any advice on tracking down a winXP crash problem?
Friday, June 27, 2003 by feline | Discussion: WinCustomize Talk
i am on the verge of going into hibernation, and stopping using my computer. that, or a total reformat.
my home machine (winXP pro) has two types of crash. both happen at complete random, and i can find no pattern or cause for these crashes.
in type 1 the machine experiences a hard lock. the screen just freezes, the mouse stops working, and the keyboard caps lock light no longer changes. the only option at this point is a hard reset >
in type 2 the machine spontaneously reboots.
both have happened to me already today.
now for the details:
i have run anti-virus and spyware checks, and found nothing.
i have a nvidia gforce2 MX 64meg graphics card, with the 40.72 drivers. these are not the most recent, but they are the most recent i have found where DVD playback still works.
i thought i saw a brief flash of blue when the machine spontaneously rebooted today, so it occurred to me i may have had a blue screen of death. so, i have just turned off the "automatically restart" option in system settings for dealing with a system failure. if i do get a blue screen of death, maybe it will give me some clues as to the possible root of the problem.
the only pattern i can provide is that the spontaneous reboots only happen when i am off line (56k modem, dial up connection) and the hard locks only happen when i am online.
i have been unable to find anything even close to helpful in the system event logs
i thought i had a pattern to the online hard locks, in that for every one of them microsoft messenger (the one bundled into winXP, msmsgs.exe) was always running. one night i had 3 hard locks in 3 hours with this program running *sob*
however, earlier tonight, online again, i had another hard lock without this program running.
i am under the impression that no application should be able to do this to my machine. since i have no evidence there is a hardware problem (and i don't really have the spending money to buy a whole new PC on the off chance) a driver problem seems possible. however, this doesn't get me very far.
knowing in the back of your mind that at any moment any and all work i am doing, and any conversations i am having, can be snatched away from me with no cause or notice, this is really starting to get to me. it is taking the fun out of using my computer
my home machine (winXP pro) has two types of crash. both happen at complete random, and i can find no pattern or cause for these crashes.
in type 1 the machine experiences a hard lock. the screen just freezes, the mouse stops working, and the keyboard caps lock light no longer changes. the only option at this point is a hard reset >
in type 2 the machine spontaneously reboots.
both have happened to me already today.
now for the details:
i have run anti-virus and spyware checks, and found nothing.
i have a nvidia gforce2 MX 64meg graphics card, with the 40.72 drivers. these are not the most recent, but they are the most recent i have found where DVD playback still works.
i thought i saw a brief flash of blue when the machine spontaneously rebooted today, so it occurred to me i may have had a blue screen of death. so, i have just turned off the "automatically restart" option in system settings for dealing with a system failure. if i do get a blue screen of death, maybe it will give me some clues as to the possible root of the problem.
the only pattern i can provide is that the spontaneous reboots only happen when i am off line (56k modem, dial up connection) and the hard locks only happen when i am online.
i have been unable to find anything even close to helpful in the system event logs
i thought i had a pattern to the online hard locks, in that for every one of them microsoft messenger (the one bundled into winXP, msmsgs.exe) was always running. one night i had 3 hard locks in 3 hours with this program running *sob*
however, earlier tonight, online again, i had another hard lock without this program running.
i am under the impression that no application should be able to do this to my machine. since i have no evidence there is a hardware problem (and i don't really have the spending money to buy a whole new PC on the off chance) a driver problem seems possible. however, this doesn't get me very far.
knowing in the back of your mind that at any moment any and all work i am doing, and any conversations i am having, can be snatched away from me with no cause or notice, this is really starting to get to me. it is taking the fun out of using my computer
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bordfryr
Reply #42 Monday, June 30, 2003 2:43 PM
....................
Feline, I just bought a new Radeon 9500 128mb (Connect 3d) for 145.00 USD. Free shipping. It was more than I wanted to pay, but it really works well and is rock solid.
