[cpc2004/all] Event ID 1003, possibly bad RAM, not quite sure.

[Luckychunk]

Greetings cpc2004/all,

I found this forum through Google while trying to decipher my Event ID 1003 and related issues with my PC.

System:
Processor: Intel P4 3.0 GHz
MB: Intel® Desktop Board D865PERL
RAM: (4) x 512 MB DDR 3200, 2 matching pairs from different companies (I'm almost sure it's DDR, though it might be SDRAM)
OS: WinXP Pro, SP2
Disk drives: C:120GB SATA/D: 250GB SATA
Graphics card: eVGA/nVidia GeForce FX 5900 Ultra, 256 MB, driver ver. 77.77
Protection: NAT router, McAfee Firewall/VirusScan, Spybot, Adaware

Problems:
About a month and 1/2 ago these problems started. This is the first set of errors I've ever experienced with this PC in over two years of daily use.
1. Viewing AVI files through WMP 10 causes the Desktop to crash, preceeded by a dialog box which states: "Protection Error: 15"
2. Often sudden reboots when shutting down, defragging a HD, or various other system processes.
3. Occasionally, upon startup, a message appears: "One of the files containing the system's registry data had to be recovered by use of a log or alternate copy. The recovery was successful." This happens the most frequently out of all of my problems.
4. I also experience an occasional "System Has Recovered from a Serious Error" warning upon startup.

Steps taken so far:
1. The first possible solution I read about online was a bad stick of RAM. Memtest indicates dozens of errors when all four sticks are in the MB. I've pulled them out and tested each stick, one by one, including swapping slots to test each slot as well as each stick (about 9 hours of testing). Here's the kicker: All four sticks and slots do not generate ANY errors when tested individually. I've read other messages cpc2004 has written on this forum, and I understand that Memtest's results shouldn't always be trusted 100% of the time. I've also used Memtest86, which boots from a floppy, but it made my PC hang after test #2 and #9. I then manually launched tests 3-8 with no errors found on any of my sticks.

Which led me to my next thought: what about Virtual Memory? Does Memtest test Virtual Memory? What if the pagefile is corrupted?

2. To clear my Virtual Memory, I've turned off the pagefile in the Virtual Memory advanced settings window, rebooted, defragged, and created a new pagefile of a min/max of 3 GB (Microsoft recommends a size of 1.5x the total system memory). And still, Memtest states that I have bad RAM.

Steps not taken yet:
1. I have not turned off automatic reboot to view a BSOD error page.
2. I've read writings on this forum that this issue may be linked to the latest nVidia driver 77.77. I have not rolled back to a previous version.
3. I have not replaced the RAM sticks with new sticks.

My request for assistance:
I've attached a Zipped archive of 5 recent minidumps in hopes that you could take a look at them and let me know what you find. Any assistance is greatly appreciated and will be closely followed and reported with followup information.


The following is the text logged from an Event ID 1003 from Computer Management.

Date: 8/13/05
Time: 1:41:40 PM
Source: System Error
Category: (102)
Type: Error
Event ID: 1003

Decscription:
Error code 00000019, parameter1 00000020, parameter2 e1494000, parameter3 e1494040, parameter4 0c080400.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Data:
0000: 74737953 45206d65 726f7272 72452020
0010: 20726f72 65646f63 30303020 31303030
0020: 50202039 6d617261 72657465 30302073
0030: 30303030 202c3032 39343165 30303034
0040: 3165202c 30343934 202c3034 38306330
0050: 30303430


Thanks in advance,
Luckychunk

 

[cpc2004]

I've studied your minidumps and it is faulty ram.

 

[Luckychunk]

cpc2004, your efforts and assistance are greatly appreciated.

I went and bought two new sticks of 512 MB DDR PC3200 @ 400 MHz, and when I installed them, my PC went nuts. Everything was crashing upon startup (mostly internet apps that call out upon startup), and when I just *opened* a folder that contained AVIs, I received the dreaded Protection 15 error and a crashing desktop. What a wasteland.

But luckily, I have 2 sets of 512 in my system, so I must have left the bad set installed, I thought. I went back in and swapped out the other set of 512, and low and behold, I think I've solved the problem. AVIs don't crash, startup was clean, and no "Serious errors found" or registry backups loaded so far (I'm going on two reboots so far, as I just installed the RAM an hour ago).

I ran two instances of the Memtest program at the same time (Memtest cannot test all 2 GB at once, so you have to run two instances of the program and allocate as much as possible to each, in my case, it was 812MB apiece), and I did generate 3 errors with 100% coverage. But 3 errors is a big decrease from about 12-20 errors of 30% coverage with the other, bad set of RAM in the PC.

I realize that I didn't run Memtest over all available RAM, as Windows & countless other programs that run in the background use a portion of RAM, but I believe that my main problems may be licked (crosses fingers). Only time will tell if the problem has vanished. I will monitor all events for the next few days and report back if I find any problems or experience smooth sailing.

For this cpc2004, I tip my hat to you. And out of any problem that occurs in a PC environment, I've learned a lot along the way, which is valuable information to retain. Thank you very much for your assistance!

Luckychunk

 

[Luckychunk]

Hello cpc2004, if you're still around, could you take a look at a new set of minidumps for me and let me know what you find?

I replaced all the RAM in my PC with brand new sticks (4x512MB), and I'm still experiencing reboots. These are different reboots than before -- it seems almost random now. Sometimes it reboots just sitting idle.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Luckychunk

 

[cpc2004]

Hi LuckyChunk,

I've investigated your minidumps. Maybe one of memory slot of the m/b is faulty or new ram is incompatible with the m/b. Take out memory stick one by one to diagnostic which memory slot is faulty. Reseat memory and clean the dust inside the computer case may improve the connectivity of the memory stick and the memory slot.