Blue screen of death (BSOD) caused by atikmdag.sys

So I'm running Windows 10, and lately my system keeps crashing out of nowhere, always pointing back to atikmdag.sys as the culprit.

I've got Windows 10 home 64-bit installed, using an NVIDIA GeForce GTX series card. I'm pretty sure I've got the latest drivers since I checked everything through Driver Booster, and I guess all my other hardware is up to date too.

Does anyone happen to know how to fix this?

It started acting up after I took the PC in for a tune-up because it was freezing on me before. The freezing stopped once they cleaned out the dust and gave it a look, but instead of doing a full clean install, I just went with the "Fresh start" option—mostly because I don't actually have a Windows 10 key, just my old Windows 8 one from when I upgraded for free.

placidrider48 said:So I'm running Windows 10, and lately my system keeps crashing out of nowhere, always pointing back to atikmdag.sys as the culprit.

I've got Windows 10 home 64-bit installed, using an NVIDIA GeForce GTX series card. I'm pretty sure I've got the latest drivers since I checked everything through Driver Booster, and I guess all my other hardware is up to date too.

Does anyone happen to know how to fix this?

It started acting up after I took the PC in for a tune-up because it was freezing on me before. The freezing stopped once they cleaned out the dust and gave it a look, but instead of doing a full clean install, I just went with the "Fresh start" option—mostly because I don't actually have a Windows 10 key, just my old Windows 8 one from when I upgraded for free.

Well, if you upgraded to 10 from Windows 8, you still have that digital license stored somewhere; you can easily format the drive, and once you finish installing Windows 10 and jump online, it should activate automatically—so honestly, don't sweat the activation part too much. As for that specific error, try grabbing WhoCrashed 6.01
http://www.resplendence.com/downloads once it's installed, run a scan on your system, and it'll generate a log for you.

Larry Ortiz5 said:Well, if you upgraded to 10 from Windows 8, you still have that digital license stored somewhere; you can easily format the drive, and once you finish installing Windows 10 and jump online, it should activate automatically—so honestly, don't sweat the activation part too much. As for that specific error, try grabbing WhoCrashed 6.01
http://www.resplendence.com/downloads once it's installed, run a scan on your system, and it'll generate a log for you.

It seems like my PC might be deleting .DMP files or maybe it isn't even making them in the first place. WhoCrashed didn't find any files in C:\Windows\Mindump or even in C:\Windows. And I'm pretty sure I've seen blue screens at least three times in the last couple of weeks.

I just did a quick Google query and it looks like your issue—that atikmdag.sys error—is tied directly to your graphics card. It’s almost certainly a driver-related headache...

Grab this tool: http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/...-download.html

This utility cleans out all the leftover junk—you know, those little bits of residue that usually hang around even after a standard driver reinstall. So, here's the plan: run this tool, use it to wipe the old graphics drivers completely, reboot your PC, and then grab a fresh set of drivers from the AMD website. If you're still seeing the same errors after that, I'm worried we might be looking at more than just software—it could be a hardware issue. If that happens, it might be worth testing the card in another computer just to be sure.

Larry Ortiz5 said:I just did a quick Google query and it looks like your issue—that atikmdag.sys error—is tied directly to your graphics card. It’s almost certainly a driver-related headache...

Grab this tool: http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/...-download.html

This utility cleans out all the leftover junk—you know, those little bits of residue that usually hang around even after a standard driver reinstall. So, here's the plan: run this tool, use it to wipe the old graphics drivers completely, reboot your PC, and then grab a fresh set of drivers from the AMD website. If you're still seeing the same errors after that, I'm worried we might be looking at more than just software—it could be a hardware issue. If that happens, it might be worth testing the card in another computer just to be sure.

I already tried all that once. I've got that tool, and I used it in Safe Mode to scrub every trace of those AMD drivers before reinstalling everything. It still keeps crashing on me every few days. I even had a red screen once—just totally blank, no text at all.