Reply #42 Monday, June 30, 2003 2:43 PM
| if the format fixes this |
| it is time to save up and get a nice ATI radion graphics card |
Feline, I just bought a new Radeon 9500 128mb (Connect 3d) for 145.00 USD. Free shipping. It was more than I wanted to pay, but it really works well and is rock solid.
RotAtoR
Reply #43 Tuesday, July 1, 2003 8:29 AM
Reply #43 Tuesday, July 1, 2003 8:29 AM
If it really is the nvidia driver's fault, you may be able to increase stability or even fix the problem by going to display properties-settings tab, advanced button-troubleshooting tab and turning down hardware acceleration. The settings there will turn of video card acceleration of the windows (like cursor and other image acceleration in windows). Try turning acceleration all the way down first and stpe it up slowly if there are no problems.
feline
Reply #44 Tuesday, July 1, 2003 8:39 AM
i looked, and there is no sign of any other versions of this file, no backups, etc.
well, my machine was stable last night, however i have had enough of this waiting for it to crash again game. so, i spent last night double checking my backups were up to date. the plan is to format and start a very slow rebuild tonight.
hehe, i know how ATI drivers used to be. i had an ATI expert at work card back when i first tried winNT4. the pain i went through with driver games on that machine! that was why i got a nvidia card this time around.
as for the drivers, i was going to try the 23.11 ones, since they seemed quite stable for me before the HD crash. if i have any concerns over them, i will try the series 3 ones. thanks for the hint.
Reply #44 Tuesday, July 1, 2003 8:39 AM
| yrag - Also, before you do that, when you look in Sys32 folder you'll be looking not only to make sure that 'processor.sys' exists, but look for any others that might be there. |
i looked, and there is no sign of any other versions of this file, no backups, etc.
well, my machine was stable last night, however i have had enough of this waiting for it to crash again game. so, i spent last night double checking my backups were up to date. the plan is to format and start a very slow rebuild tonight.
| yrag - ATI drivers run into the same thing...although they've really gotten their act together of late. Since you have a Geforce 2 you might want to drop down to a Detonator 3 driver (the 4 series seems to be a little 'punch-drunk' lately). The 3 series will give you everything your card is capable of and you won't have the hassle of the new drivers for the things you can't use........ Link |
hehe, i know how ATI drivers used to be. i had an ATI expert at work card back when i first tried winNT4. the pain i went through with driver games on that machine! that was why i got a nvidia card this time around.
as for the drivers, i was going to try the 23.11 ones, since they seemed quite stable for me before the HD crash. if i have any concerns over them, i will try the series 3 ones. thanks for the hint.
feline
Reply #45 Wednesday, July 2, 2003 3:21 AM
Reply #45 Wednesday, July 2, 2003 3:21 AM
well, last night i did the format and reinstall of winXP. it seemed to go smoothly. the only program i have installed so far is PowerDesk5, since i simply cannot use windows explorer effectively, it is so limiting.
i have not installed any drivers, so the only drivers present are the ones windows applied during the install process.
so, having got the machine up and running, i went online to check my email. this is where the new problem showed up.
the internet setting appear to be correct. i can dial and connect ok. i can even receive email. but i could not send email. i could not log into wincustomize.com. and at another forum site where i go i was unable to make a single post. the posts would not upload.
it is almost as if i had no ability to upload any data at all. however, i did manage to perform a google search, and i could follow links.
so, perhaps this strange and bizarre problem was due to an ISP issue, and it will be fixed by tonight. if so it is something of a coincidence that this happened just after a format and a clean install of winXP.
and if it is not the ISP.......
