VERY Critical XP Professional SP3 Problem

[ajg308]

Take the new hard drive out ...

I can already access the hard drive from the other original hard drive (the one that contains the operating system that mysteriously fixed itself!). I shouldn't need to to take it out as you describe, I would think. I've done chkdsk /r from the cruelly-named "recovery console". I can try a chkdsk /f from this system. (/f isn't available on the RC.)

I already have norton ghost for backup.

AVG lets viruses through. I'll never trust it.

I don't have a backup of this particular system before it went down. And I don't know how to replace a "registry hive" (?).

Here is a good how to article from Microsoft. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545

It could be bad hardware also, graphics card, sound, or even the motherboard. When i deal with these issues it is almost always related to the registry being corrupted by some type of malware.

There is no antivirus that will stop everything without help from the user. I see computers in my store every day that have infections, most have some sort of AV installed, but they all let viruses in if the user is careless.

[wgnoyes]

Bill, I had a problem like this once. I replaced the motherboard, which intermittently was going out, and never had another issue. It's now cheaper to buy a new unit (complete tower) from Tiger Direct and transfer all your needed documents than all the headache of replacing the motherboard. The one I bought for the shop here is a 3.6 gig Pentium4 Hyperspeed with 2 gigs of ram and a 500 gig hard disk. It cost me under $400. My high performance mother boards were costing me close to that.

Yeah, we keep buying new desktops for the office and as I set them up, I just keep thinking these are nice. My fear is if I buy something new and this hassle was caused by something completly illiterate that I'm doing and don't know about, how do I know it's not going to happen to the new system.

[wgnoyes]

Here is a good how to article from Microsoft. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545

Damn, that's a hell of a procedure. That'll take awhile, but so will rebuilding from nothing. I'll let you know. Bn

[wgnoyes]

Since you sound fairly tech savvy and most of what others have suggested, and you have tried, is not working try this.

Do you have another PC that has the same chipset? If you do, yank the drives and drop them in the other system by themselves using known good cables. If it boots, then it is the drive controller on the old board or a memory issue more than likely.

Another way to test the same thing is to get an external drive controller and do the same thing on the system you have after disabling the onboard controllers in the BIOS.

You might also check and see if there is an onboard sound AIC chip that somehow got enabled in the BIOS and is causing a conflict.

Since it will boot off of the other "old drive" one of the questions I have that was not quite clear is if the "old drive" has also had the sound and video driver update or not?

As to one last gasp as well. have you taken the drives out of the current box and scanned them with a good, up to date anti-virus as well as some spyware removal tools like Spybot, Malwarebytes, and AdAware? As someone else said as well if there are multiple anti-virus programs on the system, Norton does not play well with others at all as it puts Hooks into the very low level "kernel" of the operating system. On the outside chance, some of the errors you are describing could be caused by a root-kit or some really nasty spyware.

More info and from my understanding:

Generally the AGP440 driver is used for backwards comparability with the older 440BX chipsets so you should not hurt anything at all by not running it when you use the F8 and step by step loading. You should also be able to try running without MUP.sys as long as you are not trying to use the network. Many times crashes that look like they are from MUP.sys are not since it is usually the last file loaded before windows starts. ( http://www.aitechsolutions.net/mupdotsysXPhang.html )

For some advice on drivers "suggested" to be updated from Microsoft.

I generally try to never use the default sound blaster or Video card drivers that they suggest and always go to the manufacturer. The reason for this is past history in running some computer shops where those default drivers caused serious OS stability issues very similar to what you describe. The drivers for both of those that Microsoft puts on their site just contain the default drivers that enable the *minimum* functionality without all of the other features and most importantly, proper error handling. For sound card manufacturers other than Sound blaster or ones that are AIC chips then the default Microsoft ones generally work well.

Hope this helps!

