Counter Strike 2/CS2 crashes without error message. RAM failure?

[Performer]

 Hey,

this forum is my absolute last resort. I try to be as detailed as possible with my problem and what I tried so far. Maybe you guys have a solution. I'm kinda having an idea on what it could be but this involves money and may not even solve my problem.

 

My system: 

AMD RYZEN 7 5800X with a Noctua DH14 cooler

32 GB RAM  ( i don't remember the brand but it has an HS and 3200 MHz and all 4x 8 GB sticks are the same.)

ASUS ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (WI-FI) II

MSI RTX 4060 TI  8 GB VENTUS 2x

Sound Card: Creative Sound Blaster Z

PS: Corsair RM 750x (750 Watt)

 

How it started: I was happily enjoying CSGO on my old Ryzen 1st GEN System until CS2 came around. Since CS2 wasnt exactly hitting the FPS numbers I was expecting I decided to upgrade from a b350 board, a 1700X Ryzen and a GTX 960 to something better. Everything was bought new, except the RAM and the PSU which never failed and the PSU was only 2 years old so I decided to use them in the new build again. 

New hardware arrived. I installed everything correctly. Tested it with Memtest and Prime95 and everything seemed fine. No issues with XMP or anything. No errors and the system seemed stable. EXCEPT FOR GAMING as it seems.

 

The problem:  CS2 crashes to the desktop without any error. I play 30 minutes and its gone. I don't have this problem with a Premiere Pro Render or any other game (such as Flatout Ultimate Carnage). But my premiere renders are short and Flatout doesn't nearly use as much ressources as CS2. So just CS2 crashes.  But it does so without any error or warning. The game stutters and I'm back at desktop just like that. No event viewer logs. No nothing. Checked the hardware and RAM usage: It doesn't even get close to maxing out. Temperatures are normal. This can't be a widespread issue aka "the games fault" because many more people would complain then. So I narrowed it down to being a hardware fault. But that is the problem: WHAT KIND OF HARDWARE IS FAILING?

Recently something odd happend. A BSOD occurred. Failing was a system component: dxgmms2.sys - But that was just a DIRECT X error and it was recommended to "Install newest nvidia drivers" which I did! Bluescreen didn't happen anymore but the closing issue did.

 

HERE ARE MY BIOS SETTINGS.  Maybe you see something that I missed: 

 

 

What I did so far: 

- Multiple hours of MEMTEST and Prime 95. Absolutely rock stable. No errors and no crash.

- newest bios drivers and newest amd, nvidia and sound drivers I could find is installed

- reduced memory frequency to 2133 mhz and completely disabled XMP and any overclocking on the entire BIOS on anything I could find.

- disabled windows notifications

- tried new pephirals such as a new mouse and new keyboard

- rearranged the RAM

- tried without my sound card.

 

What it could be:  I googled extensively the problem. Most people say it's ram or PSU or temperatures. That's exactly the problem. Everyone of those is fine. The PC never shutted down due to a PSU outtage. And a PSU wouldnt close a program on windows. The whole PC would fail. A RAM failure is also not possible. Since I ran multiple instances of MEMTEST for HOURS. Even with PRIME 95 along side it. If a RAM is failing I would need to have an error there too. And the temperatures are at a max of 70 degrees thanks to my coolers and the case fans.

I still think it could be the PSU or RAM. But I don't have evidence. Both seem absoluty fine. I don't wanna spend 300 $ to buy both new to end up with the same problem again. 

 

I'm out of ideas. Maybe you have one? Maybe someone experienced the same suffering as me and is willing to help. I highly would appreciative that. 

I cannot play CS2 anymore. The danger of my PC failing is too high and that saddends me. Everything can game CS2 on christmas except for me. That sucks.

 

 

Anyway

Merry Christmas everyone

[sivispacem]

Have you tried running a single RAM stick?

[Margot Robbed Me]

It seems the fixes you tried were on the hardware side of things. It's going to suck, but have you tried reinstalling Windows or the game itself? You didn't list an HDD/SSD in your components, but you did say that everything was new except for the RAM and PSU. So this is assuming you got a new drive and did a fresh Windows install.

 

If you in fact re-used a drive. I believe there are situations where you could carry your Windows install from one board to the next, which would be convenient, but I always prefer a fresh install when I upgrade. If that's what you did (carried over), then I'd suggest doing a fresh installation and trying again.

[Performer]

1 hour ago, sivispacem said:

Have you tried running a single RAM stick?

Infact thats the only thing I didn't try. This is because of the fact that memory testing was totally error free. But I will try it.

31 minutes ago, Margot Robbed Me said:

It seems the fixes you tried were on the hardware side of things. It's going to suck, but have you tried reinstalling Windows or the game itself? You didn't list an HDD/SSD in your components, but you did say that everything was new except for the RAM and PSU. So this is assuming you got a new drive and did a fresh Windows install.

 

If you in fact re-used a drive. I believe there are situations where you could carry your Windows install from one board to the next, which would be convenient, but I always prefer a fresh install when I upgrade. If that's what you did (carried over), then I'd suggest doing a fresh installation and trying again.

I reused my Samsung 970 EVO m.2 as the main C drive. This is also where my installation of steam is. but I formatted it and freshly installed windows on it. This shouldn't be the issue. Also there wasn't made a single change to system files yet.

 

Edited December 25, 2023 by Performer

[Performer]

23 hours ago, sivispacem said:

Have you tried running a single RAM stick?

Wasn't the solution. Still happening. Even with one stick!

[Margot Robbed Me]

Assuming it isn't software related, is it too late to return/exchange some of your parts?

[44Orca]

I see you have tried other games but were they newer ones? (After 2018 or so). Since Flatout is from 2007. (if not, try new ones if you have to see if they also crash)

I don't know what it might be, not good with these either.., you probably tried this already with the fresh install/upgrade. Aside game directory there's also other file locations, settings etc. I would delete every game folder related to CS2/CSGO elsewhere so it recreates them. (or place them elsewhere/backup, to keep the downloaded matches/crosshair settings and such)

Lastly, might be something to do with the CPU cores?..maybe not but just adding this too.. there were some games that had this problem for me but they were older.

CS2 is still being fixed/updated, I remember seeing other people having all sorts of different issues on steam/reddit discussions before.

Edited December 26, 2023 by 44Orca

[Jason]

I'm no expert on this by any means so I'm just spitballing, but have you ran a GPU stress test?

 

If it's PSU or GPU related then my one guess would be that it could be either that there's some issue with say the power to the GPU where it momentarily drops, or some other hardware fault with the GPU that only shows after extended use under high load.

[Performer]

Found the solution (well kind of) - It was 2 problems. One is a "tier0.dll" in the game files that makes trouble and the other one was the NVIDIA driver itself. I 

I reinstalled the nvidia driver with wiping it with DDU first and deleted tier0.dll and verified CS2 games files on steam and the problem was kinda gone.  

 

Seems like I was looking for a hardware failure but under "event viewer -> Windows Logs -> Application is where you can find software errors and thats where I found the stuff I needed to know

 

 

BUT now after 1-2 hours there is a 99% chance of having a BSOD: 

(not my picture but I have the EXACT SAME error) and the problem really is: Googling this error only reveals "it might be a driver issue". - So basically I shifted the problem to something else now

AAAAAND the stress continues.

 

And no: I don't have a dump file because the bluescreen stays on "0%"  -.-

Edited December 27, 2023 by Performer

[sivispacem]

That's an error that can manifest itself with bad RAM, BTW.