BSOD Problem with Windows 7

[SonOfCrusader76]

After being fine the night before, Windows 7 now refuses to start. It gets to the 'Starting Windows' screen and then throws up a BSOD similar to the sample in this thread:

http://www.faultwire.com/solutions-f...0F4-*1241.html

It's now stuck in a continous reboot/BSOD cycle. I've done some research and it seems one of the main causes could be the system HDD. I can get into Win 7 safe mode however.

Now, I think my system drive has been suspect for a while, so that's my prime suspect for this issue, but the only thing is, Windows XP boots up without a problem and I'm sure it's on the same old HDD (in fact I'm sure Windows 7 is on a partition on the new HDD I bought a while back). Is it still likely to be the HDD, or since Win XP boots fine could it be something else? Or is it only a matter of time before Win XP goes the way of Win 7? If that's the case, I'll just get my local repair shop to copy all the system drive's data on to a new HDD.

Ideally, I'd love a Solid state drive for my system drive, but they're still really expensive and for not much storage, aren't they? SSD would be good because they're less likely to go wrong due to fewer moving parts.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Edit: I don't think it's any issue with a driver - I'm sure they're all up to date. I recently bought a Ferrari F430 USB FF Wheel, but that was a good few weeks ago, so I don't think that's the cause. The only thing I did before this happened was activated TuneUp Utilities' Turbo Mode - when I next tried to boot Win 7, it wouldn't start. I set Turbo Mode to shutdown when then system was shut down, so I don't think that's the problem, but you never know I suppose.

I've tried the automatic repair options, none of them worked. Is there a way to test each HDD, to see which one (if any) is causing the problem?

[PoleCat]

Any software updates recently that you can think of? Maybe to an AV program?

The timing between the Tune Up and the BSOD is highly suspicious. Can you reload an old restore point and try again? Good luck!

[SonOfCrusader76]

Haven't got any restore points - which is odd, as I usually have a few, but I recently reinstalled Windows 7, so they're all gone. Might be worth trying to get into safe mode and uninstall TuneUp temporarily, to see if that helps - or maybe I should just go with cutting my losses and getting a new HDD - as I said, this system drive has been suspect for a while. I can't think of any software updates that might have caused this.

[PoleCat]

If you suspect the HD then run a Checkdisk on it to see if you have bad sectors. If you have XP in a partition on that drive and that doesn't BSOD it may be the disk isn't fried yet and something else is causing this. It's at least worth a shot before you throw good money at a new drive that may or may not be needed. Good luck!

[SonOfCrusader76]

If you suspect the HD then run a Checkdisk on it to see if you have bad sectors. If you have XP in a partition on that drive and that doesn't BSOD it may be the disk isn't fried yet and something else is causing this. It's at least worth a shot before you throw good money at a new drive that may or may not be needed. Good luck!

Thanks!

What else do you think could cause it? According to that article, it's either going to be something to do with the HDD's cabling (and that hasn't been touched since the drive was fitted), HDD failing (which my money is on) or a driver issue (and I haven't installed any new hardware recently). Besides which, I've had driver issue BSODs before - don't they usually come up with DRIVER_IRQ_NOT_LESS_THAN_OR_EQUAL, or something like that? This is the worst BSOD I've ever had - I've never had one that meant the O/S literally couldn't start and I have had it for quite a few years now.

XP BSOD'ed tonight, but that was in game, so it's probably not a connected issue. First BSOD I've had under XP for ages. Thank God I decided to keep XP, otherwise right now I'd be stuffed. Dual booting is always a good idea for me, it can help with a variety of problems.

Edit: Windows 7 has also been freezing up from time to time - only on the desktop, or while surfing - not while doing something CPU/GPU/RAM intensive like playing a game. People have told me that could well be a sign of an HDD that's due to pack up. I've tested my RAM with Memtest86 (all day) and it came back clean, so that's not the issue.

[PoleCat]

Thanks!

What else do you think could cause it? According to that article, it's either going to be something to do with the HDD's cabling (and that hasn't been touched since the drive was fitted), HDD failing (which my money is on) or a driver issue (and I haven't installed any new hardware recently). Besides which, I've had driver issue BSODs before - don't they usually come up with DRIVER_IRQ_NOT_LESS_THAN_OR_EQUAL, or something like that? This is the worst BSOD I've ever had - I've never had one that meant the O/S literally couldn't start and I have had it for quite a few years now.

