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Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered causing hard system freezes

Dec 25, 2025
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Hi everyone,
I’m facing a hard crash / system freeze only in Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered and I’m running out of ideas.
System specs:
GPU: RX 9060 XT (16 GB)
CPU: i5-11400F
RAM: 16 GB
OS: Windows 11 (latest updates)
Monitor: 60 Hz
PSU: Cooler Master 650w MWE v2

Problem description:
Game freezes completely with audio stuck
PC becomes unresponsive have to long press power button to restart.

After reboot, AMD shows:
“Default performance tuning settings have been restored due to an unexpected system failure”

Event Viewer shows Kernel-Power 41 / Bugcheck 0xE6
GPU temps are low (45–50°C), power usage under 100W
This happens only in Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered
Other games like Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden and Granblue Fantasy Relink run perfectly

Things I have already tried:
Clean AMD driver install using DDU (Safe Mode)
Using WHQL / Recommended drivers only
Disabled all overlays:
RTSS / MSI Afterburner (fully uninstalled)
Xbox Game Bar
Disabled Windows MPO (OverlayTestMode = 5)
Disabled HAGS
Power plan set to High Performance
Disabled Fast Startup

In AMD Adrenalin:
No overclock / no undervolt
Zero RPM fan disable

In-game settings:
Medium preset
FSR OFF
Dynamic Resolution OFF
Motion Blur OFF
Adaptive Performance OFF
No external FPS cap (no RTSS)
VSync ON (in-game only)

can anyone help me why is it happening and how to fix it
 

Zed Clampet

Community Contributor
Your card is crashing so hard it thinks it must be overclocked and is resetting itself.

When you say you disabled overlays, you don't mention PSN. Does the game not have a PSN overlay? Because from what I'm reading, the PSN overlay seems to cause some problems with AMD cards from time to time.

After looking around, it sounds like this game causes a lot of people problems, especially with DX12. It might be worth trying to run it in DX11. If I remember correctly, you right click on the game in Steam, go to Properties, and then put -DX11 into Launch Options.

I've heard--not about this game--people complaining that Steam's new recording feature is crashing their AMD cards, so you might want to disable that in Steam settings.

I found a few more complicated fixes that I'm skeptical about and require changing things in your registry. I would give the above a try first. I always start with the easiest fixes and work my way out.
 

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