*sigh* feline heads for the marathon thread to make a voodoo like sacrifice to the gods.
this is the most sensible course of action left to me at this point in time.
i have not installed any drivers, so the only drivers present are the ones windows applied during the install process.
so, having got the machine up and running, i went online to check my email. this is where the new problem showed up.
the internet setting appear to be correct. i can dial and connect ok. i can even receive email. but i could not send email. i could not log into wincustomize.com. and at another forum site where i go i was unable to make a single post. the posts would not upload.
it is almost as if i had no ability to upload any data at all. however, i did manage to perform a google search, and i could follow links.
so, perhaps this strange and bizarre problem was due to an ISP issue, and it will be fixed by tonight. if so it is something of a coincidence that this happened just after a format and a clean install of winXP.
and if it is not the ISP.......
*sigh* feline heads for the marathon thread to make a voodoo like sacrifice to the gods.
this is the most sensible course of action left to me at this point in time.
IPlural
Reply #46 Wednesday, July 2, 2003 11:25 AM
Reply #46 Wednesday, July 2, 2003 11:25 AM
in your outlook express settings make sure your SMTP (outgoing) Server is setup to use the same settings as your POP3 (incoming)...
feline
Reply #47 Thursday, July 3, 2003 2:32 AM
Reply #47 Thursday, July 3, 2003 2:32 AM
IPlural, thanks for the idea. however, i had already done that.
well, last night (24 hours after the problem first showed up) it was still there. i have checked and double checked the settings in outlook express and they seem correct.
so, i booted up my backup machine, and set up outlook express on there. normally i don't do this because it splits my email across two machines, but i needed to test this.
well, i can send and receive email from the backup machine, using the same settings as my main machine.
the main machine uses an external 56k modem connected to COM1 (i can watch the lights, which is useful), and the backup machine uses an old 33k modem which can only download at 1k per sec, not the 3k per sec i would expect.
so, tonights experiment is to try the external modem on the backup machine, to see if it is the modem which is at fault.
however, there is one other fact which i am currently in denial over. when i did the format i booted to win98 to use auto play on the winXP CD to kick start the winXP installer.
obviously this required booting win98. however, when i did this the first boot (it started loading win98) didn't result in win98 running, instead it resulted in the machine rebooting. on the second attempt i got a scan disk ("win98 didn't shut down properly", yes, i noticed) after which it loaded ok.
well, i am ignoring this for now, but it really is starting to look like some strange hardware problem is at the root of all of this
well, last night (24 hours after the problem first showed up) it was still there. i have checked and double checked the settings in outlook express and they seem correct.
so, i booted up my backup machine, and set up outlook express on there. normally i don't do this because it splits my email across two machines, but i needed to test this.
well, i can send and receive email from the backup machine, using the same settings as my main machine.
the main machine uses an external 56k modem connected to COM1 (i can watch the lights, which is useful), and the backup machine uses an old 33k modem which can only download at 1k per sec, not the 3k per sec i would expect.
so, tonights experiment is to try the external modem on the backup machine, to see if it is the modem which is at fault.
however, there is one other fact which i am currently in denial over. when i did the format i booted to win98 to use auto play on the winXP CD to kick start the winXP installer.
obviously this required booting win98. however, when i did this the first boot (it started loading win98) didn't result in win98 running, instead it resulted in the machine rebooting. on the second attempt i got a scan disk ("win98 didn't shut down properly", yes, i noticed) after which it loaded ok.
well, i am ignoring this for now, but it really is starting to look like some strange hardware problem is at the root of all of this
c242
Reply #48 Thursday, July 3, 2003 2:53 AM
Reply #48 Thursday, July 3, 2003 2:53 AM
The Win98 start problem You described indeed cries for a hardware fault somewhere. But I wonder why You installed 98 at all ? And : Not using NTFS as file system ?
yrag2
Reply #49 Thursday, July 3, 2003 8:32 AM
Reply #49 Thursday, July 3, 2003 8:32 AM
just made a post and don't know where it went... let's try again...
feline...forget the Win98 boot disk...go into bios and change 1st boot device to CD rom. After XP installs and starts to re-boot, go into bios and change 1st device back to HDD.
let's try again... feline...forget the Win98 boot disk...go into bios and change 1st boot device to CD rom. After XP installs and starts to re-boot, go into bios and change 1st device back to HDD.
feline
Reply #50 Thursday, July 3, 2003 9:04 AM
i am not sure what you mean about not using NTFS. winXP is using NTFS.
win98 is there so i can play Rogue Squadron and Civilization 3. also, it is good for experiments that may be dangerous, like installing strange shareware programs that look interesting.
