Display driver has stopped responding but has recovered

[Nope-Nope]

I'm at a loss on how to track down the problem. I routinely but randomly experience the problem. It doesn't appear to be tied to any tool. I haven't experienced any graphics related problems outside of Photoshop. I've tried several different drivers but none have stopped or reduced the frequency of the crashes.

I'm running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit and have a GeForce GTX 260 card.

[Noel Carboni]

Well, to be fair Windows looks for things like people trying to read or write data from or to places they're not supposed to.  The processor and memory management logic catch exceptions.

The real bug might be that data unexpectedly ran off the end of a too-small buffer or something, and the crash occurs much later when someone tries to use the data that was supposed to be in the NEXT buffer.  If the OpenGL system sees that you've tried to do something blatently wrong to it it generally catches that and returns an error to the application.  I'd be surprised if Adobe didn't have error handling and recovery logic in Photoshop to handle those kinds of responses.

-Noel

[Hudechrome]

You are confident, then, it is Open GL that has the unhandled exceptions leading to this kind of failure? Could you not validate that by turning off Open GL?

[Noel Carboni]

Confident is too strong a word.  For software to work properly, everything has to be perfect.  Any one pointer that's pointing to the wrong place - and pointers are used millions or billions of times per second - could cause an exception.

Yes, to eliminate OpenGL as a possible problem, one could temporarily disable the Use OpenGL Drawing setting in Photoshop.  I suggest this all the time.

But video drivers have bugs in them outside the OpenGL parts too.  Remember the "partial circle cursor" nVidia bug?  That wasn't OpenGL.

So nothing is ever definitive, but trial and error and the process of elimination can yield clues.  And remember that one of the hardest things in the world to debug is a system that has several different problems.

Video card makers are among the most pressured to release hardware and software quickly...  Think about it.  If the latest and greatest new video game comes out and in the first few weeks the competition's video card runs it better than yours, who do you think the rabid gamers are going to write about online?  Then everyone will buy the other company's card.  Can't have that happening!

Go read the release notes for ATI or nVidia for any given release.  Photoshop is virtually never mentioned.  They couldn't care less whether a few thousand people get good performance out of Photoshop as compared to the millions who play the latest video game.  It's all about who spends the most money.

-Noel

[Hudechrome]

Confident is too strong a word.

It is? Confidence is all I have by which to go. Am I always right even when confident? No. But I can tell you this. If I am wrong, I am really well positioned to deal with the error as I initially came to be confident because I am thorough enough to be there, and I am willing to sign off on it.

Here's a good example of confidence. When Tektronix began building and selling scopes, the power transformers were purchased from the usual sources, like Stancor. Down the line, scopes were being shipped for repair and too many of those were because of bad transformers which the manufacturer declined to replace. Engineering took a look at that, evaluated the failure and determined it was faulty product to begin with, and that a transformer designed for instrumentation should never fail. So Tek went into the transformer business and promptly advertised that any subsequent failure would be under warranty for as long as the instrument is operable. This included the crt high voltage versions as well.

The rest is history, and that was the basis of my training and experience. Confidence. If you don't have it, don't sign off.

We have come a long way since then, and the gumption to produce a quality product, to sign off, is shrinking in the face of the dominant paradigm: Make Money. Make it as fast and as much as you can. Doesn't meet spec? Change the spec and ship! I saw that and it made me disgusted.

My advice to anyone having this problem: Find a supplier that will take returns and begin a process of elimination. Hint: the most effective and trouble free nVidia cards are under $100. 100% guarantee of no problems? No. Greater degree of overall success? Yes. My card uses the GeForce 9500. Runs PS with no problems. Displays video beautifully. Leave it set at default. And if it isn't broke, don't fix it! The advice to update the driver when a new one appears is bogus, and may be counterproductive, as I found out recently.

I don't play games with my computer. Figuratively and literally.

Anyway, one man's opinion, fwiw. I'll get off my soap box now!

