Repeated BSODs and automatic restarts during cold boot – ASUS TUF Gaming A15 FA506NF

Zaineb Ismail 0 Reputation points
2026-10-11T20:19:09.3866667+00:00

Dear Microsoft Support Team,

I am contacting you for technical assistance with a persistent Windows startup problem on my ASUS TUF Gaming A15 FA506NF laptop. I have been troubleshooting this issue for several weeks, but the problem continues despite multiple diagnostic tests and troubleshooting steps.

1. Device and Windows information

  • Device: ASUS TUF Gaming A15 FA506NF

BIOS version: FA506NF.309

BIOS date reported by System Information: October 30, 2025

Windows: Windows 11

RAM: approximately 16 GB (15.32 GB detected by Windows)

SSD: WD PC SN740 SDDPNQD-512G-1102, 512 GB

MyASUS reports that my device is up to date.

2. Description of the problem

The issue started sometime during the summer of 2026, possibly in July or August. I do not remember the exact date.

When the laptop has been powered off for several hours, I turn it on and the ASUS logo appears normally. As Windows begins loading, the laptop automatically restarts several times without initially displaying a blue screen. Eventually, a blue screen appears.

Restarting the computer while Windows is already running generally works normally. The issue is primarily associated with starting the laptop after it has been switched off for several hours.

I reinstalled Windows while keeping my personal files, but the problem has persisted. My Reliability Monitor history only goes back to September 6, 2026, and the C:\Windows.old directory is absent.

3. Blue-screen errors and crash-dump analysis

I have two older crash dumps available:

C:\Users\ismai\Dumps\100126-17515-01.dmp

C:\Users\ismai\Dumps\100526-19265-01.dmp

The October 1 dump reported PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA (0x50). WinDbg identified vgk.sys, the Riot Vanguard kernel driver, at the faulting instruction, with the failure bucket AV_vgk!unknown_function.

The October 5 dump reported DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL (0xD1). The analysis did not conclusively identify a third-party driver as the cause.

Windows Event Viewer also contains unexpected-restart events with the following recorded bugcheck codes:

October 5: 0xD1

October 6: 0x162

October 7: 0x0A

These events suggest that the crashes may involve kernel-mode code, drivers, or memory access, but I do not know the underlying cause.

I uninstalled Riot Vanguard after discovering its involvement in the October 1 crash. However, the cold-boot problem continued after its removal, so Vanguard does not appear to explain every incident.

4. Windows logs and dump-creation problems

Event Viewer repeatedly reports Volume Manager event ID 161:

“Dump file creation failed due to error during dump creation.”

These events occurred on multiple dates, including October 7 and October 11. Consequently, I have not obtained a new usable crash dump from the more recent incidents.

The system also records Kernel-Power event ID 41 following unexpected restarts. The event data does not show a long power-button press, and WHEABootErrorCount was zero in the inspected events.

I would appreciate help determining why Windows repeatedly fails to create crash dumps and how to ensure that the next blue screen is recorded correctly.

5. Troubleshooting already performed

I have completed the following steps:

Ran sfc /scannow. Windows Resource Protection reported no integrity violations.

Ran DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth. The restore operation completed successfully.

Ran Windows Memory Diagnostic multiple times. No memory errors were reported.

Checked the physical SSD using PowerShell. Windows reports its health as Healthy and its operational status as OK.

Confirmed that the system has approximately 68.8 GiB of free space on drive C:.

Uninstalled Riot Vanguard. The problem persisted.

Checked for updates through MyASUS, which reports that the device is up to date.

Confirmed that the installed BIOS version is FA506NF.309.

Enabled automatic management of the Windows paging file.

Changed the crash-dump configuration to Automatic Memory Dump and disabled automatic restart after system failure.

The current paging file is reported as C:\pagefile.sys, with an allocated size of 8192 MB. Despite these changes, Windows has previously continued to report dump-creation failures.

6. Possible causes requiring further investigation

I cannot determine the exact cause based on the available evidence. The possibilities I would like assistance investigating include:

A faulty or incompatible kernel-mode driver.

Kernel memory corruption caused by a driver or another underlying component.

A driver conflict or an issue involving AMD chipset, graphics, storage, or power-management components.

A firmware, ACPI, or cold-start initialization problem.

An intermittent hardware issue that has not been detected by the memory diagnostic or the SSD health check.

I am not claiming that any of these causes has been confirmed. I would like to identify the root cause through a reliable diagnostic process rather than continue changing drivers or system settings without sufficient evidence.

7. Assistance requested

Could you please help me with the following?

Determine the most appropriate next diagnostic steps for these repeated cold-boot crashes.

Investigate why Windows reports repeated dump-creation failures under Volume Manager event ID 161, including whether the current dump configuration and paging-file settings are appropriate.

Explain how I can obtain a complete, usable crash dump from the next incident.

Help identify whether the available bugcheck codes indicate a specific driver or subsystem that should be investigated first.

Advise whether any additional Windows diagnostic tools or hardware tests are appropriate before considering another Windows reinstall or a hardware repair.

I can provide the two existing crash dumps, the relevant Event Viewer output, WinDbg analysis, and additional system information as needed.

Thank you for your assistance. I would appreciate a methodical approach to identifying the root cause of this issue.

Kind regards, ASUS TUF Gaming A15 FA506NF userDear

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Performance and system failures
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2 answers

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  1. zhang_wang_hong 6,670 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2026-10-12T11:49:27.7966667+00:00

    Hi Zaineb Ismail. I understand your issue.

