After installing a new video card in their workstation, a user reports that the workstation...

When a system begins randomly crashing after a hardware change (installing a GPU) and the correct vendor driver update does not resolve it, the best next troubleshooting step is to collect evidence about what is failing. Windows records crash details, driver faults, and unexpected shutdowns in Event Viewer (System/Application logs) and related reliability tools. Quentin Docter specifically states that Event Viewer should be the first place you look when the solution is not evident because applications and the OS often create log entries that help verify operation and diagnose problems. These logs can reveal whether the crash is tied to a display driver fault, power/kernel events, or another subsystem. Docter also notes you can often find more information about application crashes by reviewing the Application log, and for instability/shutdown patterns you “start combing through the logs” in Event Viewer to determine whether the system lost power or crashed. Mike Meyers adds that Event Viewer is the tool used to read and understand Windows logs (Application/System/Setup/Security) for diagnosing what’s happening on a system.