Well, if you get a chance, maybe try testing that graphics card in another PC for a few days? If the exact same thing happens there, then you'll know for sure the card is toast—but otherwise, which model are we talking about here?

Larry Ortiz5 said:Well, if you get a chance, maybe try testing that graphics card in another PC for a few days? If the exact same thing happens there, then you'll know for sure the card is toast—but otherwise, which model are we talking about here?

NVIDIA GeForce GTX series

On Wed Jan 17, 2018 at 9:54:45 PM, your PC hit a wall or flagged an issue
crash dump file: C:\WINDOWS\MEMORY.DMP
This was likely triggered by this module: atikmdag.sys (0xFFFFF80823867220)
Bugcheck code: 0x7E (0xFFFFFFFFC0000005, 0xFFFFF80823867220, 0xFFFFA003E8C61428, 0xFFFFA003E8C60C70)
Error: SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED
file path: C:\WINDOWS\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\c03 22096.inf_amd64_7ff7d53c3793b9e4\atikmdag.sys
product: ATI Radeon Family
company: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
description: ATI Radeon Kernel Mode Driver
Bug check description: This bug check means a system thread threw an exception that the error handler just couldn't catch.
It looks like a third-party driver is the culprit here. You might want to hunt down an update for this one: atikmdag.sys (ATI Radeon Kernel Mode Driver, Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.).
Google query: atikmdag.sys Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED

(Well, it happened again, I guess. Just copied this straight out of WhoCrashed. Lately, it seems to be crashing whenever I'm just watching stuff on YouTube.)

placidrider48 said:On Wed Jan 17, 2018 at 9:54:45 PM, your PC hit a wall or flagged an issue
crash dump file: C:\WINDOWS\MEMORY.DMP
This was likely triggered by this module: atikmdag.sys (0xFFFFF80823867220)
Bugcheck code: 0x7E (0xFFFFFFFFC0000005, 0xFFFFF80823867220, 0xFFFFA003E8C61428, 0xFFFFA003E8C60C70)
Error: SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED
file path: C:\WINDOWS\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\c03 22096.inf_amd64_7ff7d53c3793b9e4\atikmdag.sys
product: ATI Radeon Family
company: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
description: ATI Radeon Kernel Mode Driver
Bug check description: This bug check means a system thread threw an exception that the error handler just couldn't catch.
It looks like a third-party driver is the culprit here. You might want to hunt down an update for this one: atikmdag.sys (ATI Radeon Kernel Mode Driver, Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.).
Google query: atikmdag.sys Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED

(Well, it happened again, I guess. Just copied this straight out of WhoCrashed. Lately, it seems to be crashing whenever I'm just watching stuff on YouTube.)

I'm getting the exact same thing again. 😁

Maybe you could check your graphics card temperatures using HWMonitor? Once you install the program, just grab a screenshot so we can see what those temps are looking like.

Larry Ortiz5 said:I'm getting the exact same thing again. 😁

Maybe you could check your graphics card temperatures using HWMonitor? Once you install the program, just grab a screenshot so we can see what those temps are looking like.

I've got Speccy running, and it's showing 34 degrees. That's about the same load as when the system crashed. Does HW actually give more info than Speccy?

Yeah, there's definitely more detail here...

Larry Ortiz5 said:Yeah, there's definitely more detail here...

https://ibb.co/enm746

Just noticed that once I actually uploaded this to the site, it looks all blurry or something...🤦

Man, I think HWMonitor might be giving us some wonky readings—I'm looking at the GPU fan RPM and it's showing some pretty crazy numbers, which usually means the software is just tripping.
From what I can tell, though, the temperatures look fine. Honestly, I'm not sure if it's just a glitch or if we're actually looking at a hardware issue with the card itself. It might be worth throwing it into another PC just to see if the problem follows it.

So, does high memory usage actually mean anything?

...it's a real thing where the latest drivers actually cause more headaches than they solve, so honestly, rolling back to an older version isn't a bad move at all...
I just stick with whatever Windows 10 installed by default on my old rig, and I haven't run into a single issue.