It's somewhat surprising, but most of the bios setting you all are suggesting I set or reset don't exist on this system (Dell XPS Gen 2, from 2005), that is, they're just not available to tweak. I've got things that I can set to go between SATA and IDE hard drives, and if SATA, standard primary/secondary or RAID. There's a setting to go between the AGP slot and built-in graphics, and something to step down the processor for older programs, but none of the other things everyone says to try are there at all.

[Classic_jon]

Since you sound fairly tech savvy and most of what others have suggested, and you have tried, is not working try this.

Do you have another PC that has the same chipset? If you do, yank the drives and drop them in the other system by themselves using known good cables. If it boots, then it is the drive controller on the old board or a memory issue more than likely.

Another way to test the same thing is to get an external drive controller and do the same thing on the system you have after disabling the onboard controllers in the BIOS.

You might also check and see if there is an onboard sound AIC chip that somehow got enabled in the BIOS and is causing a conflict.

Hope this helps!

It's somewhat surprising, but most of the bios setting you all are suggesting I set or reset don't exist on this system (Dell XPS Gen 2, from 2005), that is, they're just not available to tweak. I've got things that I can set to go between SATA and IDE hard drives, and if SATA, standard primary/secondary or RAID. There's a setting to go between the AGP slot and built-in graphics, and something to step down the processor for older programs, but none of the other things everyone says to try are there at all.

Ah, the Dell modified/proprietary BIOS strikes again... Yeah, you may be out of luck on that part of bug hunting then....

If you are not able to disable those things in the BIOS then about your only option is to find a similar box and drop the drives into it and see what happens.

Have you by chance checked Dell's site to see if there is an updated BIOS revision out there for the box? I have been continually amazed at what a BIOS flash can do to a systems stability. Always remember that you can make a system a brick with a BIOS flash no matter how small the chance of it happening these days. That being said, I have flashed probably over 100 and only had one "brick" on me and that board was having issues to begin with so... We ended up RMAing that board.

[wgnoyes]

I did... the BIOS level listed on their support center pre-dated the date I got the machine.

I gave up. I made use of my technet subscription and I'm testing (wink-wink nudge-nudge say-no-more!) Win7 Ultimate. It's running just fine for now (whatever "fine" is for this stuff) off the newer larger hard drive. I gotta say; I've never seen a windows install go faster or take up less space than this one! Now to start installing stuff and restoring data.

I REALLY hate the bright pastel default windows logo wallpaper; that's simply GOT to go! All this other bubble-gum stuff hits my gag factor, too.

Maybe I can now try to get a small sense of humor about this whole disaster, but it'll take some doing.

[Classic_jon]

I did... the BIOS level listed on their support center pre-dated the date I got the machine.

I gave up. I made use of my technet subscription and I'm testing (wink-wink nudge-nudge say-no-more!) Win7 Ultimate. It's running just fine for now (whatever "fine" is for this stuff) off the newer larger hard drive. I gotta say; I've never seen a windows install go faster or take up less space than this one! Now to start installing stuff and restoring data.

I REALLY hate the bright pastel default windows logo wallpaper; that's simply GOT to go! All this other bubble-gum stuff hits my gag factor, too.

Maybe I can now try to get a small sense of humor about this whole disaster, but it'll take some doing.

If it works fine with Win 7 and all of the other installs were from the ghost image you were talking about before I would bet that what ajg308 said about a registry hive being corrupt for some reason is probably the culprit.

On anti-virus software:

I generally run an antivirus and spybot search and destroys teatimer at the same time. Between the two (unless I am stupid and say yes to downloading some random program ) they usually catch most everything.

Have you taken a look at F-secure antivirus. It is a very good product overall and integrates a good heuristic AV, the adaware spyware engine, and a rootkit detector called blacklight. They are big in Europe & Asia and are just starting to make inroads here in the states. I have been using their stuff for a couple of years now off and on.