Lawrence

[Noel Carboni]

You've gone kind of philosophical on me there, Lawrence.

I honestly can't tell whether you're disagreeing with something I've said or what, so I have nothing in response to say.

I am confident in what I've written.

-Noel

[Hudechrome]

That's fine, Noel. I wasn't exactly disagreeing, nor agreeing with you but rather the attitudes that seem so prevalent in today's operations in technical matters. I I simply say I disagree, without some sort of foundation, it gets sticky.

Just sayin'!

[Chris Cox]

🙂

Sorry, no, I'm not going to start making my own GPUs and drivers....

🙂

[Hudechrome]

Why not!

Hey! You guys do the code, I'll see to the validation. Just think of all the happy, contented folks here.We could one up Mac! Next to the word "Hero" in Pictionary would be....Chris COX! 

Deal?

[Chris Cox]

Pass.

[Hudechrome]

Sigh!

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi

Anyway, I hope this video issue gets resolved,.

[Noel Carboni]

I'm having some trouble seeing what is the debate here...

Lawrence, if you don't like the way a particular car works - say it breaks down a lot - what do you do?  You need a car?  But you're in no way qualified to build a new one from the ground up - and even if you were, do you have the several years it would take to do so?

You buy someone else's car.  Maybe you change brands hoping to get a better-built one.  In my personal case, that involved throwing out nVidia and siding with ATI/AMD, because the latter company makes better products in my opinion.

Thing is, you cannot buy a perfect car, at any price.

Adobe doesn't make GPUs.  Neither does Microsoft.  Big and powerful as they are, they prefer to create and use interfaces that allow others who are more expert at GPU design/manufacturing/software development to build subsystems that connect in.  Only a few companies are good at this.

The thing is - and what I suspect you're not really understanding here - is that these things are so WILDLY, INSANELY complicated that they are simply impossible to make perfect, even by the smartest, most expert people in the world!  The design may be imperfect, or the implementation may be imperfect, or the particular hardware copy may be a lemon, or maybe the designers just didn't have time to iron out all the bugs before release because of business reasons.  But that's life!

Modern systems are on the cutting edge of what's possible.  The development processes and supporting software/hardware are ever-improving, and they allow us to engineer things that are more complicated than ever before - but there are limits, and a company that explores those limits carefully will succeed at business where others who sit back and just try to perfect what they already have simply fail.  This is not theory.

Some of us do have systems that run without fault for weeks or months.  Considering a modern computer executes billions of instructions per second, I'd say that's pretty near perfect operation.  Near perfection is a reality.  With cars and computers, things have NEVER been better than they are right now.

-Noel

[Hudechrome]

There is a fair dose of whimsy here, Noel!

I know what a GPU is, and who makes them. I know it's hardware, and Adobe does software. I also realize, as does Chris, that not many are inclined, or have the finances to mount such an operation.I certainly didn't expect that Chris would take me up on that, and even if he was inclined, and had the money, he has people far more qualified than I to do the QA stuff. Ergo, the whimsy!

TTFN!

Lawrence

[Guest]

I have a similar issue to the one discussed here.

Actually I had a crash like that with BSOD included 10 minutes ago (while using Ps CS5). And yesterday. I have them statistically once a week. Can't give much detail, but it's a cutting edge equipment with a serious nVidia hardware on it. Mind that it doesn't happen on other equipment with same software/drivers, but older nVidia GPU's. Used furMark - nothing: can burn for an hour and no crash, and then out of nothing once a week all goes down. Changed graphics cards (same model), changed drivers - to no avail. Will be replacing the whole thing as a result.

My bets (since no support could precisely diagnose the issue for some months now) are with nVidia's fault. I'm guessing they changed something in their  hardwares/firmwares/drivers/etc... (no idea precisely what) and now  there are issues with new products and some particular instructions used  in particular scenarios.

