GA-Z170X-Gaming 7 (rev 1.0): Led Error D4

[ed.etamasan]

Hello there,

Since a few weeks my desktop computer started to develop an issue and I have no idea why or how to fix it. It does not happen every time and not every day, but every few days.

To give a specific example, I did not use my computer for about 3 days and I have just switched it on a while ago. Everything booted up as usual, but when it got to the actual ‘desktop’ from Windows 10, everything froze: no software was loading, nothing was moving, the mouse and the keyboard were not working.

I checked the motherboard and it was displaying error code D4 which stands for “PCI resources allocations error. Out of Resources.”. At this stage, I am not even able to use the ‘reset’ button from the case because nothing happens and I have to switch the entire computer off from the ‘power’ button.

My computer specification is as follows:
MB: Gigabyte GA Z170X Gaming 7 with BIOS F6
CPU: Intel Core i7 6700K 4.0GHz
CPU Cooler: NZXT Kraken x61
RAM: Corsair Vengeance LED 32GB 3000MHz
GPU: EVGA Nvidia GTX 1080 FTW
SSD: 2 x Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB
PSU: EVGA SuperNOVA G2 650
Case: NZXT H440 White
Monitor: Dell U2414H 23.8" IPS 1080p
Keyboard: Corsair K95 RGB Cherry MX Red
Mouse: Logitech G502 Proteus Core
Mousepad: Logitech G240
OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro x64

The BIOS is pretty much ‘default’ and I have not overclocked any component. Moreover, I have not touched the BIOS or modified anything in the Windows between the time period when it was working just fine and the problem that I have now.

Does anyone have any idea what would cause this? Or something that I can try? Any advice or help would be very much appreciated.

Thank you for your time.

PS. I also checked the ‘Event Viewer’, but it does not help at all: the first ‘Error’ that I have for today is at 21:56:10 and it says “The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused…”, followed by the one at 21:56:14 “The previous system shutdown at 21:53:43 on 04/02/2017 was unexpected.”.

[wh173]

Hard to diagnose but maybe the CPU is at fault.

Ive had to RMA a 6600k because it froze my pc randomly, sometimes 2-3 times in one day, sometimes once every couple of days.

A CPU replacement solved it in my case. Good luck, these kind of issues surely are head scratchers.

[ed.etamasan]

Thank you for your suggestion, wh173.

Unfortunately, but fortunately, my computer does not freeze at all during use, only when I turn it on (as described above). When you had that problem, were you getting any error codes on the motherboard? How did you figure out that the CPU was causing this?

[wh173]

Thank you for your suggestion, wh173.

Unfortunately, but fortunately, my computer does not freeze at all during use, only when I turn it on (as described above). When you had that problem, were you getting any error codes on the motherboard? How did you figure out that the CPU was causing this?

It was a known problem for skylakes, motherboard manufacturers were supposed to have fixed it with bios updates to the microcode, but apparently some, like gigabyte, didnt (in my case at least) despite claiming to have done so. If you search for skylake freezing you will find a ton of hits.

So ive simply tested everything else i could, and because the issue matched the known cpu issue aswell, i opened the rma with Intel and they replaced it. Had to wait more than a month for the replacement despite their claim of replacing in a week. PC sometimes froze, and sometimes gave out a bluescreen error without any codes, upon checking windows event viewer, there was no causes for the error, just a warning for the unexpected shutdown.

[ed.etamasan]

wh173, I do not understand something from what you are saying - if the problem was with the Gigabyte motherboard (BIOS CPU Microcode update), how did you solve it with a CPU RMA? Have they not replaced it with a new, but the same model of the CPU?

As for my problem, there is something really strange going on: a few days ago I turned on my computer, it reached the ‘desktop’ and it froze again with error code ‘D1 - IOH initialization error’. I switched the computer off from the ‘power’ button, back on and it was fine.

Later on I turned it off, turned it back on after a while and the ‘desktop’ froze with code ‘A0 - IDE initialization is started’, which is the default code when the computer is in use / runs fine and I had to switch it off again. When I turned it back on, the computer started a continuous loop of powering up (3-5 seconds) - powering off, and it did not seem to reach anywhere. There were no debug codes displayed, only the LED buttons on (Power, ECO and OC). I had to switch off the power supply as the ‘power’ or ‘reset’ buttons did not seem to do anything. Switched back on the power supply, the computer, and everything started up as usual, without any issues.

