D
Don Cohen
I desperately need help on the following problem which has stumped me (and
everybody else) for the last several weeks. I apologize for the length of
this post, but there's no other way to adequately document it.
System: a 2 year old Gateway 700XL running XP Home. 1 gb RAM. ATI 8500 64
mb VideoCard. 18.1" FPD 1810 LCD monitor using DVI connection. From the
very beginning I have run ZoneAlarm, NAV 2002 and then 2003 when my initial
subscription ran out, scan with NAV weekly, install all Critical Updates
when available.
The system has run virtually flawlessly since I bought it with one fairly
infrequent glitch that others with this system have experienced whose cause
has never been identified. Whether this is connected to the current more
serious problem is unknown. Sporadically, under random circumstances, the
monitor would go black for about 2 or 3 seconds, would then come back on,
with nothing else occurring. This would happen once every few months,
occasionally more frequently. I researched this on the newsgroups - people
updated drivers, replaced VideoCards, etc., but nothing seemed to
consistently work for all involved. It seemed harmless, and so I just lived
with it.
The problem now: the system would, out of nowhere, spontaneously reboot.
This first occurred Dec. 24, 2003, when my daughter (26 years old and not
doing anything more than surfing the web) was at the computer. She told me
about it, but I couldn't find anything. It didn't happen again for close to
a month, and over the past month it has become a recurring problem. It may
run a few minutes, a few hours, a few days, before the problem recurs.
I have wondered if there was a relation to the 'black-out' glitch, as it
would seemingly start the same: the monitor goes black, and then after a
second or so instead of coming back on like it did in the past, it would
reboot. Again, I don't know if this is connected or a coincidence.
Trouble-shooting so far:
I disabled the 'reboot automatically' checkbox in order to find out what was
going on. So now instead of rebooting, I received the following BSOD:
A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage
to your computer
"PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
****STOP: 0x00000050 (0xB7874E5E, 0x00000000, 0xB7874E5E, 0x00000000)
Beginning dump of physical memory
Physical memory dump complete"
1.. I researched this on the web, and found that the most likely cause of
something like this was a hardware error, with RAM, hot CPU and Power Supply
the most likely culprits.
2.. I opened the case and verified that the fan was working fine. The
computer would also do the reboot within minutes after being off all night,
seemingly making heat an unlikely cause.
3.. I downloaded memtest86.exe from the web, created a bootable CD with
it, and ran it overnight, selecting All Tests and after 6 ½ hours, and more
than 2 full passes, no errors were detected.
4.. I replaced the originial 250W Power Supply with an Antec 430W TruPower
unit. The computer ran fine for almost 48 hours, and then rebooted.
5.. I brought it to a local computer repair shop, and they couldn't
diagnose any specific hardware problem. Because we both suggested a
VideoCard issue, we put in a new ATI Radeon 9200SE 128 mb card. This time
it
ran for about an hour before it again did the same thing. This time a
slightly different 'b.s.o.d.' came up:
0x0000008E, 0xB7874E5F, 0xB6A2E728, 0x00000000 and another time:
0x0000008E, 0xB7874E60, 0xB6A2E728, 0x00000000
6.. I next went into Windows Recovery Console, and ran CHKDSK /R. It
indicated that it found and fixed some problems. It now ran fine for almost
72 hours and then the reboot again occurred.
7.. This time, I couldn't even boot back into the Recovery Console, even
when I booted from the XP Home CD. It would get to the point when I would
select the c:\winnt installation, and it would then reboot.
8.. In desperation, I brought the system to a Gateway Country Store. They
said they tested the motherboard, RAM, etc., and found no hardware problems.
They said they found and removed the Welchia worm. I was extremely doubtful
about this, given how I maintain my computer. But that's all they had to
offer. I took it home, it ran for about 30 hours, and the same crash
occurred, with the same original BSOD message (the original VideoCard had
been reinstalled, with the driver updated by Gateway when they had the
machine).
9.. I have also downloaded and run 'blastfix.exe' just in case something
had somehow got through, but it was negative.
10.. I have installed Windows Support Tools, in order to use dumpchk.exe
to look at the minidump files created when these events occurred, but I was
not able to identify anything useful in these files as far as suggesting the
source of this problem.
11.. These reboots have occurred from within a normal boot to Windows,
from within Safe Mode, and even on a few occasions when just trying to boot
into Windows Recovery Console when booting from the XP CD.
Gateway says the next step is to reformat the hard drive. I am willing and
able to do this, but I'm just not convinced this is a software issue,
especially when considering point # 11 above. But I am also out of ideas on
what to do next.
One final detail: the system came with a 120 GB Hard Drive. I used
Partition Magic 8.0 to shrink the OS/Applications to an 11 gb partition, and
have the rest for Data Files (c:\ and h:\ respectively). This was done
within the first few months of buying the computer. I use DriveImage 2002
every few months to image the c:\ drive, and have ones from December 7, 2003
and September 13, 2003 available. I have a second hard drive installed as
well (d:\) where these files are located. I can restore one of these, but
again I am not convinced this is a software issue.
I suspect, but don't know, that this is a sporadic hardware issue -
motherboard, CPU, RAM, I just don't know.
So there it is. I have a computer that is essential useless as I never know
if it will run 5 minutes, 5 hours or 5 days before it crashes. Please let
me know if you have any idea of where the problem is, or what I can do next
to pinpoint and fix it.