Adobe is not directly to blame in my opinion. I have this while running Adobe, or Autodesk, or sometimes something as demanding as a browser. Still - Adobe should look into it in my opinion, as well as everybody else. There may be patches necessary, since something may be outdated.

In other words - I would say from my experience that in this case Adobe is not who's responsible. But "your GPU is broken, buy a different brand" is also not the answer in this particular case. People got GPU's that are recommended by Adobe as tested, and sometimes are specifically certified for Adobe applications. So I expect Adobe to be up to date with nVidia (aren't you friends with them with the whole collaboration on the Flash thing and other projects?), solve things on Adobe's side if needed, or talk to nVidia about it when it's something on their end.

Regards.

[Noel Carboni]

a-neko.eu wrote:

So I expect Adobe to be up to date with nVidia (aren't you friends with them with the whole collaboration on the Flash thing and other projects?), solve things on Adobe's side if needed, or talk to nVidia about it when it's something on their end.

Just to be clear, since you replied to me:  I am not with Adobe.

I do have a working relationship with several GPU makers myself, but it's no doubt different from Adobe's, and my operation is so small that I don't really carry any weight beyond my ability to make certain insiders aware of certain issues.  Our assumption must be that Adobe does maintain a working relationship with some folks at ATI/AMD, nVidia, Intel, but keep in mind they're all different companies.  What's important to one isn't necessarily important to the other.

It's probably a bit like if you make cabinets for nationwide distribution, and some cabinet installer in the southeast with whom you've done a little business in the past calls you up and talks about improvements that you should consider for the door hinges.  You may not make immediate design changes based on the conversation, because you have the bigger picture to deal with, but you might keep the suggestions in mind next time you have to deal specifically with a new design involving hinges.

-Noel

[Guest]

Sorry - I suppose I got the wrong button. Wasn't meant to reply directly to you - only contributing to the topic itself and addressing Adobe. Thanks for your support on the other issue by the way ; )

[Chris Cox]

Still - Adobe should look into it in my opinion, as well as everybody else. There may be patches necessary, since something may be outdated.

We do look into them, and try to reproduce as many as we can to get more info.

But then we always have to turn it over to the GPU maker to fix the driver.

I don't recommend buying a different brand -- but I do recommend letting the GPU maker know about the problem and hold them accountable for fixing the bugs in their drivers.  They need to hear that Photoshop is just as important to customers as "Team Fortress 3: the Pandering".

[widelec]

Welcome again

After many hours of tests, there's my result:
1) ps is more stable in opengl mode (the same alert) but gives no possibility to save - stop responding
and gives new event:

- System
  - Provider
   [ Name]  Application Error
  - EventID 1000
  [ Qualifiers]  0
   Level 2
   Task 100
   Keywords 0x80000000000000
  - TimeCreated
  [ SystemTime]  2010-10-05T17:40:02.000000000Z
   EventRecordID 3069
   Channel Application
   Security

- EventData
   Photoshop.exe
   11.0.2.0
   4bf2d91c
   nvoglv64.DLL
   8.17.12.5896
   4c378ebb
   c0000005
   000000000071be4b
   1408
   01cb649b5a158ed7
   C:\Windows\system32\nvoglv64.DLL
   947622a1-d0a7-11df-977f-e43b6086d9b5

2) in directx mode hangs after 10 sec at some circle selection but still responding

purchase of different card is not a solution
I have no other problems with gtx260
...and google is full of problems concerning HD 4670 and windows 7 and "display driver has stopped responding"
summarise: no warranty that a new card will change anything and work properly, better to find another resolution

I will try this trick with DriverSweeper.

[Chris Cox]

 nvoglv64.DLL 

That is the cause of the crash.

PLEASE talk to NVidia.  (so they can do further testing and get the problems fixed)

[Hudechrome]

A search on google connects it to malicious spyware as well.