    Could you try booting Windows once in Safe Mode? This will help us determine whether the issue is caused by a third-party application.

    Please open Settings, go to System, and click Recovery. You will see an option called Advanced startup; click Restart now on the right side. This will take you into the Windows RE environment.

    Once you are in Windows RE, you can navigate through Troubleshoot, Advanced options, and Startup Settings, then restart the computer. Next, press 4 or F4.

    Please let me know the result.

    This reply was translated from Simplified Chinese into English. I have tried my best to ensure translation accuracy, but issues may still occur.

    Here are some articles you can review:

    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/experience/backup-recovery/windows-recovery-environment

    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/experience/startup-boot/windows-startup-settings

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  2. AI answer

    2026-10-11T20:20:04.7+00:00

    The next diagnostic path should focus on three areas: driver isolation, storage/file integrity checks, and crash-dump readiness.

    1. Prioritize driver and hardware-change isolation
      • Since one earlier dump implicated vgk.sys, uninstalling Riot Vanguard was a correct step.
      • Because the cold-boot crashes continued after removal, continue with the standard stop-code workflow for drivers and hardware:
        1. Remove or disconnect any recently added hardware, if any was added before the issue started.
        2. Open Device Manager by right-clicking Start and selecting Device Manager.
        3. Check for devices marked with an exclamation point (!).
        4. For any suspect device, right-click it and select Update driver.
        5. If updating does not help, disable or uninstall the device.
      • Also check Event Viewer system logs for critical errors in the same time window as the stop codes. This is specifically recommended for bug check troubleshooting.
    2. Use Safe Mode for controlled testing
      • Since the failures happen during startup, use Safe Mode to reduce loaded drivers and services.
      • Path:
        1. Go to Settings > Update and Security.
        2. Select Recovery > Advanced startup.
        3. Select Troubleshoot > Advanced Options > Startup Settings > Restart.
        4. After restart, choose option 4, 5, or 6 for Safe Mode.
      • If the system is stable in Safe Mode after a cold boot, that strongly points toward a driver or service loaded during normal startup.
    3. Run file-system and system-file checks
      • Since dump creation is failing and startup crashes can involve storage or corruption, run the checks Microsoft lists for stop-code troubleshooting:
        • Scan disk: right-click the system drive, select Properties > Tools > Check now.
        • System File Checker: run SFC /scannow.
      • sfc /scannow was already completed with no integrity violations, so the remaining supported check is the disk scan.
    4. Confirm free space and Windows updates
      • Free space is not likely the issue here because Microsoft’s guidance is to keep roughly 10% to 15% free space available, and the reported free space appears to satisfy that.
      • Still install the latest Windows updates from:
        • Start > Settings > Windows Update > Check for updates
      • For WHEA-related hardware stop errors, Microsoft also recommends using Windows Update to receive the latest updates and drivers before manually updating drivers.
    5. Check firmware and hardware basics
      • Microsoft’s bug-check guidance recommends checking with the manufacturer for updated BIOS/UEFI firmware and ensuring hardware connections are sound.
      • BIOS FA506NF.309 is already installed, so the remaining supported action is to verify with the manufacturer that this is still the latest BIOS for the device.
      • Microsoft also recommends running the hardware diagnostics supplied by the system manufacturer for unexplained hardware-related stop codes.
    6. Run memory diagnostics and review results in Event Viewer
      • Windows Memory Diagnostic was already run multiple times with no reported errors.
      • If needed, Microsoft’s bug-check guidance says to review the result in Event Viewer under the system log and look for MemoryDiagnostics-Results.
    7. Crash-dump configuration and why dump creation may still fail
      • The supported context confirms that crash dumps depend on page-file configuration.
      • A manual kernel or complete memory dump is useful because it captures system memory at the time of the crash.
      • The documented requirement is to set up page files appropriately for system crash dumps. Since automatic page-file management is already enabled and C:\pagefile.sys exists, the next supported conclusion is that page-file configuration remains a key area to verify when dump creation fails.
      • The available context does not provide a supported root-cause mapping for Volume Manager event ID 161, so no specific cause should be assumed from that event alone.
    8. How to obtain a usable dump from the next crash
      • Keep crash-dump collection enabled and ensure page-file support remains configured.
      • If a crash dump is successfully written and later needs verification in a debugger session, Microsoft documents checking IopFinalCrashDumpStatus; a value of zero means the dump process succeeded.
      • For deeper analysis, a kernel or complete memory dump is the most useful supported dump type mentioned in the documentation.
    9. What the current bugchecks suggest
      • The available stop codes and the earlier vgk.sys finding are consistent with the Microsoft guidance that stop-code errors are commonly caused by a hardware device, its driver, or related software.
      • Because one crash implicated a third-party kernel driver and later crashes continued after its removal, the first subsystem to investigate is still drivers loaded during startup, followed by firmware/hardware diagnostics.
      • The provided context does not support assigning 0xD1, 0x162, or 0x0A to a specific ASUS, AMD, storage, ACPI, or graphics component.
    10. If the issue continues after the above
    • Use System Restore or other Recovery options in Windows if the issue began after a recent system change such as an update, driver installation, or app installation.
    • If the system remains unstable even after Safe Mode comparison, Device Manager review, disk check, Windows Update, and manufacturer diagnostics, the remaining supported path is advanced bug-check troubleshooting with a proper crash dump.

    References:

    AI-generated content may be incorrect. Read our transparency notes for more information.

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