Vista - "display driver atikmdag stopped responding and has successfully recovered" error

I assume you've updated your video drivers?

Have you tried temporarily disabling aero, played a game and seen if it still crashes?

I'd explore all software issues first before blaming a faulty card and potentially replacing it needlessly.

it's not only the crash problem... before the crash i experice black windows which "freeze" the game for a moment. i played an hour in Battlestations now, after cleaning the registry with CCleaner and i had "only" 2 black windows.
i'll try to disable aero next time i'll play...

What drivers do you have installed?

i have installed 9.4.
i cleaned up the registry with CCleaner, maybe this may help.
i just played Crysis and after 5 minuets of playing the game crashed to desktop.

i really don't know what can i do to get rid of this problem...

Use GPU-Z to log your cards speeds/temps while you play a game. This will confirm whether your cards temps and fan speed are okay or not.

GPU-Z Video card GPU Information Utility


Do the games crash with an error code?

Check in Event Viewer>Administrative events for the game crashes. Look for the "faulting module". This may point to a particular driver etc.



Are you using any cracked/no-dvd .exe's? Some cracks will cause plenty of CTD.

so, i did what you suggested: (i played crysis and it crashed after 5 minuets)

this the gpu-z log file:


and in the event viewer i get two Errors and one Warning.
(the game doesn't crash with an error code)

the warning is:
Display driver atikmdag stopped responding and has successfully recovered.

one error:
Faulting application crysis64.exe, version 1.1.1.5767, time stamp 0x471f96dc, faulting module kernel32.dll, version 6.0.6002.18005, time stamp 0x49e041d1, exception code 0x0000087a, fault offset 0x00000000000176fd, process id 0x1a04, application start time 0x01c9e83f55d522c1.

and the second:
Faulting application crysis64.exe, version 1.1.1.5767, time stamp 0x471f96dc, faulting module atidxx64.dll, version 8.15.10.190, time stamp 0x49beb3b7, exception code 0xc0000005, fault offset 0x000000000000e72b, process id 0x1a04, application start time 0x01c9e83f55d522c1.


so, how's my card temps and fan speed? what to do with this "faulting module"?
i don't use any cracked/no-dvd .exe's.

hope for a solution,
GigaDude

Sorry for the delay in replying.

Your cards temps and fan speed are perfectly fine, so it's not a heat issue

It's the video drivers.

atikmdag and atidxx64.dll are part of the display drivers. So something has gone a little screwy so it's time to start from scratch again. It may also be worthwhile downloading the Cat 9.5 drivers.

First Download driversweeper and install:
Guru3D - Driver Sweeper

Next go to control panel>uninstall programs and uninstall ATI Catalyst install manager. This should remove CCC and the drivers.

Now, boot into safe mode and run driver sweeper. (Driver Sweeper must be 'run as admin'). Select only ATI components and then 'clean'.

Boot back into Vista normally and then run the catalyst driver installation again. Then restart once more.

Hopefully all has installed cleanly and will put a stop to your BSOD's.

Let me know how you get on or need any more help with it.

during the install of the ATI driver, there was an error "Driver Install: the INF file was not found". but the install still continue... what to do with that? all the steps before i did exactly as you said.

also, i checked crysis (even though i got this error during the installation) and it crashed after 5 minuets and i got the warning.

what are my next steps?

Thanks for your help

The cat 9.4 drivers sometimes have issues installing the drivers properly. This is easily fixed.

Go to device manager>Display adapters, right-click properties and select "update driver software" under the drivers tab.

Next "browse my computer for driver software" > "let me pick from a list of device drivers" and in the window select "have disk"

Navigate to:

C:\ATI\Support\9-4_vista64_win7_64_dd_ccc_wdm_enu\Driver\Packages\Drivers\Display\LH6A_INF

and select CH_78303.inf which should then install the driver.

To verify both the correct CCC and driver version are installed, open Catalyst Control Center and check the info in Information Center / Graphics Software

the driver version should be 8.60 and CCC 9.4




Now it should be all installed. The BSOD's and errors could possibly have been caused my a mismatch between the Catalyst version and the display driver.

i did what you say and i even installed Catalyst 9.5.
so the driver version is 8.612 and Catalyst version 9.5. (According to ATI Catalyst Control Center...)
but still, crysis is crashing after 5 minuets of playing, even less then 5 minuets.

so, if it's not the drivers, what cause this warning? (and those game crashes)

Thank you