[kgunz11]

Wow Bill, a Dell from 2005 still running? Be glad you made it this far. You are in the perfect position to upgrade too. As mentioned before, keep your extra hard drive and use it as an external in a cradle. That way it goes with you. On your new system, put nothing but your OS on the hard disk in the tower. Send everything else to your F: drive (the external hard disk). That way, you go work a match somewhere and need a prog or doc off your HD, you have it there with you. Plug the cradle in and go to work. Most all virus' target the C: drive which is where Windows is by default. Format your new system with a partition and set the BIOS to boot from the partition D: which is where you now have your OS. Leave about 25 gigs in the C: partition for junk. You can even put all your AV stuff on the C: drive as it might not be compatible with other systems you plug your EHD into. I would not advise running a heuristic scanner on ANY machine with Norton or McAfee installed. That can cause crashes of its own. I use to do lots of playing around on the internet and have a friend in Ireland that spent a lot of time teaching me everything he knows. We use to do a lot of crazy stuff. He's discovered a few virus' and I have more than one named after me. He spent 3 months over here with me so when Susan and I got married we honeymooned in Ireland and spent some time with him and his new family. Yes, believe it or not, I DO have friends.

[kgunz11]

I did... the BIOS level listed on their support center pre-dated the date I got the machine.

I gave up. I made use of my technet subscription and I'm testing (wink-wink nudge-nudge say-no-more!) Win7 Ultimate. It's running just fine for now (whatever "fine" is for this stuff) off the newer larger hard drive. I gotta say; I've never seen a windows install go faster or take up less space than this one! Now to start installing stuff and restoring data.

I REALLY hate the bright pastel default windows logo wallpaper; that's simply GOT to go! All this other bubble-gum stuff hits my gag factor, too.

Maybe I can now try to get a small sense of humor about this whole disaster, but it'll take some doing.

If it works fine with Win 7 and all of the other installs were from the ghost image you were talking about before I would bet that what ajg308 said about a registry hive being corrupt for some reason is probably the culprit.

On anti-virus software:

I generally run an antivirus and spybot search and destroys teatimer at the same time. Between the two (unless I am stupid and say yes to downloading some random program ) they usually catch most everything.

Have you taken a look at F-secure antivirus. It is a very good product overall and integrates a good heuristic AV, the adaware spyware engine, and a rootkit detector called blacklight. They are big in Europe & Asia and are just starting to make inroads here in the states. I have been using their stuff for a couple of years now off and on.

F-Secure use to be the #1 ranked AV in the world, it too uses Kaspersky's heuristic scanner. It's a little more popular than Kasper because it was an English version that had very simple user interfaces. The early versions of Kasper were not very friendly, but it was absolutely impossible to get a virus while it was operating.

The new trend in virus development involves using an inert trojan to skip by most virus scanners. This prog in itself is harmless UNTIL you open another program with a dynamic link library that activate the executable and will connect it to the internet and then the host server. They typically use the DLL's from very common programs like yahoo.dll, Kazaa.dll, Limewire.dll, and the list goes on. For example, you have the harmless file on your computer that got there from visiting some website (yes, you can DL stuff to your computer and never know it) but the first time you log into Yahoo messenger, AOL messenger, MSN messenger, that harmless file is now connected to the internet. Your other AV software did not detect it because in itself it is nothing. That is the beauty of the heuristic scanner, it cross references every file on your computer to insure that no combination can become malicious. If you're not using AV software with a heuristic scanner, you're vulnerable and it's just a matter of time before you get infected. I have photos on my computer that I sure would not want to lose, and it's worth it to me to have protection that I can depend on. Not to mention this very computer is my work computer. While there is no financial information for any of my customers stored on this machine, I feel comfortable knowing that when I enter their credit card information into eprocessing it is completely protected from any keylogger or trojan virus.

[wgnoyes]

Wow Bill, a Dell from 2005 still running? Be glad you made it this far.

