Windows has detected a problem and is shutting down . . .

[Seeker47]

. . . to protect the computer. With Blue Screen briefly shown, the ever-popular memory dump, and an automatic reset. What are the likely or possible causes of this ? (List, please.)

Fortunately, it has not been happening that often or regularly. In the most recent example, the only open & running program was a game of FreeCell. (Ha -- this is probably going to hurt my winning %, which was hovering around 80%. But I was about to lose that game anyway. ) At least it hasn't happened while I was encoding video . . . .

A boot-time scan with Avast-5 was run just an hour prior to this, and came up clean.
I'll run a Spybot check next.

Athlon X2 5600+ with 4GB Ram, XP SP3 that is up to date on MS fixes.

[jagabo]

In no particular order:

1) software problem
2) hardware problem

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315263

[hech54]

http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/blue_screen_view.html

[jman98]

I've had this happen when disk drives were beginning to go bad for me.

[fritzi93]

Or an SSD drive. The OCZ forums are full of BSOD threads, two common denominators being old iffy firmware and incorrect setup/usage of the SSD. (Fingers crossed, I have two and no problems..yet).

Didn't you just build a new computer?

Not to be a wise guy, but supposedly all Free Cell games are theoretically winnable.

[El Heggunte]

To me, that happened only once, and it was because of a wicked Epson printer driver

( stupid installer required )

[redwudz]

Is your system set for automatic recovery? If so uncheck that option and take a closer look at the blue screen which will stay on till your reboot. There is often a reference to what caused it. To disable automatic recovery, go to your 'Control panel>System>Advanced system settings>Startup and Recovery' and uncheck the 'Automatically restart' box. This BSOD may also tell you if it's a hardware or software error.

And if no help there, open up the PC and reseat all cards and connectors. Then pull out one of your RAM modules and try it again with one, then switch to the other module. Bad RAM can cause all sorts of problems, including BSODs.

[Seeker47]

@jman98,

This is a brand new WD Caviar Blue HDD.

Didn't you just build a new computer?

No, not me. You might possibly be thinking of a power supply I replaced recently . . . but that wasn't on this particular computer.

Not to be a wise guy, but supposedly all Free Cell games are theoretically winnable.

I think it may be more correct to think of them as a puzzle, where there is one (or maybe a couple) correct paths to take for the solution (all involving those moves you're allowed to make per the rules), but if you take a wrong turn you're screwed. It's almost like you can see "checkmate in three" looming up ahead.

Redwudz,

Thanks for that tip. I'll look into this automatic recovery setting.

[ranchhand]

If you boot into Safe Mode and run the computer for a while and get no blue screens, that would indicate that something that loads on normal boot (usually a driver conflict) is causing it. If you BSOD even in Safe Mode, its almost guaranteed that a piece of hardware is failing. Try to remember when this first happened; had you recently installed a new software, changed some hardware, etc.? It wouldn't hurt to run Malwarebytes and Combofix just to make sure you didn't pick up a virus.

[jman98]

@jman98,

This is a brand new WD Caviar Blue HDD.

Brand new parts CAN be bad. But my suggestion was simply to offer you that a possibility, not to suggest that it was with absolute certainty that a bad disk drive was your problem.

[magillagorilla]

Instead of guessing, why don't you read the dumps? They might actually tell you what failed just prior to the crash. What operating system are you running? What was the last thing you installed, hardware or software, before the problem started? Have you run a memory check?

[plundstr20]

I have in fact seen several (10-15 in the last 6 months) WD Caviar Blues go bad only weeks after they were purchased... all of them started causing bsods and eventually windows refused to start at all.

[Seeker47]

Instead of guessing, why don't you read the dumps? They might actually tell you what failed just prior to the crash. What operating system are you running? What was the last thing you installed, hardware or software, before the problem started? Have you run a memory check?

I've been out of town, and still won't have a chance to look much further into this until some time after the holiday. But I do have BlueScreenView now, and fired it up briefly to do a quick check of two memory dumps that I saved. What it is showing is

DRIVER_IRQl_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

with these two items highlighted

ntkrnlpa.exe
scsiport.sys

The OS is XP Pro SP3, which is pretty much up to date on hotfixes. (I have not installed a couple items like NetFramework 4.)

I will run a memory check later when I get a chance, but I would bet you that there is nothing wrong with the memory or the HDD: the failures are too infrequent (and possibly random) for those to be implicated, IMO.

No new hardware has been installed recently. With one of the two incidents for which I saved the memory dump, the last change very shortly before the BSOD was a regular update to the NoScript add-on in FireFox. (And that may be another coincidence or red herring, as well.)

[jagabo]

Memory errors can be very infrequent. I'd run a memory test overnight, at least. But the error occurring in scsiport.sys implies a drive related error. Maybe a bad driver, cable, controller, or drive electronics.

