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Hi all! Thanks in advance for help. I'm relatively newb at tech support.
My wife's computer is having issues. It will blue screen shortly after booting normally. The error given is variable. I've tried doing a system restore to a previous iteration, no dice. I can get it to be stable in safe mode, but I can't seem to wipe the hard drive. I also get a blue screen error when I try reinstalling Windows. There is a new 100mb partition that I didn't create, which makes me think maybe it's a virus?
A little googling has suggested that booting with an XP cd, formatting, then stopping the install and booting from a Win7 cd might do the trick, but I cannot for the life of me find my XP cd. Are there any downloadable boot cd's that might let me format the drive, or do I need to put on my eyepatch and go find a copy of XP?
I opened the computer up and made sure everything was attached right, so I don't think it's hardware, but I really have no idea what the issue could be at this point, hence me resolving to format the hard drive.
Help!
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Having blue screen error while trying to install windows is a clear sign that something is wrong with your pc. Anyway, you might try Hiren boot cd if you want to erase your disk/partition tables (that boot cd includes a lot of diagnostic tools btw).
PS: that 100Mb partition might be the windows system reserved partition (in case you have win7)
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@mahnini The code varies. It is never the same one. I'll try to capture one though. Thanks. @HomeWorld Thanks, I'll try that out.
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Hiya!
One issue I have had in the past with my PC is the RAM, if a stick fails or does something other than normal it blue screens quite a bit.
You could try removing 1 stick of RAM at a time (if you have two in the computer) and seeing if that improves the situation.
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Also if you are thinking it's RAM, you may want to consider running memtest on each stick individually.
Anecdotally, the only times my Win XP installs ever blue screened were when my RAM was dying (twice) and when my GPU decided to revolt against mankind (once). Error codes definitely help figure out what the problem is.
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If the bluescreens really are random, a memory failure is quite possible. Run memtest86 overnight.
You don't need to capture a bluescreen. You can just run a program called BlueScreenView to see the old ones. Should work fine in safe mode.
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On April 02 2012 06:55 jaj22 wrote: If the bluescreens really are random, a memory failure is quite possible. Run memtest86 overnight.
You don't need to capture a bluescreen. You can just run a program called BlueScreenView to see the old ones. Should work fine in safe mode.
I've been using Hiren's boot CD.
So I did a memtest86 run, I get tons of errors. I tried to wipe the hard drive using DBAN, failed. Tried the seagate HD tool, didn't detect a HD. HD still shows up in the bios, however.
This seems to indicate that it's a bad HD? Do you guys concur? I tried swapping out ram sticks, and that did nothing. I'm gonna try to find my old tower and scavenge an old HD to test.
Thanks for your help guys!
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No, memtest86 has nothing to do with the hard drive. The fault is most likely RAM or motherboard.
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I also have a problem with my pc. Im getting blue screen or most of the time it just freezes. It mostly happends when im playing a game.. for example Starcraft2. I already reinstalled windows . So it should be something with the RAM or Motherboard right?
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i remember having the same issue a while back . you should try opening the case , pulling out the RAM , wipe them clean with smth and use a brush to clean the RAM slots. i know this isn't tech related but it worked for me. best of luck
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On April 02 2012 02:21 Rho_ wrote: A little googling has suggested that booting with an XP cd, formatting, then stopping the install and booting from a Win7 cd might do the trick, but I cannot for the life of me find my XP cd. Are there any downloadable boot cd's that might let me format the drive, or do I need to put on my eyepatch and go find a copy of XP?
Ummm why would you need the XP CD to format the drive? If you have the Windows 7 DVD that would work just as well....
In any case to get the BSOD error code, in Windows, right click on My Computer and select Management. In the computer management window go to Event Viewer on the left menu then select System Events. Scroll down and find any red items, these are system errors and the text they contain explain what the issue is.
Based on the errors you ran into with Memtest it sounds like a good bet that there may be a bad memory sector on one of the dimms, but then you may have caused this when you were messing around inside the case. Dimms don't go bad on their own very often. Either way the system errors should explain what was originally causing the issue.
And if you can't find the Windows 7 DVD or license key, honestly go buy a new one copy. Even with a validation hack you have to be constantly checking to avoid certain Windows updates that would fix the loopholes that hacks use and can't update certain things. You also don't have access to any Windows support. If the system isn't 64bit (or you aren't looking for high performance in software applications) a copy of 32bit home basic is like $100.
On April 16 2012 20:38 Splunge wrote:I also have a problem with my pc. Im getting blue screen or most of the time it just freezes. It mostly happends when im playing a game.. for example Starcraft2. I already reinstalled windows . So it should be something with the RAM or Motherboard right?
Could be, or it could be a driver issue. Open a thread with all the information including the BSOD code and the system specs.
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