Thanks for wading through all of this.
Hopefully,
everybody else) for the last several weeks. I apologize for the length of
this post, but there's no other way to adequately document it.
System: a 2 year old Gateway 700XL running XP Home. 1 gb RAM. ATI 8500 64
mb VideoCard. 18.1" FPD 1810 LCD monitor using DVI connection. From the
very beginning I have run ZoneAlarm, NAV 2002 and then 2003 when my initial
subscription ran out, scan with NAV weekly, install all Critical Updates
when available.
The system has run virtually flawlessly since I bought it with one fairly
infrequent glitch that others with this system have experienced whose cause
has never been identified. Whether this is connected to the current more
serious problem is unknown. Sporadically, under random circumstances, the
monitor would go black for about 2 or 3 seconds, would then come back on,
with nothing else occurring. This would happen once every few months,
occasionally more frequently. I researched this on the newsgroups - people
updated drivers, replaced VideoCards, etc., but nothing seemed to
consistently work for all involved. It seemed harmless, and so I just lived
with it.
The problem now: the system would, out of nowhere, spontaneously reboot.
This first occurred Dec. 24, 2003, when my daughter (26 years old and not
doing anything more than surfing the web) was at the computer. She told me
about it, but I couldn't find anything. It didn't happen again for close to
a month, and over the past month it has become a recurring problem. It may
run a few minutes, a few hours, a few days, before the problem recurs.
I have wondered if there was a relation to the 'black-out' glitch, as it
would seemingly start the same: the monitor goes black, and then after a
second or so instead of coming back on like it did in the past, it would
reboot. Again, I don't know if this is connected or a coincidence.
Trouble-shooting so far:
I disabled the 'reboot automatically' checkbox in order to find out what was
going on. So now instead of rebooting, I received the following BSOD:
A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage
to your computer
"PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
****STOP: 0x00000050 (0xB7874E5E, 0x00000000, 0xB7874E5E, 0x00000000)
Beginning dump of physical memory
Physical memory dump complete"
1.. I researched this on the web, and found that the most likely cause of
something like this was a hardware error, with RAM, hot CPU and Power Supply
the most likely culprits.
2.. I opened the case and verified that the fan was working fine. The
computer would also do the reboot within minutes after being off all night,
seemingly making heat an unlikely cause.
3.. I downloaded memtest86.exe from the web, created a bootable CD with
it, and ran it overnight, selecting All Tests and after 6 ½ hours, and more
than 2 full passes, no errors were detected.
4.. I replaced the originial 250W Power Supply with an Antec 430W TruPower
unit. The computer ran fine for almost 48 hours, and then rebooted.
5.. I brought it to a local computer repair shop, and they couldn't
diagnose any specific hardware problem. Because we both suggested a
VideoCard issue, we put in a new ATI Radeon 9200SE 128 mb card. This time
it
ran for about an hour before it again did the same thing. This time a
slightly different 'b.s.o.d.' came up:
0x0000008E, 0xB7874E5F, 0xB6A2E728, 0x00000000 and another time:
0x0000008E, 0xB7874E60, 0xB6A2E728, 0x00000000
6.. I next went into Windows Recovery Console, and ran CHKDSK /R. It
indicated that it found and fixed some problems. It now ran fine for almost
72 hours and then the reboot again occurred.
7.. This time, I couldn't even boot back into the Recovery Console, even
when I booted from the XP Home CD. It would get to the point when I would
select the c:\winnt installation, and it would then reboot.
8.. In desperation, I brought the system to a Gateway Country Store. They
said they tested the motherboard, RAM, etc., and found no hardware problems.
They said they found and removed the Welchia worm. I was extremely doubtful
about this, given how I maintain my computer. But that's all they had to
offer. I took it home, it ran for about 30 hours, and the same crash
occurred, with the same original BSOD message (the original VideoCard had
been reinstalled, with the driver updated by Gateway when they had the
machine).
9.. I have also downloaded and run 'blastfix.exe' just in case something
had somehow got through, but it was negative.
10.. I have installed Windows Support Tools, in order to use dumpchk.exe
to look at the minidump files created when these events occurred, but I was
not able to identify anything useful in these files as far as suggesting the
source of this problem.
11.. These reboots have occurred from within a normal boot to Windows,
from within Safe Mode, and even on a few occasions when just trying to boot
into Windows Recovery Console when booting from the XP CD.
Gateway says the next step is to reformat the hard drive. I am willing and
able to do this, but I'm just not convinced this is a software issue,
especially when considering point # 11 above. But I am also out of ideas on
what to do next.
One final detail: the system came with a 120 GB Hard Drive. I used
Partition Magic 8.0 to shrink the OS/Applications to an 11 gb partition, and
have the rest for Data Files (c:\ and h:\ respectively). This was done
within the first few months of buying the computer. I use DriveImage 2002
every few months to image the c:\ drive, and have ones from December 7, 2003
and September 13, 2003 available. I have a second hard drive installed as
well (d:\) where these files are located. I can restore one of these, but
again I am not convinced this is a software issue.
I suspect, but don't know, that this is a sporadic hardware issue -
motherboard, CPU, RAM, I just don't know.
So there it is. I have a computer that is essential useless as I never know
if it will run 5 minutes, 5 hours or 5 days before it crashes. Please let
me know if you have any idea of where the problem is, or what I can do next
to pinpoint and fix it.
Thanks for wading through all of this.
Hopefully,