MSI Katana 15 B13V experiencing progressive freezing, lag spikes, audio/video stutter. Possible hardware or thermal issue?

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lyn.k.r.c.15ab02e5

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I’m looking for advice regarding my MSI Katana 15 B13V, which has been developing increasingly serious stability issues over the past 2–3 weeks.It started with occasional full system freezes while gaming, severe enough that I often had to force shut down and restart the laptop to keep using it.Over the last week and a half, the issue has worsened and now happens even under very light loads (for example, only Chrome with two tabs and Discord open). Current symptoms include:
  • Random system freezes or micro-freezes.
  • Screen and audio stuttering/freezing for a few seconds, then recovering.
  • During these freezes, sometimes the cursor can still move, but often it freezes too.
  • Videos appear laggy or choppy.
  • Alt+Tab and switching between windows has become noticeably slower and sometimes hangs.
  • General responsiveness feels degraded compared to normal.
  • Cooling fans are running more often than they used to, even under light usage.
  • Previously fans were only loud under gaming loads; now they ramp up more frequently.
Using MSI Center diagnostics, most tests passed, but the sound system test behaved abnormally (channel outputs were mismatched and did not respond correctly), which makes me wonder if there may be a deeper issue.Based on the progression, I’m concerned this may be related to:
  • Thermal throttling / cooling issue
  • GPU instability (hardware or driver)
  • RAM instability
  • SSD/storage issue
  • Or another hardware problem not detected in basic diagnostics
According to what I have checked, my laptop should still have at least about half of its 24-month standard warranty remaining, so I do not want to take it to a non-MSI local repair shop for maintenance. Also, many places tend to reformat systems as a default step, and that is something I definitely do not want.

  1. Does this sound familiar to anyone with similar MSI laptops?
  2. Would you recommend sending it directly through MSI warranty support at this point? (Although I would strongly reconsider this since, from what I've seen, the nearest MSI help center is 18 hours away from where I am, so I doubt I'll be able to get it there in time or that my warranty will even cover this type of service.)
  3. Are there specific diagnostics or logs I should run before contacting MSI?
  4. Since I only have one week available to get maintenance done without disrupting my daily work, what would be the best course of action in my situation?
I’d especially appreciate input on whether this sounds more like a thermal issue, GPU issue, or something else progressing at the hardware level. (Sorry for chatgpt english, this is not my first language n had trouble explaining my laptop problems, thx 4 any help)
 
Try to solve the issue on the software side first.
Update BIOS, clean installing graphics drivers to the version on MSI website, use HWinfo64 to check the CPU/GPU temperature, etc.
What have you done before the problem occurs? Windows update, upgrading key parts, or else.
Try to roll back all of the changes and see if they can solve the problem.
Especially the dynamic tuning driver, refer to the FAQ to do clean install.
 
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