[PC Nana]

I have been using Microsoft Defender deep scan daily and after  the suggestion that it might be because of a worm or other virus type of code also down loaded Avast which I have had great luck with on all my other systems.  I did a deep scan and it turned up nothing.  So I don't think a virus is my problem unless it is so unknown that neither product can detect it  which I find doubtful.

Good news (I hope) for me is that a member of the HP Crash Team actually called me on the phone and we used the HP Virtual Room so he could look at my system.  He then selected the Event Logs to up load and the Memory Dump files and a few other things which took about 5 hours to up load.  He is looking at them to determine what needs to be done.  I told him one of my suggestions is a new computer from HP and I would send him back this one in the box it comes in. Of course if it comes with the same type of video card it will probably just have the same issues --- unless I just have a lemon.  I really have a hard time believing that a company of HPs size would keep putting a faulty card in one of its most expensive systems.  They did let go an awful lot of people so quality control might have gone down the tubes.  CEO problems on top of everything had just hit the fan as my system was being built.  Don't know if that factors in at all but one never knows.

Another suggestion has been to do a system restore back to complete factory settings and start reloading things again one by one and see what happens.  But since it was the WORST right out of the box I fail to see the point.  At least getting the latest version of Adobe Flash fixed part of the problem so I still believe there is a link there somewhere.

[widelec]

I don't think they will do anything especially for me - problem is known by NVIDIA, ATI, MICROSOFT... I wasn't expecting this situation because
PS is not 3d game. That's why I wrote here

Probably I found solution. Now I'm performing "crash tests" (ca 3 circle selections per second). After 15 minutes everything seems to be alright.

[Noel Carboni]

Funny you should mention 3D games...

If only you knew what an incredible ball of yarn OpenGL is under the covers.  It's no surprise that every 4th post on this forum is about it not working just right with Photoshop.  But OpenGL CANNOT be ignored because it provides access to the incredible power of the modern GPU.

Bravo to Adobe for braving this territory.  No doubt the video card makers / driver writers will settle their systems down now that serious Photoshop users expect them to actually work for something other than teen entertainment.

-Noel

[widelec]

All day with PS and none problems. But of course  a completely new critical events - NVIDIA Stereoscopic 3D Driver Service

Never mind, PS is stable, i'm happy.

Kind regards,

widelec

[PC Nana]

A member of the HP crash team was able to resolve my issue finally.  It was the 32 bit software that I used with the Belkin cable to set up my new 64 bit computer. The cd went in my old 32 bit computer but evidently it still pushed all the files and photos etc. with enough code to start the ball rolling down hill.  Then I added my old Microsoft keyboard which probably had 32 bit software.  Plus I bought an APC unit that had, yes, 32 bit software.  So piles and piles of little things kept getting added on top of each other and the system kept crashing.  We did a Factory Restore and I did things totally differently this time and my system seems perfectly stable now.  It really had nothing to do with the display driver.  The guy I worked with was fantastic!  He called me and spent hours on the phone with me giving me step by step instructions plus walked me through the difficult stages.  He said to have the new system run faster after doing the initial out of the box set up, let it sit for about 10 - 15 minutes and shut it down.  Reboot and let it set, and go through that for about 4-6 times to get all the programs and all the drivers going where and when they should.  THEN get the virus software that shipped with it, Norton in this case up and running and connect to the Internet.  Shut down between updates and do that again several times.  Only after ALL up dates have been installed do you move on to the Microsoft up dates and again you shut down and reboot in between downloads to make sure everything goes where it should and works correctly.  WHAT A DIFFERENCE!!!!!  Hopefully this will be the end of it and I will be very careful about what goes on my 64 bit system from now on.  Perhaps others should check to make sure they haven't used the drivers for their printers that aren't right which was another thing I had done.  Just one little thing after another.  No wonder the thing kept crashing!  I'm not sure 64 bit is ready for prime time yet....

Hope this is helpful to somebody else.

[Chris Cox]

Ouch.  Sorry to hear that it was that complicated to clean up.