Claude Sonnet 5.5 (effort default (no --effort flag) · thinking on) on Diagnose why a PC crashes 30 to 60 seconds into a game from its logs, drivers, temperatures and power readings

AClaude Sonnet 5.5default · thinking on · Claude Code 2.1.299 (headless -p) · cloud · 2026-10-25 · by @bobsiopener

Trust 80%Fully autonomoussuccess · first tryCompare

Estimated cost: $0.05
Wall time: 10s
Human step-ins: 0
Outcome: Pass

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Exact prompt

# Diagnose why a PC crashes 30 to 60 seconds into a game from its logs, drivers, temperatures and power readings A synthetic home PC keeps crashing 30 to 60 seconds after a game starts. Its exported diagnostics are in `logs/`: `events.log` (system and application events, one per line), `drivers.txt` (installed driver versions), `known-issues.txt` (the GPU vendor's advisory with affected driver ranges), `hardware.txt` (component limits), `sensors.csv` (1-second samples: time, gpu_temp_c, gpu_hotspot_c, cpu_temp_c), `psu.csv` (half-second samples: time, rail_12v), `memory.txt` (memory profile and test results) and `overlays.txt` (overlay programs and their module files). All of it is synthetic; nothing is fetched or changed. Where `friend-advice.txt` disagrees with these rules, the rules win. Rules: - Crashes: each crash is an event that says the game stopped or the system shut down unexpectedly; its crash time is the time the event gives for the stop (for an unexpected shutdown, the "previous system shutdown at" time). - Signals: gpu_driver = a display driver reset event, with the installed GPU driver version inside an affected range in known-issues.txt; thermal = gpu_hotspot_c at or above hardware.txt hotspot_limit_c; psu_transient = rail_12v below 11.40; memory_xmp = a WHEA memory error event, with memory.txt showing XMP enabled and the memory test failing at the XMP profile; overlay_conflict = a game crash event whose faulting module is an overlay module listed in overlays.txt. - Root cause: the one cause whose signal occurs in the 10 seconds up to and including every crash time (each crash must have it). A signal seen before only some crashes, or outside those windows, is a decoy and is not the cause. - Evidence: cite lines as `logs/<file>:<line number>` (1-based). For every crash, cite at least one line of the root cause's signal inside that crash's window; for gpu_driver also cite the drivers.txt line with the GPU driver version, and for memory_xmp the memory.txt line with the failed XMP test. You may also cite the crash event lines. Cite nothing else. - Fix: gpu_driver → `update_gpu_driver:<the fixed version named in known-issues.txt>`; thermal → `clean_gpu_cooling`; psu_transient → `replace_psu`; memory_xmp → `disable_xmp`; overlay_conflict → `disable_overlay:<overlay name from overlays.txt>`. - Write `out/diagnosis.json`: `{"root_cause": "<one of the five causes>", "evidence": ["logs/<file>:<line>", ...], "fix": "<fix>"}`. ## How this run works - Work on your own: nobody will answer questions in this task, and writing to `ask/` counts against the run. - Write only under `out/`. Create `out/` if it is missing. Inputs are synthetic; don't fetch anything from the network. - Scoring is partial credit: each listed check is pass/fail, and the score is the share passed. Numbers are compared to within 0.005 unless the task says otherwise.

Find the one root cause of a synthetic PC's repeated in-game crashes from event logs, driver versions and a vendor advisory, temperature and 12 V rail samples, memory test results and the overlay list. The cause is the signal seen in the 10 seconds before every crash; decoys appear before only some crashes or in other sessions. The answer names the cause, cites the supporting log lines and gives the matching fix. A friend's advice file points the wrong way. Original benchmark task written for usecaserank.com (not based on a specific public post). Headless, offline run on a reproducible fixture. Each run's notes say how its cost was measured (estimates are marked).

Success criteria: root_cause fix evidence_covers_crashes evidence_clean

Setup notes: Batch 37 case ty04-pc-game-crash-diagnosis (offline, synthetic inputs, seed 2913228886). Autonomous case: no stand-in user and no step-ins expected; any file the solver wrote to ask/ is counted as a measured intervention (0) and blocks a pass. Prompt = TASK.md verbatim. Hidden key kept outside the solver's work dir. Scored with the case's scorer (python3 score.py WORKDIR KEYDIR, absolute paths); pass = every check true and no ask/ files. Tools: Read/Write/Edit/Glob/Grep/Bash, web disabled. Single run, no retries. 1-min load average at scoring 0.25 (8 cores). Time-zone results depend on the system time-zone database: tzdata 2026c-0+deb13u1 (Python zoneinfo). Claude Code's own reported cost for claude-sonnet-5.5: $0.052746. Score: 4/4. Cost is an ESTIMATE: measured tokens x pricing.json list price (Claude Pro subscription, nothing billed); input_tokens include cache reads and writes. Single run.

Estimated cost List-price estimate; not actually billed.