Rogue Squadron does install on winXP, but is prone to crashing even with every compatibility option i can find set to max.
as for Civilization 3, when i installed it on winXP, it nuked getright, outlook, my firewall, and at least one other program, the name of which i forget. i am assured by tech support this cannot happen, but since i had to do a system restore to get a working machine, i don't believe them. that was nearly a year ago now though, so no connection with the current load of issues. my best guess is the Civ3 problem was something to do with modifications to allow it to read / use the copy protection on the CD. i do know i am not the only person to have had big headaches with Civ3 and winXP, while others have had no problems.
Reply #50 Thursday, July 3, 2003 9:04 AM
| c242 - The Win98 start problem You described indeed cries for a hardware fault somewhere. But I wonder why You installed 98 at all ? And : Not using NTFS as file system ? |
i am not sure what you mean about not using NTFS. winXP is using NTFS.
win98 is there so i can play Rogue Squadron and Civilization 3. also, it is good for experiments that may be dangerous, like installing strange shareware programs that look interesting.
Rogue Squadron does install on winXP, but is prone to crashing even with every compatibility option i can find set to max.
as for Civilization 3, when i installed it on winXP, it nuked getright, outlook, my firewall, and at least one other program, the name of which i forget. i am assured by tech support this cannot happen, but since i had to do a system restore to get a working machine, i don't believe them. that was nearly a year ago now though, so no connection with the current load of issues. my best guess is the Civ3 problem was something to do with modifications to allow it to read / use the copy protection on the CD. i do know i am not the only person to have had big headaches with Civ3 and winXP, while others have had no problems.
feline
Reply #51 Thursday, July 3, 2003 9:07 AM
ah, i never thought of that. i grew up in the era of floppy boot disks
however, no boot disks were used. the machine has win98 on drive C, so the winXP CD auto plays in winXP, and takes over from there. select an advanced install, and it lets you play about with the partitions on the way through, which is what i did.
on the modem front, i should know in a few hours, once i get home and run the experiments with the two machines.
Reply #51 Thursday, July 3, 2003 9:07 AM
| yrag - feline...forget the Win98 boot disk...go into bios and change 1st boot device to CD rom. After XP installs and starts to re-boot, go into bios and change 1st device back to HDD. |
ah, i never thought of that. i grew up in the era of floppy boot disks
however, no boot disks were used. the machine has win98 on drive C, so the winXP CD auto plays in winXP, and takes over from there. select an advanced install, and it lets you play about with the partitions on the way through, which is what i did.
on the modem front, i should know in a few hours, once i get home and run the experiments with the two machines.
yrag2
Reply #53 Thursday, July 3, 2003 9:38 AM
XP setup gives you the option to use either Fat32 or NTFS...make sure your format is jiving with your install.......
yrag2 thinks we should take up a collection, come to your house and fix this damn machine
Reply #53 Thursday, July 3, 2003 9:38 AM
| am not sure what you mean about not using NTFS. winXP is using NTFS. |
XP setup gives you the option to use either Fat32 or NTFS...make sure your format is jiving with your install.......
yrag2 thinks we should take up a collection, come to your house and fix this damn machine
Oldrockr42
Reply #54 Thursday, July 3, 2003 11:00 AM
Reply #54 Thursday, July 3, 2003 11:00 AM
i had a similar problem to you, it turned out that when XP crashes any USB devices all get jumbled up when the computer re-sets and the more your system crashes the worse the problem becomes.try unplugging all usb devices re-start your machine and then plug them back in starting with any hubs one at a time.i know it sounds a bit strange but i look after 4 seperate systems and have had the same on all of them at some point. hope it helps
IPlural
Reply #55 Thursday, July 3, 2003 12:25 PM
Reply #55 Thursday, July 3, 2003 12:25 PM
boot from a system diagnostics disk and remove hardware from the picture...
