Is Edge browser causing Desktop freezes and abnormal Shutdowns?

Well, that was interesting.


I made Vivaldi my default browser (replacing Edge), in the hope that this would prevent the abnormal shutdowns and desktop freezes once and for all. Then yesterday, the computer crashes again and I did not know why. It turns out that, even if I set Vivaldi as the default browser, Cortana search (start menu search box) still uses Edge to provide web results.
Why is this, and what can I do to override it?

Caledon Ken said:

Have you tried Prime95 on system?
Have a way to monitor temps, if it keeps climbing with no plateau shut it down.

Prime95 - Stress Test Your CPU

Yes, I had a go with Prime95. It automatically profiles my computer as an AMD Bulldozer rather than Ryzen CPU. I ran six workers and watched the temperatures on speccy. The CPU reached 60°C within two-three minutes. I also noticed that the fans were not getting any faster at the higher temp. Anyhow I ended up cancelling Prime95 because of the temperatures. Needless to say, in two minutes of operation there were no crashes.

I also downloaded and installed HD Sentinel. I have had this running three days now, and nothing abnormal is showing. The solid state drive is displayed as 100% healthy, and at a temperature of about 38°C


So, it appears from Prime95, that under stress, the temperatures could keep rising with no plateau. So, I shall have to delve into the manual on how to set the fan thresholds and speeds. Hopefully one day soon there will be an update to this software (Edit: Prime95 software) that can profile an AMD Ryzen chip. Then I hope to run the test longer, before needing to quit the application

Very crafty of Microsoft. Nevertheless, it is no good to me if it causes my rig to crash. But I do not know for sure if this is the source of the crash. I have installed EdgeDeflector from the GitHub website. Very resourceful find, thank you! It was pretty straight forward to install. I noticed EdgeDeflector did not work unless I selected "Always use this app" when asked "How do you want to open this?" I had to re-install again. After that Cortana search results worked in the Vivaldi browser.

I have also got Prime95 to work for over an hour, with 4 workers this generated a CPU utilisation of 36% at a speed of 3.38GHz. The CPU temperature (according to speccy) peaked at 71°C, motherboard 40°C, graphics card 71°C, solid state drive 39°C, room temperature 25°C. Using stock cooler. This test is now very successful in demonstrating the stability of the computer under a high load.

I am going to test EdgeDeflector for a few more days, to test the stability over a longer period. I shall also schedule a memtest86 to run sometime this weekend.

Today, Windows Update has

uninstalled and reinstalled all my hardware drivers
reset reliability and problem history.

This morning I also received out of no-where a desktop shortcut - how did that get there??

dalchina said:

Have you perhaps received a feature update to build 1803?
Have a look at your Update History.. what's the earliest event listed?

Yes, it appears I have hit upon a red herring. I went and checked update history, and it does indeed say 1803 feature update installed today. Looks like it was not related to the initial topic or the installation of EdgeDetector. I enjoyed a day without any crashes, that is going to be the main thing. So, thanks for pointing that out.