Trouble with BSOD and internet connection in XP
I've been having this problem for about a week now and maybe one of you can help me before I throw my laptop out the window.
I have a Gateway 450SX4 Laptop running XP Pro SP2 on a 2.00 GHz Pentium 4, 256 MB, and a 30 GB HDD. I bought the system about two and a half years ago, and I have never had any problems that I could not fix with my limited knowledge until now.
I have always connected to the internet using an Intel(R) PRO 2011B Wireless LAN PCI card, and for over two years I operated without a problem. However, I have recently been experiencing system crashes, restarts, and the dreaded BSOD (either ‘BAD POOL CALLER’ or ‘IRQL NOT LESS OR EQUAL’). These problems usually occur between 5 and 30 minutes after connecting to the internet. I believe that the problems started when I downloaded an MP3 that turned out to not really be an MP3 (smart, huh?). I am fairly sure that this is not a hardware issue, since nothing on my system has changed and I did download that dubious file, but Symantec AntiVirus has not found anything in the last five scans. Preceding each BSOD is usually a series of pop-up's (never a problem before), so I have also removed everything that Lavasoft Adware SE has found every day for the last two weeks, but the problems persist.
The first thing I did after the scans was get every update Microsoft and Gateway could throw at me. I have the most recent drivers, BIOS, and security patches. I tried reinstalling the old drivers, but that did not help either. MemTest and dskchk found no errors with my memory. I moved my single stick to the other slot just for fun, and naturally, that did nothing. I have not been able to find anyone with my exact problem on any threads, but most people with similar problems try to reformat and reinstall XP. It usually does not work for them, and I would really like to avoid doing that.
There seems to be absolutely no problems when I take the wireless card out the PCI slot (except that I have no internet!). If I keep the processor running at 100 percent capacity all the time by running a computationally intensive program, I can stave off the crashes and restarts for up to four hours, maybe more, but as soon as the system becomes idle, a BSOD can come at any moment. When I reboot in Safe Mode, I can use my wireless card all I want without a single BSOD, and the pop-ups are gone too. This one really has me stumped. A virus is the only thing that I can think of which would explain all of these symptoms. My copy of Symantec is up to date, but is it generally considered reliable? It has caught a lot of stuff for me in the past, but I'm not sure. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
I've been having this problem for about a week now and maybe one of you can help me before I throw my laptop out the window.
I have a Gateway 450SX4 Laptop running XP Pro SP2 on a 2.00 GHz Pentium 4, 256 MB, and a 30 GB HDD. I bought the system about two and a half years ago, and I have never had any problems that I could not fix with my limited knowledge until now.
I have always connected to the internet using an Intel(R) PRO 2011B Wireless LAN PCI card, and for over two years I operated without a problem. However, I have recently been experiencing system crashes, restarts, and the dreaded BSOD (either ‘BAD POOL CALLER’ or ‘IRQL NOT LESS OR EQUAL’). These problems usually occur between 5 and 30 minutes after connecting to the internet. I believe that the problems started when I downloaded an MP3 that turned out to not really be an MP3 (smart, huh?). I am fairly sure that this is not a hardware issue, since nothing on my system has changed and I did download that dubious file, but Symantec AntiVirus has not found anything in the last five scans. Preceding each BSOD is usually a series of pop-up's (never a problem before), so I have also removed everything that Lavasoft Adware SE has found every day for the last two weeks, but the problems persist.
The first thing I did after the scans was get every update Microsoft and Gateway could throw at me. I have the most recent drivers, BIOS, and security patches. I tried reinstalling the old drivers, but that did not help either. MemTest and dskchk found no errors with my memory. I moved my single stick to the other slot just for fun, and naturally, that did nothing. I have not been able to find anyone with my exact problem on any threads, but most people with similar problems try to reformat and reinstall XP. It usually does not work for them, and I would really like to avoid doing that.
There seems to be absolutely no problems when I take the wireless card out the PCI slot (except that I have no internet!). If I keep the processor running at 100 percent capacity all the time by running a computationally intensive program, I can stave off the crashes and restarts for up to four hours, maybe more, but as soon as the system becomes idle, a BSOD can come at any moment. When I reboot in Safe Mode, I can use my wireless card all I want without a single BSOD, and the pop-ups are gone too. This one really has me stumped. A virus is the only thing that I can think of which would explain all of these symptoms. My copy of Symantec is up to date, but is it generally considered reliable? It has caught a lot of stuff for me in the past, but I'm not sure. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
