I keep getting random blue screens of death on xp - can anyone please help?

I had trouble a few weeks ago where a small piece of metal got lodged in between the processor and the motherboard and so my computer wouldn't boot up. I removed it, and it booted up fine. However, since then I keep getting blue sceens of death with different error messages (DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_NOT_EQUAL, IRQL_NOT_LESS_NOT_EQUAL, BAD_POOL_CALLER, PAGED_FAULT_IN_NON_PAGED_AREA are the ones I remember, sometimes there is no error message).

I'm getting them very randomly, sometimes my computer can go days without crashing whilst others, like today, it's crashed a number of times.

I've uploaded the most recent minidumps that windows have created - the attachment was too large to upload them all, I hope they can be any use.

Thanks.

Also, programs such as Windows Media Player and Firefox crash on a regular basis and I have to restart the application.

Hello and welcome to Techspot.

Your minidumps crash with the following bugchecks.

2 have a bugcheck of 8E, 1 has a bugcheck of D1.

0x0000008E: KERNEL_MODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED

A kernel mode program generated an exception which the error handler didn’t catch. These are nearly always hardware compatibility issues (which sometimes means a driver issue or a need for a BIOS upgrade).

0x000000D1: DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

The system attempted to access pageable memory using a kernel process IRQL that was too high. The most typical cause is a bad device driver (one that uses improper addresses). It can also be caused by caused by faulty or mismatched RAM, or a damaged pagefile.

Go HERE and follow the instructions.

Regards Howard :wave: :wave:

Thank you, I'll run memtest whilst I'm at university and I'll follow the rest tonight.

Hi, I ran Memtest this afternoon and it found 17 Stride38 errors.

Does this mean that it's most likely to be caused by faulty RAM? I haven't had time to follow the rest of the instructions yet, I'll be doing that hopefully tonight.

Temporarily disable legacy usb support in your bios and retest your ram sticks one at a time.

If you still get errors, the ram is bad.

Regards Howard

Sorry about this, but I'm not sure how to get into the bios. Isn't something like pushing F8 as it boots up or something?

Normally you get into bios by pressing either the delete or the F2 keys during bootup.

Regards Howard

sometimes it's the DEL key or F2

Thanks, I'll try that.

I disabled and ran memtest again overnight.

There were still Stride38 errors. It looks like it didn't fail everytime but I'm guessing that the RAM is still bad because there were 28 failures overall.

Howard what do you think, I'm not knowledgable about mem errors, is this what's causing the crashes, could this happen when the metal thing happened?

What I'm suggesting is did he damage his PSU, which is very likely or worse the CPU. tranmerefan do think the metal was actually touching any electrical part of the CPU? That would be hard to do (bad luck) because they sit down into the socket practically flush and the socket itself is about 1/4" deep off the mobo surface. Hmm.
Can you give us your system specs please.

Howard do you ever sleep mate?

According to the minidumps and memtest ram is the culprit.

However, it is possible for a bad psu/cpu to cause the same kind of errors in a minidump.

Once the ram has been replaced, we will have to see if that is the end of the problem. If it isn`t then we will have to look at other possible causes.

Of course there are different typs of ram that can be faulty. The most serious of which is the L2 cache ram of the cpu.

It is possible that this is the cause of the problem, but I hope not.

Regards Howard

As i know, it must be RAM problem.

Thanks for all your help guys, I'll get my RAM replaced (I still have the guarentee from the place I bought the RAM from - have to wait until Monday though) and see what happens.

My System specs by the way;

Intel pentium 4 processor - 2.4GHZ
512Mb Ram - 1 stick
128Mb Sapphire Radeon 9600 series

Not sure where to find the exact power supply specs, but the invoice says that its P4 compatible - 300W.

I haven't managed to change my RAM yet (Got too much coursework due in soon that needs to be done) and the blue screens are still happening.


If possible can someone please check the latest minidumps, to see if it's still likely to be the RAM? Thanks.

Also, my computer has now just restarted on it's own, followed by an immediate blue screen when I attempted to virus scan my system. Any reason why it would restart when Automatic restarts are turned off?

f8 boots safe mode.

f2 or del boots into BIOS

PSU failing is one sure cause. If the 5Volt power good signal falls away the mobo resets the CPU. The effect is as if you just pushed the reset button on the front of the PC. Like I said that metal falling into the mobo was probably not good for the PSU. BTW your 300W PSU is probably some generic crappy and is really only putting out 70% of that. Go here to see what your system really needs for power. Take what ever that number is and add 30% for headroom.
http://www.extreme.outervision.com/index.jsp

How's the RAM tests coming? It might be a RAM prob, but since your last post about the auto restart I'm really thinking it's the PSU.

Cheers. Keep us posted.

1 minidump crashes with memory corruption and a bugcheck of 7E.

1 minidump crashes at avgtdi.sys. AVG antivirus. It has a bugcheck of D1.

1 minidump crashes at afd.sys. Windows Ancillary Function Driver for WinSock. It has a bugcheck of D1.

Update/reinstall AVG.

Check your system for viruses etc.

Untill you get some new ram, it`s going to be difficult to make any further diagnosis.

Regards Howard