PSA: Avoid the AMD Dual Core Optimizer or Possibly Face the Blue Screen of Death

[Occulus]

Somehow, in the past few days, the AMD Dual Core Optimizer was installed on my Win7 x64 PC. I did NOT install this knowingly; most likely, it was part of some package or other, and I didn't catch it.

The AMD Dual Core Optimizer caused me, and apparently many others, a great deal of grief.

I don't know what this program is supposed to do. It seems to be something that "optimizes" dual-core CPU functionality on AMD chipsets, but for me, it caused severe program hangs, general slowdowns, and hard crashes, up to and including the dreaded BSOD. I would never have installed this knowingly, as I have a quad-core processor and thus have no need to optimize a dual-core CPU. That said, others with dual-core AMD processors have had similar issues, seemingly at random, with arbitrary hardware combinations.

The application was impossible to uninstall in normal mode; as soon as the system tried to start it (immediately after loading the desktop), BOOM! Blue screen of death. However, safe mode did not blue screen at all, and that was my first clue that Something Was Amiss in startup.

However, booting into safe mode and attempting an uninstall of the Optimizer failed, as Windows Installer was not running or some such (!@!). The only remedy that worked was to disable the AMD Optimizer startup service via the Control Panel's admin tools, under "System Configuration". Doing so eliminated the blue screens and system stability was completely reestablished.

I don't know who installed this application or what package it was included with, but this one just seems to be bad news all around. Please save yourselves the headache (and the panic of frantically backing up all the little new everything, as I did), and get rid of it if it's there and don't install it if it's not.

This has been a DU "Computer Help and Support Group" Public Service Announcement.