HP Omen 870-104na

[XboxDeserter]

Hello all, happy new year. Hoping someone can help.

My Son has a Omen 870-104na its about 3 years old now. For the past fews months he has been experiencing more and more game crashes. These can be Steam games, Battlenet games etc. Im no expert and we have Googled all sorts of "fixes" but nothing works. Some games which we have paid £30-40 for will not even launch and if they do, the moment the game actually starts, its crashes. GTA 5, Portal 2 and even Fortnite are some of the culprits. I didnt think a game like Fortnite was particularly heavy??

As far as we can tell, everything is up to date. This pc has a Radeon RX480 8GB GPU, Intel i5 6400 and 8GB Ram which I thought was pretty good? My Son is only 14 and is becoming very frustrated that games he was once able to play no longer work. We have discussed a Windows 10 refresh but he is concerned he will loose add ons downloaded from Steam. Does anyone have any suggestions before we look into a factory restart.

Thanks in advance, 

[old_geekster]

@XboxDeserter , welcome to the forum and Happy New Year!

Some of the problems may be that the technology of the games has changed considerably in 3 years.  I know that Steam updates their games about every time I login.  However, I don't know about the other sites.  It sounds more like there may be some driver conflicts or other glitches.  I always do a System Recovery at least once per year.  This takes the computer back to its original configuration and gets rid of any glitches that may have occurred while installing and deleting apps.  With the new Recovery process all of your apps will remain exactly as they are at present.

Note:  I suggest that you assure all of the drivers are up to date by using HP Support Assistant.  You can install the latest version here.

Please click the Thumbs up + button if I have helped you and click Accept as Solution if your problem is solved.

[Grzwacz]

Greetings,

Welcome to the forum.

I am not a HP employee.

A crash is generic, what happens? Is the system shutting down, or the games freeze, or the system locks up causing a restart?

I would run HP Diagnostics to check hardware.

Start the PC

Tap "ESC".

Select "F2".

Run system tests.

Then check Windows system file integrity (Link).

The power supply can cause this. The graphics card could be in thermal trouble. The CPU could be in thermal trouble.

Run a graphics stress test. Try Furmark (Link). Tun on GPU temp readings.

Run a CPU stress test. Try Prime95 (Link). Run HWiNFO portable (Link) when running Prime95 to check CPU core temps.

A crash running either test may isolate the problem component. The power supply could also be the cause.

Regards

[XboxDeserter]

Thanks, im running some of the checks in the HP Assistant. The link you provided has given me a different version with more checks. Will let you know how it goes.

Im convinced its a corrupt file somewhere as he has been able to play these games previously with great results but something recently has caused issues.

Thanks

[XboxDeserter]

Hi both,

Ive done all the checks that you have both suggested. No corrupt files found, HP says all components and drivers are ok. I started the GPU stress test but aborted it after a few minutes (was concerned about the disclaimer "do the burn in test at your own risk") the GPU never got about 93 degrees, the fan was running at 133% and I was worried something was going to break.

I havent done the CPU stress test for the same fear but the tests that the HP software did said everything passed.

I seems to me that the only option is to do a system recovery/reset. Is it worth backing up my son's saved game files as well as documents etc or does the New system recovery keep all this data?

Thanks for the advice so far.

[old_geekster]

You are very welcome, @XboxDeserter!  I believe that the Recovery will solve your problem. If not, as @Grzwacz, there may be a faulty component.

[Grzwacz]

Hi,

I agree with @old_geekster , try a factory reset or a clean install.

But back up all data as you will lose this stuff.

You may also have a graphics card thermal problem if your card is getting into the upper 80 degree C or low 90 degree C area. Many graphics cards will throttle at 90 degrees C. This may be why the games are crashing.

Poor chassis airflow can also adversely effect graphics card and CPU temps.

Furmark is used to check graphics card temps.

Prime 95 is used to test CPU thermals.

I run each test on new PC builds for up to 25 minutes to verify system stability.

Regards

[XboxDeserter]

Hi @old_geekster and @Grzwacz,

We've done a complete refresh using HP Recovery, this inculded clearing both drives. Supprisingly didnt take long, everything is back on but my Son says its just the same?? 

He was playing Roblocks which crashed. He tells me the game froze for about 20sec then came back. Same goes for Fortnite? 

Will doing a full stress test cause any damage to the components? At least we can fully eliminate hardware issues?

This PC is shop brought and we havent changed anything on it. Before we reset it last night we cleaned it out thoroughly but there wasnt much dust in anything, we have cleared it out before.

Im now at a loss? Was really hoping the refresh was going to work. Any further ideas?

Thanks again.

[Grzwacz]

Hi @XboxDeserter, @old_geekster 

You're very welcome.

Both stress tests will push each component (Furmark stresses the graphics card, Prime95 stresses the CPU). I run each test for at least 15 minutes on new PC builds and older PCs I am repairing.

A component could fail if it is in trouble now. This is why you use HWiNFO with Prime 95 to check CPU temps, thermal throttling, and power limit throttling. Furmak has a baked in GPU temp monitor. Consistent high temps can shorten the life of each component.

Since a factory reset or Windows reset did not help I would say you have a thermal problem. One component or both components could be getting hot when your son is gaming.

How does the PC do with games when the side panel is removed?  Are all fans working?

You cleaned the PC, this is good. Excessive dust can cause problems.

Regards

[old_geekster]

Thank you for the additional information, @XboxDeserter!

Now, you have eliminated any glitches that could have occurred over the past 3 years.  Here is the latest driver for the RX 580 from AMD.  It will be in the Windows 10-64-bit section.  It should install.  This will eliminate another possible problem area.  If this doesn't work, it is time to check your Internet connection for possible problems.  Playing games online can cause a lot of stress on it.