Anyway, I started to troubleshoot the problem by removing the NZXT Hue+ lighting systems and Logitech webcam (that I forgot to mention above), the dedicated GPU (moved the monitor to the iGPU) and one SSD. I was still able to reproduce the freeze issue after a few restarts (by restart I mean switching the computer off and on), however, this time the actual desktop image was disappearing and getting replaced by a solid fullscreen colour (had purple, black and blue - 3 different freezes):

* Video Example Here
* Picture Example Here

At this point I decided to get rid of Windows 10 and install 8.1 (with all the drivers and nothing else). Surprisingly, I was not able to reproduce any freeze and I restarted it more than 15 minutes. Therefore, I believe that freeze was a Windows 10 / driver problem. But I have no clue what, why or where, and I cannot even compare Windows 10 with 8.1 and the drivers as they are probably quite different. Then, I reinstalled the latest version of Windows 10 (from Microsoft website) with all the drivers, utilities, most of the software and everything seems to work okay.

Something that I noticed now is that everytime I wake up the computer from sleep, the motherboard shows error code ‘D3 - Some of the Architectural Protocols are not available’, however, I did not experience any strange behaviour following that. Hmm…

Therefore, it seems that it was more of a Windows / software problem, rather than hardware. But the motherboard / led display did not help at all. If the freeze problem will occur again, I will try to find the issue within the ‘Startup’ programs or so… Though I hope that will not be the case.

[wh173]

wh173, I do not understand something from what you are saying - if the problem was with the Gigabyte motherboard (BIOS CPU Microcode update), how did you solve it with a CPU RMA? Have they not replaced it with a new, but the same model of the CPU?

Newer ones don't have the issue in order for the fix to be needed. I'm glad you sorted it out and it wasnt a hardware issue,  it was surely a bizarre problem.

[shadowsports]

ed.etamasan,
For future, I would suggest reviewing the System Event Viewer, which might yield error or diagnostic information more specific to the issue you were experiencing.  May help with pinpointing the issue.

[ed.etamasan]

Thank you for your answer, shadowsports.

However, in my first post above, I mentioned the following:

PS. I also checked the ‘Event Viewer’, but it does not help at all: the first ‘Error’ that I have for today is at 21:56:10 and it says “The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused…”, followed by the one at 21:56:14 “The previous system shutdown at 21:53:43 on 04/02/2017 was unexpected.”.

In other words, the ‘Event Viewer’ was not recording absolutely anything when I was getting the freeze because the Windows not getting so far into loading its things (I assume), as it was taking place straight away on the ‘desktop’ (video example in my previous post). The only record I could get was AFTER I was powering off the computer (from ‘power’ button) and get it back on, followed by the paragraph above.

[Gregi_R]

Hi @ed.etamasan, @all
I have came across this thread because I have some similar (but not that severe) problem with my Gigabyte motherboard based PC. Up till now I haven't found a solution.
I have Gigabyte GA-Z170X-UD3 rev1.0 MB which is basically quite similar model.
I also have very similar PSU: EVGA SuperNOVA 550 G2.
CPU Intel Core i5 6600K Skylake
RAM: Kingston HyperX Fury KHX2400C 12D4/8GX (2x8GB) - this module pair is not on the list of supported RAM modules by my MB.
Graphics Card: EVGA GTX 960 SuperSC ACX 2.0+ 4 GB
OS: Win10 64-bit
The rest of the specs I will omit for now.

My problem is that after I put my PC to sleep mode and than after some time I wake the PC up, there are two situations:
- waking up goes successfully although I get D3 code on the MB.
- The PC doesn't wake up, it just powers up and nothing happens, no picture on the monitor. I have to use power button on PC case (hold it pressed for a couple of seconds) to turn it down. Reset button does nothing. After powering up again, the OS state surprisingly is the same as before going to sleep.

The other problem I have is D4/D3 debug code after hibernation state, although PC works fine.
So, the only situation when I have A0 code, which is I think proper one is when I power on PC from completely shut down state (Cold BOOT).

I don't use X.M.P. of my RAM because I have experience instability problems during booting when I used it.

I've reported it to the Service Desk.
First the answer was to update BIOS (I had second to newest F22). So I did but no change.
Second I get suggestion to check my PC with different PSU and RAM. Now I'm going to do that.