STOP 0x50 PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA

[asklucas]

Hi there,

since yesterday morning my three weeks old ThinkPad X41 refuses to
boot.

During Windows boot up screen a BSOD appears for a few seconds, then
reboots the system:

STOP 0x50
PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
ntfs.sys

So far I did not find useful information at the web about this STOP
error in combination with ntfs.sys.

I can't imagine that suddenly my brand-new hardware is defective, after
working without problems for weeks.
The IBM Rescue and Recovery partition is wiped already, of course. Now
it seems that was not too smart, however that Win PE based thing is
quite castraded and barely useful.
Unfortunately I have no USB CD-ROM drive to boot BartPE, thus I can't
make a chkdsk on the HDD.
But there is no reason the HDD or the file system is damaged anyway.

Assuming that the RAM is okay and also the HDD, what could have caused
this error and how to resolve it?

Many thanks in advance for your support!

Ciao,
Lucas.

 

[Malke]

Hi there,

since yesterday morning my three weeks old ThinkPad X41 refuses to
boot.

During Windows boot up screen a BSOD appears for a few seconds, then
reboots the system:

STOP 0x50
PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
ntfs.sys

So far I did not find useful information at the web about this STOP
error in combination with ntfs.sys.

I can't imagine that suddenly my brand-new hardware is defective,
after working without problems for weeks.
The IBM Rescue and Recovery partition is wiped already, of course. Now
it seems that was not too smart, however that Win PE based thing is
quite castraded and barely useful.
Unfortunately I have no USB CD-ROM drive to boot BartPE, thus I can't
make a chkdsk on the HDD.
But there is no reason the HDD or the file system is damaged anyway.

Assuming that the RAM is okay and also the HDD, what could have caused
this error and how to resolve it?

I don't know where you looked on the web, but you can research your Stop
Error here: http://www.aumha.org/win5/kbestop.htm

However, this does usually indicate bad hardware. The fact that your
machine is new is irrelevant. Actually, if hardware is going to fail it
does so very quickly or just goes for years. Since the laptop is
brand-new, call Lenovo tech support immediately.

Malke

 

[Will Denny]

Hi

Please try the following link to Jim Eshelman's web page - left hand column
(50)

http://aumha.org/win5/kbestop.htm

--


Will Denny
MS MVP Windows Shell/User
Please reply to the News Groups

 

[asklucas]

Dear Malke, dear Will,

thank you for your soon response!

MS KB 183169 suggests three possible resolutions:
1 - Hardware failure (memory, processor, or motherboard).
2 - Anti-virus software that is running on your computer.
3 - Drivers installed by third-party software.

ad 1) HW fault is possible, but in my experience, when there is faulty
RAM, the OS usually doesn't crash in the same moment every time, but at
different points of time, sometimes during boot, other times during
logon, other times e. g. 5 minutes after successfull boot.
Do you have experience with defective cache, maybe that causes
immediate BSOD!?

ad 2) I use Trend Micro Office Scan on various clients for about a
year, and on this notebook for 3 weeks without problems, unprobable
that this causes the fault.

ad 3) The only installed drivers are the automatically installed by the
IBM Software Update utility, and they haven't been updated for the last
three weeks either.

MS KB 894278 doesn't apply, as it has a different error message than
mine.

The only article in the web I found about the 0x50 STOP in conjunction
with ntfs.sys is:
http://www.experts-exchange.com/Operating_Systems/WinXP/Q_21411987.html
, but the proposed resolution doesn't sound motivating:
The experts-exchange.com article recommends to either check the RAM or
make a chkdsk. In the case of that article, change of RAM did not solve
the problem, but a change of the HDD. However, Hitachi Drive Test on
the not booting HDD was okay. Thus, either the HDD or the OS on the HDD
were defective.
This is no solution for me, I don't wanna reinstall my freshly
installed XP. Who tells me, whether in three weeks XP again refuses to
boot!?

Anyway, I'm going to contact IBM support now. But I'm afraid they will
only provide the standard solutions (reinstall the OS etc.), but not an
analysis or the reason of the BSOD.

Ciao,
Lucas.

 

[Plato]

STOP 0x50
PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
ntfs.sys

http://tinyurl.com/23w5h
http://aumha.org/win5/kbestop.htm

 

[jeffreyalsip]

I had the exact same problem with my T21. It turned out to be caused by
a driver update for the Intel Ethernet/Modem PCI card. The update was
suggested by Microsoft Update during a routine update check. Since they
had identified the hardware correctly, and since it WAS Microsoft
making the suggestion I went ahead and did it. The next reboot brought
the PAGE_FAULT error that you describe. To fix it, I booted up into
Safe Mode and deleted the driver upgrade...then everything worked
normally.

 

[Gary L.]

This is no solution for me, I don't wanna reinstall my freshly
installed XP. Who tells me, whether in three weeks XP again refuses to
boot!?

Anyway, I'm going to contact IBM support now. But I'm afraid they will
only provide the standard solutions (reinstall the OS etc.), but not an
analysis or the reason of the BSOD.

If you send it back to IBM they will simply re-image the disk to
restore it to the factory original. If the system boots properly after
that, they will consider it fixed and send to back to you.