XP BSOD'ed tonight, but that was in game, so it's probably not a connected issue. First BSOD I've had under XP for ages. Thank God I decided to keep XP, otherwise right now I'd be stuffed. Dual booting is always a good idea for me, it can help with a variety of problems.

Edit: Windows 7 has also been freezing up from time to time - only on the desktop, or while surfing - not while doing something CPU/GPU/RAM intensive like playing a game. People have told me that could well be a sign of an HDD that's due to pack up. I've tested my RAM with Memtest86 (all day) and it came back clean, so that's not the issue.

Thanks for your post - a wealth of info to work with.

Try uninstalling that USB FF Wheel just in case in Safe mode - even if it worked fine for weeks it's the latest hardware (sort of) that you've added recently. It would help to just eliminate it from the equation from the start.

What game were you playing when XP crapped out on you? It is probably not related but it might give us a clue. Was it a game that uses a high amount of CPU time?

don't they usually come up with DRIVER_IRQ_NOT_LESS_THAN_OR_EQUAL, or something like that?

Not necessarily. There are many ways drivers can screw with you without giving a comprehensible error message especially with a BSOD - sometimes the error comes too quickly for Windows Shell to even generate a report. Ishan had a program a while back that allowed one to check the source of a BSOD error - search the forums for his program. I'll look later but I'm in the middle of a hockey game at the moment and will have to wait till later to get back.

You've said you ran a Memtest - did you run a Checkdisk? What was the result? Good luck!

EDIT: If you're willing a new format and reinstall of Win7 might be a way to cut through the and get the job done. Trust me - it's a pain in the ass but you'll know soon after if it was a software problem or HDD if you continue to get the BSOD. No BSOD would likely mean software as the original problem.

[irishron]

I don't know about anymore but I could have more than one bootable partition in the past using a third party program since it was not built into any BIOS, yet. In fact, I don't know why not unless there is something wrong with the boot part of the partition.

[SonOfCrusader76]

This is the txt file from Blue Screen View about the last five crashes (probably made during the Boot/BSOD cycle.

Edit: When Win XP crashed, and I sent the error report, it came back with a message about a possible problem with the RAM - but I tested that the other time not long ago for about ten hours straight! I hope the whole system isn't falling apart - I can't afford a major repair job right now. A new HDD, or some new RAM won't be a problem, but that's about it.

Edit: When Win 7 was crashing though and I loaded safe mode and sent the error report, it didn't display any message at all. Is the Win XP error reporter inaccurate? What's better, Memtest86 or Windows' own RAM Diagnostic? I ran that yesterday and it came back clean.

I reckon I'll try reinstalling Win 7 - if that won't install, then it's surely a problem with C:\. If it does install, then God knows what the issue is.

[irishron]

Ntoskrnl.exe causing the problem.

Have you checked for root-kit viruses in Safe Mode?

[SonOfCrusader76]

I'm not sure how to do that to be honest - do I just run a scan with my AV? If so, I did that last night and it came up clean.

So is this more likely to be a corrupt Window 7 file rather than an HDD problem? Is there no other way to fix that other than reinstalling Windows 7? What about the freezing on Windows 7 desktop - happens every few weeks or so and requires a reboot. It doesn't happen in game and it doesn't happen on XP.

Edit: Avast's normal scan seems to include rootkits - I might as well scan again to be sure I suppose, but as I said before it came up clean.

Edit: XP's crash report:

It also has an issue with Ntoskrnl.exe, yet it boots fine.

Thanks for Blue Screen View, it'll definitely come in handy in the future.

[SonOfCrusader76]

I'm not sure how to do that to be honest - do I just run a scan with my AV? If so, I did that last night and it came up clean.

So is this more likely to be a corrupt Window 7 file rather than an HDD problem? Is there no other way to fix that other than reinstalling Windows 7? What about the freezing on Windows 7 desktop - happens every few weeks or so and requires a reboot. It doesn't happen in game and it doesn't happen on XP.

Windows 7 desktop has just frozen up again, even after reinstalling Windows 7 - what could be causing this? It's happening every few weeks or so, therefore it's no biggie, but I'd like to know why it's doing it. RAM and both HDDs have both tested clean.

