I have a Toshiba Tecra M4 that keeps popping this message up when I try to install Windows XP. The laptop originally had the Tablet XP OS on it but the factory image was erased.

I work for an accounting company and this is a little project that they gave me to work on. I originally took it to an authorized Toshiba repair shop and they ran a diagnostic on it and told me all of the hardware was working properly. The warranty covered hardware but not software so they sent me on my way.

I can get through a good percentage of the install (I can format with NTFS and run the setup) but when the setup is getting close to finished I get the BSOD. The stop error is 0x00000050. The version of XP that I am installing has SP2 on it.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Hello jjanson and welcome to TechSpot.

I'm about 90% sure your problem is caused by faulty RAM.

Please test your RAM with Memtest as per this guide and then let us know the results.

Regards

learn how to read minidumps

http://www.techspot.com/vb/all/windows/t-31341-How-do-I-read-minidumps.html

Ok, I need to go out and buy some CD-R's. I'll let you know what happenes. Thanks.

I picked up some CD-R's today and ran memtest. I ran it on each individual stick of memory (256MB sticks) for 7 passes and received no errors. Where should I go from here?

I think that some bad RAM can pass Memtest, though not very often.

Try installing Windows with only one stick of RAM at a time. If it crashes on one stick but not the other, you know which stick is faulty.

Regards

Ok, thanks. On laptops would the primary memory slot be the one that is in the rear or the one that sits on top of it?

I'm not sure about that. Does it make a difference?

I didn't know if it did or not. I won't worry about it. So I tried to install Windows one stick at a time and the BSOD still came up. Any other ideas? Thanks again for your help.

Have you tried it one stick at a time, but in different memory slots?

Ya, tried both sticks one at a time and in each different slot.

BTW, I ran memtest for 14 more passes this morning to make sure and I still didn't receive any errors.

I'm pretty sure the problem is caused by faulty RAM somewhere, but it doesn't appear to be the main memory. It could, however, be video RAM or CPU cache.

I recommend following the steps in Microsoft's KB article 171003. See if that solves the problem.

Regards

I'm not sure how to disable caching in my Bios. I don't see anything that says CMOS. Am I looking in the right place?

I was looking at the screenshot here: http://blogs.sun.com/japod/entry/solaris_nevada_on_toshiba_tecra

and I noticed that my bios looks exactly like that but in the "others" box there isn't the CPU cache and L2 cache option. My first option is "Dynamic CPU frequency Mode" I'm guessing thats not a good thing.

Any thoughts?

The problem is, I don't really know. Perhaps somebody who knows more about BIOS than I do will be able to help you here.

Regards