I did some searches for freeware burn in/diagnostics applications and didn't see anything I considered worth downloading. But, with most Tech books on trouble shooting/ rebuilding, upgrading PC's there is a CD and it should have PC Probe or some such on it.
There is the value added feature of lock step trouble shooting so you do not get lost in the mix of possibilities...
Remove hardware from equations, then go onto hardware drives and configuration inside windows, then specific applications, and so on....
Your sure that you click the advanced setting for your POP/SMTP setup in OE and clicked *use same as POP3 Connection* (or some such)? It is on the second page of the configuration under advanced...
Also on an external modem you are using the Comport on the mother board. With the internal you need to disable the comport on the motherboard that the Internal Modem is using in Windows - Control Panel - System - Hardware - Modems... Probably com3,irq4, they do not always play nice with two parts of hardware claiming to be comport.
just some thoughts...
I did some searches for freeware burn in/diagnostics applications and didn't see anything I considered worth downloading. But, with most Tech books on trouble shooting/ rebuilding, upgrading PC's there is a CD and it should have PC Probe or some such on it.
There is the value added feature of lock step trouble shooting so you do not get lost in the mix of possibilities...
Remove hardware from equations, then go onto hardware drives and configuration inside windows, then specific applications, and so on....
Your sure that you click the advanced setting for your POP/SMTP setup in OE and clicked *use same as POP3 Connection* (or some such)? It is on the second page of the configuration under advanced...
Also on an external modem you are using the Comport on the mother board. With the internal you need to disable the comport on the motherboard that the Internal Modem is using in Windows - Control Panel - System - Hardware - Modems... Probably com3,irq4, they do not always play nice with two parts of hardware claiming to be comport.
just some thoughts...
feline
Reply #56 Thursday, July 3, 2003 12:42 PM
Reply #56 Thursday, July 3, 2003 12:42 PM
and we have an initial result in. i have placed my external modem on my old machine, and i can:
* log into wincustomize
* send email
* post to the board i mentioned a few posts ago
so, i think it is safe to say there is nothing wrong with my external modem.
feline has reached a conclusion
if my main computer was made out of chocolate, it would be more reliable, stable, and usable. even allowing for the fact that people would keep on eating bits of it *sigh*
right, now off to finish reorganising my room so i can get in it. i had to clear the desk to swap machines around. so, once that is done, i will answer the other points here.
* log into wincustomize
* send email
* post to the board i mentioned a few posts ago
so, i think it is safe to say there is nothing wrong with my external modem.
feline has reached a conclusion
if my main computer was made out of chocolate, it would be more reliable, stable, and usable. even allowing for the fact that people would keep on eating bits of it *sigh*
right, now off to finish reorganising my room so i can get in it. i had to clear the desk to swap machines around. so, once that is done, i will answer the other points here.
feline
Reply #57 Friday, July 4, 2003 9:30 AM
hehe, it is pretty much at that point now. the offending machine is now in a different room, not plugged in, waiting for the weekend when i will have enough time to run some diagnostics programs on it. hopefully they will give me some clues as to what is going on here.
interesting, and not all that reassuring! i don't think this is effecting me though. my motherboard has 2 USB ports, and there are no hubs connected to the machine.
one USB port is connected to my mouse, and the other has a cable coming out of it, which my web cam gets plugged into when i am using it. however, most of the time the web cam is not actually plugged in.
going there now. however, given that the email and web problems are all showing up on a clean install of winXP, i think hardware is now the most likely explanation.
not 100% sure. but then i am not that sure of many things about my main computer now *sigh*
i have checked the settings many times over, and i have found that i can send email from my old machine even when the email password is wrong
it only needs the correct password to receive email. so, since i have set up both machines the same way, i am as sure as i can be at this time that the main machines email settings are correct, and it still doesn't work.
fair points. however, i actually opened up the case and took out the internal (PCI, unknown device since winXP doesn't natively support it) modem a few weeks back to help remove exactly these sort of concerns as a possible variable.
the internet problems do suggest to me that there may be a motherboard COM port problem. however, the internet seemed fine (apart from the insane instability) before the format, so why it should brake after the format..... *sigh*
at this time, and any all helpful thoughts are welcome. just try to be understanding if i seem rather upset / stressed / snappy at times. this isn't quite going to my plan.