[TBoneit]

Or an SSD drive. The OCZ forums are full of BSOD threads, two common denominators being old iffy firmware and incorrect setup/usage of the SSD. (Fingers crossed, I have two and no problems..yet).

Didn't you just build a new computer?

Not to be a wise guy, but supposedly all Free Cell games are theoretically winnable.

It isn't SSDs themselves it is the Sandforce controller and it's firmware. I have 4 Intel SSds in use, Knock wood, No Blue screens or problems excluding the Virus my brother caught.

Supposedly the latest firmware has fixed most of those issues. How could they release a drive that has problems in something as popular as Dell alptops?

@jman98,

This is a brand new WD Caviar Blue HDD.

Brand new parts CAN be bad. But my suggestion was simply to offer you that a possibility, not to suggest that it was with absolute certainty that a bad disk drive was your problem.

Agreed
I just did a HP rackmount server today amd one of the three Hard drives is bad. Brand new server grade drive and no good.

New does not always equal good.

[Bjs]

Bluescreenview ... a handy utility from nirsoft ... thou pay more attention to the list of files in the upper pane which request access via

ntkrnlpa.exe
scsiport.sys

I'd look more closely at what files are linked to scsiport.sys ... it can also relate to a poor quality data cable connected to a drive and or a power supply which isnt coping.

[Seeker47]

Well, it happened again this morning -- with only a FreeCell game running again. (I use that to help clear out the mental cobwebs, when I first power up in the morning.) But it probably has nothing to do with FreeCell . . . . At least it has not happened while I was running some long process overnight, or during various 2.5hr. video rendering jobs, or with my routine multi-tasking of 5 or 6 programs. The multi-tasking would be like FireFox + standard business app.s running during the day: when I'm doing video stuff -- other than say playback in VLC -- that gets sole use of the cpu. My point is that there have been numerous, better opportunities for this BSOD to happen, when it did not.

The last time was a month ago. In this pattern, I could live with this problem occurring once a month . . . though I would like to figure out the cause at some point. I now have a current version of Memtest86, and will run that soon. It probably won't be the memory, though.

I've got pages of Google hits to sift through, when I get the chance, but at first glance I'm leaning towards this post by "Proteus."

http://forums.storagereview.com/index.php/topic/4416-scsiportsys-bsod-in-xp/

Thanks to the system setting change redwudz suggested, I now have the complete BSOD:

DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

STOP: 0x000000D1 (0x000000014, 0x00000006, 0x00000000, 0xB7ECF7B8)

Scsiport.Sys - Address B7ECF7B8 base at B7ECE000, Datestamp 4802539d

Bluescreenview ... a handy utility from nirsoft ... thou pay more attention to the list of files in the upper pane which request access via

ntkrnlpa.exe
scsiport.sys

I'd look more closely at what files are linked to scsiport.sys ... it can also relate to a poor quality data cable connected to a drive and or a power supply which isnt coping.

Assuming this even does relate to Scsiport.Sys, how do you backtrace what may be using that driver ? I need to become more familiar with the use of Bluescreenview . . . .

[edDV]

When I get a blue screen it usually means a cooling problem. Usually a thorough cleaning of CPU and GPU fans gets it back. I usually re-seat the RAM during the cleaning.

[jman98]

I've got pages of Google hits to sift through, when I get the chance, but at first glance I'm leaning towards this post by "Proteus."

http://forums.storagereview.com/index.php/topic/4416-scsiportsys-bsod-in-xp/

Do you even have SCSI devices in your PC? Even given your PC's age that is hugely unlikely. If you don't know for a fact that you have them then you don't. I think this is yet another misleading Windows error message.

[jagabo]

IDE and SATA drive use the mini scsiport driver.

[Seeker47]

I've got pages of Google hits to sift through, when I get the chance, but at first glance I'm leaning towards this post by "Proteus."

http://forums.storagereview.com/index.php/topic/4416-scsiportsys-bsod-in-xp/

Do you even have SCSI devices in your PC? Even given your PC's age that is hugely unlikely. If you don't know for a fact that you have them then you don't. I think this is yet another misleading Windows error message.

That's what Proteus was apparently saying in the thread I cited.

I have a MS KB that I just bookmarked that mentions a Windows defect, in some similar cases. And another message suggested that if it was an occasional driver timing issue (which might tie in with the BSOD happening shortly after boot-up, before there has been much time for heat to build up), this should be reflected in the Event Logs. Nothing like that however, although I do see one remaining piece of a bluetooth app. that was uninstalled a long time ago. That keeps turning up in the logs, but I don't see it having any relevance here. It does not want to go gracefully though, so I may have to go into Safe Mode to zap those Registry keys.

If I read through enough of these tech forum threads, I will probably stumble across the answer.