If I were you, (after exhausting the potential easy fixes suggested by
others), I would re-format the disk and either restore it to the
factory original or do a clean install of XP. If XP gets corrupted
again, then there is a hardware defect and you can probably convince
IBM to do some additional trouble-shooting with the hardware. If it
works properly after the re-install, then you have proven that the
problem is software related. You then need to be careful about driver
updates and avoiding viruses, Trojans, root kits and the like.

 

[no_name]

Dear Malke, dear Will,

thank you for your soon response!

MS KB 183169 suggests three possible resolutions:

3 - Drivers installed by third-party software.

Played any Digital Rights Managed, copy protected music CDs from Sony
lately? If so, Google "Sony Rootkit"

Then check here: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=894278&sd=RMVP

 

[asklucas]

Hi there,

thank you all for your participation and sympathies!

I finally found an USB CD Drive and tried to boot from boot disks:
BartPE: same STOP during boot screen with progress bar.

Important for the analysis of the problem:
When I boot up Windows XP Professional VLP Setup CD (without SPx), I
come until the selection menu, where I can chose between Installing XP
and the Repair Console. At this point of time, NTOSKNRL.EXE and
NTFS.SYS are already loaded successfully.
1 second after I either chose "R" for Recovery Console or "ENTER" for
Installation of XP I again get the identical STOP 0x50 error.

This means the following:
o It is not a faulty driver, virus, trojan, MS Update or root kit, as
also BartPE and WinXP Setup do not work.
o It is not the loading of NTFS.SYS itself, which is causing the crash.
o In the moment, Windows uses NTFS.SYS to access the HDD, the STOP BSOD
appears.

Thus I think, that neither the cache nor the RAM are damaged, but
either the HDD or the HDD controller.
Is it possible, that the hardware is okay, but there is some bullshit
in the partition table or on the NTFS-partition, which is causing the
BSOD? If yes, where does this shit suddenly come from?

I'm right now downloading KNOPPIX 4 linux live CD. I'll see, if it
boots up and I then can access the HDD, at least safe my data.
I'll keep you informed!

Ciao,
Lucas.

 

[Gary L.]

Hi there,

thank you all for your participation and sympathies!

I finally found an USB CD Drive and tried to boot from boot disks:
BartPE: same STOP during boot screen with progress bar.

If it crashes when booting from a known good CD, then it is clearly a
hardware defect. Time to call IBM for warranty repair.

 

[asklucas]

Hello there,

somebody wrote me, that he got the same problem asking wether I have
found a resolution, so I wanna keep you updated!

1)
I booted Knoppix to use the tool ntfsclone to backup my harddrives,
before using IBM support. ntfsclone was terribly slow, it took more
than 3 hours to backup. Later a restore was not successful, don't know
why (ntfsclone: sync error).

2)
IBM/Lenovo/ThinkPad (?) support in Taiwan refused to service me
»on-site«, although I bought a ThinkPlus Service Pack (in Germany,
where I bought the ThinkPad) guaranteeing 3 years on-site service.

3)
The support took more than the promised 24 hours (one reason is,
instead of finding the error they tried to get a German Product
Recovery Environment).
They formatted the disk and installed the Chinese Product Recovery
Environment, then made several tests, including Hitachi Drive Fitness
Test, finally conluded that the additional 1024 MB RAM module was
damaged.

4)
However, right now I'm using my ThinkPad with the additional RAM module
without problems!
To my understanding, the formatting and repartitioning of the hard disk
solved the problem, but they didn't realize this and had to find a
reason for the error, thus said the additional RAM module was the
reason (because that is not covered by the Guarantee Agreement). Punish
the people/modules who can't fend!

5)
CONCLUSIONS:

5.1)
Out of any undiscovered reason, one morning »something« was on my
hard disk, preventing Windows from booting. Why? Where did it come
from? What was it (a file? wrong partition table entry?)?

5.2)
When this »something« is on the drive, Windows doesn't boot anymore,
neither from the drive, nor from any Windows boot disk (including Barts
PE, Windows PE (IBM Product Recovery), Windows Setup Disk). Linux still
boots.

5.3)
Proposal: Always keep a USB-HDD ready, which can boot from DOS and you
can use the DOS-version of Symantec Ghost Corp. Edition to backup your
HDD before reformatting it.
I tried it with Linux as I didn't have that Ghost available, but it
didn't work. I assume that, like the Linux-ntfs-driver, the
Ghost-ntfs-driver can still read the HDD, unlike ntfs.sys from MS.
But attention, as I said, I didn't test that »Ghost-way« of rescuing
the data when I had that STOP-problem, but in future I'll always do my
backup that way.



Please, if you have any comments regarding this problem or you figured
out the reason for the failure, keep this threat updated or write to my
e-mail-address!

--> If you are an employee from MS, FIND OUT WHERE THIS PROBLEM COMES
FROM!!!!

--> If you are an employee from IBM / Lenovo, TELL MY WHY I DIDN'T GET
THE ON-SITE-SERVICE I PAID FOR!!!!



Ciao,
Lucas.