) and Adobe Ph... | Adobe Community 

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2353238 

After Effects causing Bluescreen | Adobe Community 

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/support-hardware/WHEA-UNCORRECTABLE-ERROR-on-Gigabyte-x299-and-Skylake-X-SOLVED-1042/ 

Ok, thank youNFB_VM! I know someone who receive a system after me and he has bios 1.0.6...

Ok I thought you had the same cpu as me sorry. Mine has 18 core. So I should have chose 17 to do like you.

But finally I had found already the Puget System link and I tried their solution and so far it has work!!! I can't belive my computer didn't do a single blue screen since 12 hours. I just did 3d rendering with vray for 10 hours and no blue screen. They know their stuff at Puget System. It seems like the default configuration doesn't play well with those cpu and they will not have enough electricity to work. So we need to overclock them to get them to stop crashing.

I just set  Internal CPU Vcore: 1200mV
Adaptive Mode: Enable

(the name are a bit different in the alienware bios. but they were not so difficult to find) Also I noticed that when you disable speedstep the section in CPU power configuration becomes blank so that's why you didn't see the turbo something mode that will be there if your eenable speedstep.

 I will continue rendrering my project for the weekend and see if i get any bluescreen.