Vista BSODs all day on a new ThinkPad

[MikeDLA]

Hello experts

I have a brand new (30 days-ish) Lenovo X61 ThinkPad with 4Gb RAM - yes Windows can only see 3Gb - running Windows Vista Ultimate.
(It's the ultimate in something - I can tell you that).

I'm getting BSODs half a dozen times a day. I can't see any pattern to the BSODs - seemingly random. I have reinstalled the Intel Turbo Memory Driver and the Intel Video Chipset driver but the problems keep coming.
I am thinking of "downgrading" to Win XP Pro - and I'm not the first from what the lenovo reps tell me on the 'phone.

As a last ditched effort I though maybe I would see if someone here could spot the culprit in the minidumps. It's all meaningless to me and I don't know the difference between a debugger and a garden hose.

So some minidumps are attached (a random selection from the list). If anyone has any insight I would greatly appreciate it.

Thank you kindly in advance for your time and expertise.

Mike

 

[Route44]

Three of your four minidumps cite memory corruption. If you have just one stick of bad RAM it will wreck havoc with stability; I speak from experience as do tens of thousands PC owners.

I would contact Lenovo A.S.A.P. because your machine should still be under warrenty especially since their model 61 ThinkPads are top of the line.

When you contact them tell them that you had your minidumps read and that:

a) Three had 0x76 errors (that's a zero) and it said the probable cause was memory corruption. This could very well be why Vista isn't recognizing all 4 gigs. If indeed memory is the issue they should replace it free of charge.

b) That the fourth dump had an 0x24 error citing the probable cause was ntfs.sys.

They should be able to tell you what to do. I highly doubt it is a Vista issue.

 

[MikeDLA]

Thanks very much for your prompt reply.

I had given up on Lenovo support because they insist it is an OS or software problem before they will contemplate it being a hardware problem - this was before your interpretation of the minidumps.
I will call them back.

Also from what I have been told 32 bit Windows Vista can only address 3Gb of RAM max. Even if you had 8Gb installed 32 bit Windows Vista can only see/use 3Gb. That's what I read somewhere - but what do I know?!

Thank you again for your help - much appreciated.

Mike

 

[Route44]

When you wrote you had Windows Vista Ultima I was assuming it was the 64 bit OS as opposed to the 32 bit Home Premium.

Yes, all 32 bit OS versionss whether Vista or XP will only recognize a total of 3 gigs of RAM. You need the 64bit versions to handle and recognize more.

As for Lenovo, this laptop is only one month old and under warenty. The software like the hardware should be running fine. By the way, I have heard too many nightmares about their third party tech support. I hope you went with the warrenty where they come to you. That is local tech help instead of having to ship it out.