Windows 11 22H2 suffers nasty bug that crashes some PCs with Intel CPUs
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Windows 11 22H2 is causing some issues here and there, primarily for gamers with Nvidia graphics cards – though that problem now has a fix – and now we’re hearing of a nasty Blue Screen of Death (BSoD) crash that is plaguing some unlucky ones.
A BSoD is a crash that completely wrecks your PC and requires a full reboot, affecting the one with the Intel Smart Sound Technology (SST) audio driver. Specifically, it is an incompatibility issue that the Windows 11 update has with certain Intel SST driver versions on 11th generation processors (Rocket Lake, the generation before current Alder Lake chips).
Not everyone will necessarily be affected, but some will, and as a result, Microsoft has actively blocked Windows 11 22H2 from those PCs (as well as upgrades to Windows 21H2, for those migrating from Windows 10).
Spotted in a recently updated support document by Windows Latest (opens in new tab)Microsoft explains (opens in new tab)“The affected driver is named Intel Smart Sound Technology (Intel SST) Audio Controller under System Devices in Device Manager and has the file name IntcAudioBus.sys and a file version of 10.29.0.5152 or 10.30.0.5152.
“Only devices with both Intel 11th Gen Core processors and Intel SST driver version 10.29.0.5152 or 10.30.0.5152 are affected by this issue.”
Fortunately, there is a solution, and as you might guess, it involves upgrading the Intel SST driver in question. Microsoft recommends checking with the maker of your device for the new driver, which requires updating to version 10.30.00.5714 or 10.29.00.5714 (or better). Note that 10.30.x versions are: not necessarily newer than 10.29, but they are the last four digits you look at to determine release time, so whichever version applies to your needs should end with ‘5714’ (or later).
Once you’ve installed that correct driver, Windows 11 22H2 will become available to install (although it may take a while before it’s actually offered on the PC).
Analysis: Will there be a fix for Windows 11 itself? Unlikely
It’s good to see a solution here, of course, even if it’s a bit silly to mess around with driver updates (and the minor complication of those oddly different version numbers).
It’s not clear if Microsoft will tweak the 22H2 update to fix the compatibility issue on the OS side, but it doesn’t seem likely given that the bug is now marked as “mitigated” in the support document. There is, and the fact that this gremlin has been in the works since November 2021, so it’s not really new – it just reared its head again with 22H2.
Whatever you do, Microsoft makes it clear that you should not try to manually apply the 22H2 update and force it on your PC if the Intel SST driver is not updated, because then you may very well be faced with that annoying random crashes in BSoD’s form.
BSoDs are definitely a thing of the past – turn the clock back a decade or more, and they used to be, well, not regularly, but often enough to be annoying – and now, as a rule, they’re quite rare. However, sometimes such bugs are still present in both Windows 11 and Windows 10.