"The system has recovered from a serious error."

[in_sherman]

What's wrong:
-My computer is acting funny. Whenever I attempt to open a file (anything, .avi, .jpg, .exe) my computer restarts itself. When it comes back online, it gives me the error message "The system has recovered from a serious error.".
-It also does this when I try to turn off or restart the computer. When I try to restart it looks like it's going to and it does restart but not in the way it's supposed to. It gets to the "Saving your settings..." part, but then abruptly shuts off and restarts, and I can tell it's not right, because it didn't ever do that before. When it turns back on I also get the the error message.
-Firefox works fine, flawless, but VLC Media Player and Winamp won't run. Other programs like Photoshop and Open Office Writer work alright until you try to open a file and then the computer crashes.
-I've tried disk-error checking, but it needs me to restart the computer... it won't fully restart so I can't do this. I also have tried system restore but before it even starts the computer decides to shut off and start back up. I don't really know much more about computers so I don't know what direction to go with this. Really I can't do anything that requires me to reboot the computer because it simply won't reboot.
-Not really sure how this problem originated. I didn't download or run any programs that I don't use regularly so I can't pinpoint what's wrong. It was so spontaneous that I have a suspicion that the hard drive is getting messed up somehow... I don't know. This problem is so frustrating.

Running:
Dell Inspiron 5150
Windows XP Professional, Version 2002, Service Pack 2
Intel Pentium 4 3.06GHz
512 MB RAM

-It's a laptop, don't laugh at it because it's been pretty reliable and it gets the job done. I'm not really into gaming so I don't require anything great, although the slowness of the computer gets somewhat annoying, especially when running things like Photoshop or Illustrator.

Error Details:
BCCode : 10000050 BCP1 : E1F38000 BCP2 : 00000000 BCP3 : 8056C251
BCP4 : 00000001 OSVer : 5_1_2600 SP : 2_0 Product : 256_1

"The following files will be included in this error report:"
C:\DOCUME~1\Nicholas\LOCALS~1\Temp\WERe4d4.dir00\Mini071507-03.dmp
C:\DOCUME~1\Nicholas\LOCALS~1\Temp\WERe4d4.dir00\sysdata.xml

-Thanks in advance to anyone who can help me with this. I don't know that much about computers, but I'm not an ***** and I can learn if someone is willing to help. I know this seems like a common problem but I've done some research and no one seems to have it in the same way I do.

EDIT: I've run both Avast Antivirus and Spybot: Search and Destroy and neither of them found anything out of the ordinary. Another reason why I am so baffled about this problem.

 

[zipperman]

Disk error check.Use both options and ok.
It will say you need to restart your computer.
Shut down your computer for a few minutes.Do a cold boot.
It should say you have a
diskcheck scheduled.
Just wait it out,don't cancel with a key press.
This should do a 5 category scan that takes some time.
Relax and be more patient with these things.

 

[in_sherman]

zipperman, thanks for your reply.

I can't do that though. I have to shut off the computer by physically holding the power button. Clicking "shut down" will only induce an error and then will cause the computer to restart. Either way, it does not say I have a disk check scheduled after I restart.

 

[in_sherman]

My mistake, I tried it a second time and for some reason it worked. It didn't come up with anything wrong on my C drive, but I have to check D.

 

[almcneil]

I'd just do an XP repair installation. Sounds like system corruption.

 

[zipperman]

Windows Repair

Do you have the instructions ? I'm not sure if i posted it already.
Here it is from Microsoft FAQ,
======================
How do you perform a reinstallation of Windows XP, sometimes called a repair installation?

Configure your computer to start from the CD-ROM drive. For more information about how to do this, refer to your computer's documentation or contact your computer manufacturer. Then insert your Windows XP Setup CD, and restart your computer.

1.
When the Press any key to boot from CD message is displayed on your screen, press a key to start your computer from the Windows XP CD.

2.
Press ENTER when you see the message To setup Windows XP now, and then press ENTER displayed on the Welcome to Setup screen.

3.
Do not choose the option to press R to use the Recovery Console.

4.
In the Windows XP Licensing Agreement, press F8 to agree to the license agreement.

5.
Make sure that your current installation of Windows XP is selected in the box, and then press R to repair Windows XP.

6.
Follow the instructions on the screen to complete Setup.

 

[almcneil]

Yes, that is how you perform an XP repair installation.

 

[zipperman]

Note : If you can't completly shutdown you PC,you'll have to use the
Power Supply switch for a fresh cold startup.
Turn it off then the monitor.and wait a few minutes,it should be completely turned off.
You needed all previous actions in XP removed.They should be now.

Turn on the PWS,then the monitor,
Some monitors say "No Signal"
then use your PC boot switch.
Then start the Repair.
=====================
Note : I have not done this or heard back from anyone who has tried it,so it's your decision and Micosofts instructions.

 

[in_sherman]

Damnit...

I tried to do the repair. Everything worked alright until I got to the "administrator password" part...I have the sole account on the computer, and it's an administrator account. I don't have a password so I just pressed enter. That didn't work. I was baffled when it said that literally "nothing" was the wrong password. I tried two other passes that I use commonly but neither of those were correct either.

I tried this: http://pubs.logicalexpressions.com/pub0009/LPMArticle.asp?ID=305
It worked, the password was changed. When you do this, however, I believe it's reinstalling Windows. The computer finally starts up, but it's worse than it is before. I'm getting all these error messages... I have a dual monitor setup (laptop + one additional) and the primary monitor has switched, and I can't move my mouse into the actual laptop screen. When I try to disable the secondary monitor my laptop screen goes blank and the auxiliary screen is the only one that's on.

I thought this was fine, so I went on with the repair. Unfortunately, when I got to the password page of the repair procedure the same thing happened. I am absolutely sure I entered the right password... Now that I get to this page and read zipperman's last post, I wonder if I should've shut everything off and removed the batteries from the laptop, then tried the repair again. I think I'll let it sit overnight, then try it in the morning.

Sorry for the long posts guys, I appreciate the help... Hopefully I'll learn something from this and won't have to bother everyone else again.

 

[lipe123]

erm the admin pass is not your user account, "administrator" is a built in windows account that you should NOT use, only in safe mode and recovery console.

It might be that someone set the admin password before you got the laptop, but if im not mistaken the xp repair setup asks you to set a new admin pass? I always leave it blank.

All I can think of is to delete the administrator profile from documents and settings and retry a repair, but since its a laptop it wont be easy.

your dual monitor thing is just a drive issue, you need to set it to clone/span mode to get the mouse on both screens, clone is prolly the one u want.

btw your initial problem might be from faulty ram, do a memtest86 test on your laptop, you can get a bootable cd image with memtest with the ultimate boot cd program.

 

[zipperman]

Try this

Control Panel/Users accounts