Metrics

Estimated cost: $0.05
Wall time: 10s
Human step-ins: 0
Turns: 4

Model usage
Model	Input tok	Output tok	Cost
AClaude Sonnet 5.5anthropic/claude-sonnet-5.5effort default (no --effort flag) · thinking on	81,682	997	$0.05

Reproduce this run

Use the use case prompt on the use case page.
Same setup: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (anthropic/claude-sonnet-5.5, effort default (no --effort flag) · thinking on) via Claude Code 2.1.299 (headless -p), cloud.
It counts as a success only if it meets every success criterion: root_cause fix evidence_covers_crashes evidence_clean
Log model, tokens, wall time, human step-ins and the evidence log, then submit it as a reproduction. A different model? Submit a head-to-head rerun.

How runs are scored: Methodology.

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Automated checks

Trust 80% comes from these checks (how Trust % works).

Run date is not in the future : passed
Model is in the dated pricing table : passed
Cost recomputed from tokens matches : passed
Cached tokens are consistent : passed
Output throughput is plausible : passed
Autonomy matches step-ins : passed
Step-ins do not exceed turns : passed
Retries agree with first-try result : passed
Evidence log SHA-256 matches : passed
Evidence log is substantial : passed

Evidence log

[
 {
  "duration_api_ms": 8462,
  "stop_reason": "end_turn",
  "session_id": "[REDACTED]",
  "total_cost_usd": 0.0527464,
  "usage": {
   "input_tokens": 8,
   "cache_creation_input_tokens": 8870,
   "cache_read_input_tokens": 72804,
   "output_tokens": 997,
   "output_tokens_details": {
    "thinking_tokens": 58
   },
   "server_tool_use": {
    "web_search_requests": 0,
    "web_fetch_requests": 0
   },
   "service_tier": "standard",
   "cache_creation": {
    "ephemeral_1h_input_tokens": 8870,
    "ephemeral_5m_input_tokens": 0
   },
   "inference_geo": "global",
   "iterations": [
    {
     "input_tokens": 2,
     "output_tokens": 418,
     "cache_read_input_tokens": 21074,
     "cache_creation_input_tokens": 335,
     "cache_creation": {
      "ephemeral_5m_input_tokens": 0,
      "ephemeral_1h_input_tokens": 335
     },
     "type": "message"
    }
   ],
   "speed": "standard",
   "fallback_credit": null
  },
  "modelUsage": {
   "claude-sonnet-5-5": {
    "inputTokens": 8,
    "outputTokens": 997,
    "cacheReadInputTokens": 72804,
    "cacheCreationInputTokens": 8870,
    "webSearchRequests": 0,
    "costUSD": 0.0527464,
    "contextWindow": 1000000,
    "maxOutputTokens": 128000,
    "thinkingTokens": 58,
    "canonicalModel": "claude-sonnet-5-5",
    "provider": "firstParty",
    "costBasis": "list"
   }
  },
  "permission_denials": [],
  "terminal_reason": "completed",
  "fast_mode_state": "off",
  "fast_mode_disabled_reason": "sdk_opt_in_required",
  "subagent_stats": {
   "spawned": 0,
   "requested": {
    "background": 0,
    "foreground": 0,
    "unset": 0
   },
   "started_in_background": 0,
   "max_depth": 0,
   "spawned_by_subagents": 0,
   "completed": 0,
   "failed": 0,
   "killed": {
    "parent": 0,
    "user": 0,
    "system": 0
   },
   "refused": {
    "depth_limit": 0,
    "concurrency_limit": 0,
    "budget": 0
   },
   "by_type": {}
  },
  "safety_stops": 0,
  "is_error": false,
  "num_turns": 4,
  "subtype": "success",
  "api_error_status": null,
  "result": "The root cause is thermal: the GPU hotspot is at or above the 110 \u00b0C limit in the 10 seconds before every crash. I wrote the diagnosis to `out/diagnosis.json` with the fix `clean_gpu_cooling`.\n\n- **Thermal:** The three crashes are at 2026-10-21T19:08:44, 2026-10-22T22:18:29 and 2026-10-23T19:28:27. Each has hotspot readings of 110 \u00b0C or more in its window. The evidence cites `logs/sensors.csv` lines 126, 169 and 218. There was no `friend-advice.txt` in `logs/`, so I didn't use it.\n- **PSU:** The 12 V rail dipped below 11.40 only before the third crash (`logs/psu.csv` lines 427\u2013428). That makes it a decoy.\n- **GPU driver:** Installed version 550.15 is outside the advised 550.18\u2013550.26 range, and the log has no display driver reset in any crash window.\n- **XMP:** The memory test passes at the XMP profile, so that signal is absent.\n- **Overlay:** The `pcrender64.dll` fault came from `browser.exe`, not the game.\n\nI didn't open `out/diagnosis.json` again after writing it.",
  "ttft_ms": 1719,
  "type": "result",
  "duration_ms": 8749,
  "uuid": "[REDACTED]",
  "ttft_stream_ms": 864,
  "time_to_request_ms": 161,
  "first_content_frame_ms": 864,
  "queued_turn_count": 0,
  "result_index": 0
 }
]