Reply #57 Friday, July 4, 2003 9:30 AM
| yrag thinks we should take up a collection, come to your house and fix this damn machine |
hehe, it is pretty much at that point now. the offending machine is now in a different room, not plugged in, waiting for the weekend when i will have enough time to run some diagnostics programs on it. hopefully they will give me some clues as to what is going on here.
| nightprowler - i had a similar problem to you, it turned out that when XP crashes any USB devices all get jumbled up when the computer re-sets and the more your system crashes the worse the problem becomes. |
interesting, and not all that reassuring! i don't think this is effecting me though. my motherboard has 2 USB ports, and there are no hubs connected to the machine.
one USB port is connected to my mouse, and the other has a cable coming out of it, which my web cam gets plugged into when i am using it. however, most of the time the web cam is not actually plugged in.
| IPlural - boot from a system diagnostics disk and remove hardware from the picture... |
going there now. however, given that the email and web problems are all showing up on a clean install of winXP, i think hardware is now the most likely explanation.
| IPlural - Your sure that you click the advanced setting for your POP/SMTP setup in OE and clicked *use same as POP3 Connection* (or some such)? It is on the second page of the configuration under advanced... |
not 100% sure. but then i am not that sure of many things about my main computer now *sigh*
i have checked the settings many times over, and i have found that i can send email from my old machine even when the email password is wrong
it only needs the correct password to receive email. so, since i have set up both machines the same way, i am as sure as i can be at this time that the main machines email settings are correct, and it still doesn't work.
| IPlural - Also on an external modem you are using the Comport on the mother board. With the internal you need to disable the comport on the motherboard that the Internal Modem is using in Windows - Control Panel - System - Hardware - Modems... Probably com3,irq4, they do not always play nice with two parts of hardware claiming to be comport. |
fair points. however, i actually opened up the case and took out the internal (PCI, unknown device since winXP doesn't natively support it) modem a few weeks back to help remove exactly these sort of concerns as a possible variable.
the internet problems do suggest to me that there may be a motherboard COM port problem. however, the internet seemed fine (apart from the insane instability) before the format, so why it should brake after the format..... *sigh*
| IPlural - just some thoughts... |
at this time, and any all helpful thoughts are welcome. just try to be understanding if i seem rather upset / stressed / snappy at times. this isn't quite going to my plan.
kona0197
Reply #58 Friday, July 4, 2003 2:24 PM
i never have used NTFS and i have never had a problem.
Reply #58 Friday, July 4, 2003 2:24 PM
| Not using NTFS as file system ? |
i never have used NTFS and i have never had a problem.
windKnot
Reply #59 Friday, July 4, 2003 3:57 PM
Reply #59 Friday, July 4, 2003 3:57 PM
Have you updated any drivers lately? My XP crashed 2 weeks ago after a Windows Intel Graphic Driver update. First the CD & Floppy drives wouldn't work, then the key board locked up. After booting up in safe mode I got the Blue Screen of Death! It took a complete reinstall with Dell Tech to get it back.
Good Luck!
Good Luck!
Fuzzy Logic
Reply #60 Friday, July 4, 2003 5:09 PM
Reply #60 Friday, July 4, 2003 5:09 PM
Dump the modem... That seems to be the common denominator.
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Reply #41 Monday, June 30, 2003 2:39 PM
Only if you have chocolate &/or marshmallows.