Random CTD cause found.

[AsaHerring]

As the title states, I have found my own personal CTD issue. If you are uncertain why your game CTDs, then you may want to start here. However, I do not have a solution.

To elaborate, I have recently found out why my game is crashing, not what is causing it or how to fix it. That is why I'm posting here.

I have done my research. I have searched this topic for a long time, since the game came out, and more so recently, and I have not found one instance like this before.

 

The reason for my CTDs, to put it simply, is that the Skyrim process will randomly stop being an active process and move to a background process, which causes the game to close soon after.

This has never happened to me when launching the game, only while playing. It can happen 5 minutes after playing, or 5 hours after playing.

If you search on Google or forums using the words "skyrim" and "background process", every post you see will be about why the OP is not able to launch the game because it is stuck as a background process. I've never had that issue. This only happens randomly after a successful launch.

 

Here is some more information. I use two monitors. My main monitor is 1440p, and my second is 1080p. I typically leave my second monitor on while playing, with Task Manager open. I like to know how my system is running when I'm playing Skyrim. Doing this has helped me in the past resolve issues with the game.

Because I do this, Task Manager is the last active program before I launch the game. When my CTD happens, Task Manager becomes the active window and any key I'm pressing is recognized by Task Manager. For example, if I'm plying the game and using the W key to walk forward and the game CTDs, Task Manager will recognize I'm pressing the W key and go to the earliest, alphabetically organized process starting with the letter "W" because it was the last active program.

 

I got lucky today. While I was playing, I happen to be pressing the "S" key on my keyboard when the game CTDed. I look over at my second monitor, and because Task Manager was the last active program, it became the active window and recognized my S key input. It scrolled down the list to the first program that started with the letter S, which was Skryim, and the Skyrim process closed a second later. It had stopped running as an active process and moved to the background process category. When this happens, it does not stay as a background process, it closes.

 

I have 2 main questions.

1. Is this normal behavior for a program that crashes? Do other programs, during crashing, stop being an active program and move to being a background process? I have never thought to look at another program's CTD behavior in Task Manager. If it just stops outright, or if it does what I'm describing. If I'm just describing the behavior of a typical program CTD, then I need to look elsewhere, like at my mods.

2. If this issue has been found before, and it is not normal CTD behavior, then I'm hoping to find insight here.

 

Might the reason my game is CTDing is that, for some reason, Task Manager becomes the active window over Skyrim, and because my key inputs are now going to Task Manager, it causes Skyrim to CTD because of the non-intentional tab out?

Maybe the active program switch is being caused by Task Manager itself or another program like the Windows 10 antivirus(Antimalware Service Executable).

I've heard for years about issues people have had with Oldrim and SSE tabbing out while using multiple monitors. Not all people crash when tabbing out, but it is common to.

I'm not necessarily looking for an exact fix to my issue. I'm more so looking to find out the reason this is happening so that I can search for a fix.

 

System specs/info:
Windows 10, latest update.

i7-4790k

RTX 2060 Super (436.48 driver currently, but still happened on earlier versions)

Mobo, usb, audio, etc... drivers are all up to date as of 6 months ago.

No 3rd party virus or antimalware programs installed, only Windows 10 Antimalware.

Only active programs while playing are Skryim, Task Manager, and Vortex.

 

Thank you for taking the time to look at this post. I'm not asking you to fix my problem, I just thought I would put this info out there.

[HadToRegister]

Bethesda games are the very reason I always keep task manager open on my second monitor.
Too many times I've had one decide to freeze, where it freezes the game screen so I can't get to the OS, so I have to reboot.
Now, with the task manager on the 2nd screen I can use "End Task" easily now.

Are you using an actual fullscreen game, or a borderless window, because I haven't experienced what you have, if I get a crash, anything else on my desktop doesn't end up taking over the focus.

I'm thinking that because Task Manager automatically gets the focus when you CTD, then Skyrim itself is CTDing, because you never truly give SSE the focus, and the focus remains with Task Manager, so as you play, the system starts sticking it farther and farther in the background.

[AsaHerring]

"Are you using an actual fullscreen game, or a borderless window, because I haven't experienced what you have, if I get a crash, anything else on my desktop doesn't end up taking over the focus."

When reading this, I was 90% certain my game is running in fullscreen. So I double checked my ini settings. Indeed it is set to run in fullscreen, but it is also set to run in borderless. I even have borderless off in BethINI.

It may just be my system or this install of Windows that is for some reason making other windows active over what is on my main monitor.

Another thing I have noticed that I did not list, is that when I crash, my windows cursor will be on my second screen, like it's not staying in the game, like it's not set to fullscreen. I will have to see how it acts now that only fullscreen is set to true in the ini.

Thanks for the comment, glad I caught this.

[AsaHerring]

After several days of testing and playing, I've come to the conclusion that this very explanatory post about what I thought was something was just how the game typically acts when it crashes. I've just never seen anyone explain exactly how the game behaves when it crashes.

 

What caused the CTD issue for me was that both borderless and fullscreen were set to true in the ini. Not sure why because I had borderless off in Bethini and allowed it permissions to wright.

Manually changing the borderless setting to false fixed my CTD issue.

What I assume was happening, was either Task Manager or a Windows Service in the background, was becoming the active window/task over my borderless game.

 

I have not had any CTDs since changing this. Only normal modded game freezes.