blue screen

[Ivor Williams]

I have a HP Pavillion dv5 laptop that came with XP Home edition installed. I
upgraded to XP Pro, then Vista Ultimate 32 bit and then Vista Ultimate 64
bit. The computer ran well on all operating systems.
Recently I decided I wanted to go back to Vista 32 bit. I understand this
requires a clean install, so I decided I would use the restoration CD that
came with the computer and then upgrade it to Vista.
I inserted the CD in the tray and restarted the computer. When prompted to
do so, I hit any key to boot from CD, and the files all loaded into memory
without a problem. As soon as this step completed, I got a blue screen with
the following:

A problem has been detected and Windows has been shut down to prevent damage
to your computer.
If this is the first time you've seen this stop error screen, restart your
computer. If this screen appears again, follow these steps:
Check for viruses on your computer.
Remove any newly installed hard drives or hard drive controllers.
Check your hard drive to make sure it is properly configured and terminated.
Run chkdsk /f to check for hard drive corruption, and then restart your
computer.
Technical information:
***STOP: OXOOOOOO7B (OXF78D663C, OXOOOOOOOO, OXOOOOOOOO)

I have the latest AVG anti-virus with the latest updates installed, so don't
believe virus to be an issue.
There was no new hardware installed, so again, no issue.
The hard drive is currently working fine with Vista Ultimate running, so it
should be properly configured and terminated.
I ran chkdsk /f and everything was fine.
I then re-booted and tried again. Same result.
Tried once again with a full version of Windows 2000. Same result.
Bought a replacement hard drive and tried it with three different operating
systems, each time I got the same result.

Anybody have any idea what the problem might be? I want to install Windows 7
but don't want to spend the money if I'm possibly looking at an expensive
repair. Thanks for your time.

Ivor

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, Ivor.

Win2K. Yes, I remember it well! Not favorably, but well.

By "not favorably", I'm referring to installation problems, not Win2K
itself. I bought Win2K on the day it went on sale in February 2000. I was
running all SCSI hard drives at the time on an Adaptec adapter card. I
became VERY familiar with STOP 0x7B INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE! :>( And I
just about learned the boilerplate language on that BSOD by heart. And I
learned that all the pointy-fingers there were pointing in wrong directions.

Check for viruses on your computer.

It had NOTHING to do with viruses or other malware.

Remove any newly installed hard drives or hard drive controllers.
Check your hard drive to make sure it is properly configured and
terminated.
Run chkdsk /f to check for hard drive corruption, and then restart your
computer.

My problem had NOTHING to do with the hard drives, cabling or the
adapter/drivers for them.

I ran chkdsk /f and everything was fine.

Nope! My drives were fine.

And I think the misleading BSOD language has not changed since I saw it so
often in 2000. :>(

In sorting out some 10-year-old messages carried forward from OE to WLM, I
ran across many from that era that brought back these unpleasant memories.
Here's the text from just one of the posts that I made at that time
(6/19/2000):

"Many of us have had the Stop 7B, Jon. For some of us - including me - the
problem was not with the boot device at all, but an IRQ conflict! In my
case, removing my Sound Blaster PCI card let W2K Pro Setup run to
completion. Then, when I put the card back, I got Stop 7B again. After
shuffling cards in various PCI slots I was finally able to get a combination
that works - except I still can't watch DVD movies. ;>( "

With your laptop and no hardware changes, Ivor, this might not be exactly
your problem. I've never had a laptop and haven't bought a store-built
computer since about 1989. I just buy the motherboard/CPU, etc., and
assemble them myself. But I fought the "boot device" symptom for 7 weeks
before a MSFT employee hinted that it might be an IRQ problem. Once I
stopped focusing on the drive, my problem was identified almost immediately
and solved in a few days. In my home-built rig, it took a lot of shuffling
cards into different slots; I don't know how to deal with this in a laptop.

Bought a replacement hard drive and tried it with three different
operating systems, each time I got the same result.

One other factor: It MIGHT be the hard drive, after all. My original STOP
0x7B errors were with installing Win2K on my SCSI hard drives, as I said. A
few years later, I got my first SATA HDD (and have now migrated to all SATA,
no more SCSI) and then the 7B error appeared again because the SATA drivers
were not included on the original WinXP CD-ROM. Does your original Win2K
CD-ROM have built-in drivers for your new drive?

When the 7B problem really WAS with the hard drives, it was because I needed
to furnish drivers for my HDD during the Windows Setup - often referred to
as the "F6 floppy-disk shuffle" - and many other users have run into this,
too, when installing Windows onto an HDD using an interface newer than the
Windows installation disk. In brief: First, get the proper drivers from
the HDD maker and have them ready on a floppy disk! Then boot from the CD
and start Setup; very early in the process, when invited by a text line on
the bottom of the screen, press <F6>, then wait while it seems to have no
effect and all those files keep loading; it will eventually halt with
instructions on how to load those drivers from that floppy - then Setup will
run to completion. (I haven't had to deal with a computer with no floppy
disk drive; I don't know what to do in that case because most Setup files
can't get them from USB or CD drives.)

Sorry for the rambling post, Ivor, and maybe none of this applies in your
case. My GUESS that Win7's DVD-ROM will have all the drivers and other
support files that you will need and that Win7 will install cleanly with no
problems.

Please post back and let us know what you learn about this.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
Windows Live Mail 2009 (14.0.8089.0726) in Win7 Ultimate x64

 

[DL]

If you are reinstalling winxp you may need to use the F6 option to install
sata controler frivers from floppy, or you may need to amend your bios
settings, see hp site for restore instructions on your specific laptop