[irishron]

If I was betting, and I'm not, it's either a rootkit you picked up someplace - SecuRom uses one and a pain to remove but I've had no rpoblems with it and Medieval2, a bad update from Windows but I have not had one since Vista Oct. or Nov., 2009, or a bad sector it's trying to read in that order.

[SonOfCrusader76]

Yeah, I've heard about SecuCRAP (as I call it) using a rootkit.

Anyway, I've checked both the XP partition and the Win 7 partition with Chkdsk (I ran it under XP, but surely a disk check is a disk check, or do I have to run in under Win 7 safe mode) and both came back clean. So if Chkdsk isn't reporting errors, then there's not a problem with the actual HDD? So this is more likely to be some kind of corruption to the Ntoskrnl.exe file - so I'm going to try to reinstall Windows 7.

Incidentally, is it easy to install a new HDD (when it's time to do it)? My local computer shop has just put their labour and services (including pick up and return of system) up to £50!! If I can do it myself, I can save £50 each time if I can do things like GPU, HDD and CPUs (I can already do RAM and DVD Rom drives) - and just take it to them for major things like mobo upgrades. It's the only PC repair shop local to me - PC World certainly aren't going to come and pick up my system - I have no car, and it is a really heavy S.o.B. As well as that, if I take it to my local, they'll have it done within the day - I'm sure that won't be the case with somewhere like PC World.

You mentioned bad windows updates - that might well have something to do with it because after I reinstalled Windows 7 last time, there were several updates that refused to install - they took several attempts; maybe some of them didn't actually install properly. And if it was a bad sector, wouldn't Chkdsk pick that up?

Anyway, thanks for your help - with any luck, a fresh Win 7 installation will sort this out.

[irishron]

The best cure for a rootkit is format and reload Windows. Not recommended unless all else fails.

I had one of my last updates take two tries but so far, no crashes.

Checkdsk says good, I believe it. Your drive is till good.

Good luck with a fresh install.

[Doono]

i would attempt a repair of windows, pop your windows 7 disk in the drive, tap f8 on boot and select repair.

[PoleCat]

That XP BSOD crash text you posted says the USB driver is causing that crash. What hardware do you have hooked up to a USB port right now? Is it the drive wheel?

[Jaketh]

Windows 7 doesnt Bluescreen, what the heck did you do?

[SonOfCrusader76]

Windows 7 can blue screen just the same as any other O/S - issues with drivers for one thing can cause it. I didn't do anything to make it happen - it must have somehow got corrupted; if you've never had a bluescreen, then all I can say is you've been very lucky. Anyway, I have reinstalled Windows 7 and all's good so far - let's see how it goes. Encouragingly, all the Windows updates installed properly this time round.

@Polecat - I've got numerous devices in my USB ports - Xbox 360 pad, Ferrari wheel, mouse, keyboard, wireless adapter and printer.

@Irishron - if it goes wrong again, and I have to reformat, is it possible just to reformat the partition Windows 7 is on and leave the other one alone? I haven't got an external drive right now, so I wouldn't be able to backup all the stuff on there and there's a lot.

[PoleCat]

SonOfCrusader76 - I just looked at your crash log again and noticed something - your clock on Win7 is off by a month. It's registering the crash as happening on March 2nd instead of February. This can cause problems with all sorts of programs.

Go into the OS via Safe Mode, reset the date/time to the correct time and try rebooting. Hopefully it's that simple. Good luck!

EDIT: If it doesn't work then try removing the game pad and drive wheel and try again. There's no way to tell if they're contributing to the problem so remove them from the equation first.

EDIT2: Crap - you're on European readout aren't you? Then you're date is probably correct. It looked odd to my US eyes.....

[SonOfCrusader76]

Yep, I'm from the UK. My current date readout is Feb 3rd.

Thanks for your help, I can put the money I saved from getting the new HDD to getting an external drive, so I can do proper backups. I'm looking at this one at play.com:

Seagate Expansion 500GB External USB 2.0 Desktop Hard Drive



£39.99 - that seems like a good price for 500gb. Would it be OK to put that on top of the System Unit case, or could that cause damage to either of them? It's just the right size and shape for it to 'live' there.