Computer crashes when receiving or initiating a voice call - Windows 7, Skype version 7.6

Question

Whenever I either initiate a voice call or click to answer one, the system freezes and does not respond to anything short of a hard reset. I've tried the following steps without solving the problem:Reinstalling Skype (was 7.5, now 7.6)Updating video and sound driversDeleting Skype data files in the AppData foldersNone of these have helped. Running EventViewer does not yield an event corresponding to the crash at all - the first event after the time of the crash is a startup report that the system was not shut down correctly. If you can shed any light on this, I would be extremely grateful. I would happily attached the zipped DXDiag report but whenever I try I get the message "The attachment's DxDiag-Chera-2015-06-28.zip content type (unknown/unknown) does not match its file extension and has been removed."

Answer 1

Someone else in the Community had a similar issue.  The problem was actually resolved by downgrading the drivers.  There may be a bug, tweak or added Catalyst configuraiton that's causing the card to lockup. http://community.skype.com/t5/Windows-desktop-client/Skype-freezes-up-my-computer-when-I-hit-call-I-ve-tried-every/m-p/3195692/highlight/true#M266621 With the current drivers  you can see if the issue is realted to AMD Overdrive: Under Catalyst Control Center, Performance, AMD OverDrive.   If this option exists, try to disable it.  If it's disabled you can try to enable it and lower or increase the settings to see if anything changes. If nothing changes you can try older releases below Catalyst 14.2 but not below Catalyst 12.3. Older ATI Catalyst driver pacakgeshttp://www.guru3d.com/files-categories/videocards-ati-catalyst-vista-win-7.html Display Driver Uninstallerhttp://www.guru3d.com/files-details/display-driver-uninstaller-download.html