I have an Inspiron 8000 laptop from 2001 that boots just fine. (I scored the 2005 and 2006 Area Sixes on it, as well as four Nationals.) My current Inspiron E1505 dates from 2006 and it's fine. (It may get evaluated for Windows 7, too.) The owner of the company where I work had a XPS450 desktop bought in 1998 that he ran for 10 years and when we replaced it, it was still chugging along. I swapped out a Dell desktop at the office the other day that was being misused as a workgroup file server that had been running since 2003. I'm swapping out another one today that's been going since 2004. (Some of the letters are worn off the keyboard of this one!) I don't know what your experience is, but with the exception of the hideous Inspiron 5100/5150 laptops, their stuff is solid and I particularly like the small business division Optiplex 360's, which unlike the home-intended stuff, are built with isv-certified components. An Optiplex will be my next desktop, unless some new horror forces me to bite into the Apple.

Edited December 17, 2009 by wgnoyes

[Classic_jon]

If it works fine with Win 7 and all of the other installs were from the ghost image you were talking about before I would bet that what ajg308 said about a registry hive being corrupt for some reason is probably the culprit.

On anti-virus software:

I generally run an antivirus and spybot search and destroys teatimer at the same time. Between the two (unless I am stupid and say yes to downloading some random program ) they usually catch most everything.

Have you taken a look at F-secure antivirus. It is a very good product overall and integrates a good heuristic AV, the adaware spyware engine, and a rootkit detector called blacklight. They are big in Europe & Asia and are just starting to make inroads here in the states. I have been using their stuff for a couple of years now off and on.

F-Secure use to be the #1 ranked AV in the world, it too uses Kaspersky's heuristic scanner. It's a little more popular than Kasper because it was an English version that had very simple user interfaces. The early versions of Kasper were not very friendly, but it was absolutely impossible to get a virus while it was operating.

The new trend in virus development involves using an inert trojan to skip by most virus scanners. This prog in itself is harmless UNTIL you open another program with a dynamic link library that activate the executable and will connect it to the internet and then the host server. They typically use the DLL's from very common programs like yahoo.dll, Kazaa.dll, Limewire.dll, and the list goes on. For example, you have the harmless file on your computer that got there from visiting some website (yes, you can DL stuff to your computer and never know it) but the first time you log into Yahoo messenger, AOL messenger, MSN messenger, that harmless file is now connected to the internet. Your other AV software did not detect it because in itself it is nothing. That is the beauty of the heuristic scanner, it cross references every file on your computer to insure that no combination can become malicious. If you're not using AV software with a heuristic scanner, you're vulnerable and it's just a matter of time before you get infected. I have photos on my computer that I sure would not want to lose, and it's worth it to me to have protection that I can depend on. Not to mention this very computer is my work computer. While there is no financial information for any of my customers stored on this machine, I feel comfortable knowing that when I enter their credit card information into eprocessing it is completely protected from any keylogger or trojan virus.

Yep, that is why I said "unless I am stupid and say yes to downloading some random program "and sad to say, I have done that once....DOH!

I was at work and one of the people came into my office about a "funny file" they got in an e-mail. I looked at it, sucked it over to my box to send it to our AV provider ...and I doubleclicked on it out of habit when I was trying to drag it into the e-mail....

I knew what I had done and yanked the network cable out of the back of the box while I was shutting it down.... took me about 4 hours to get the thing cleaned up... and yes, I got teased about that by some of the programmers for quite a while because I am always saying "If you don't know, don't click on it"

As far as old boxes... I am running a PC I built myself at home that is a Athlon XP3200 with 2GB of ram. It cranks right along and I have yet to find something it will not run.

I am on the verge of building a new PC but I have to decide between that and a new pistol....and that is a hard decision!

[kgunz11]

Kasper wont let you open a malicious file, it scans it before opening it.

[bignickmetro]

OP: Your stop code indicates this is a hardware problem. Test your memory (memtes86+) and your hard drive (GWScan). A lot of times memory will have 1 bad spot so you can install windows, use it for a long time, and your only problem will be random intermittent blue screens and app crashes.

I am a bench technician and there is proper diagnostic procedure. Believe me, test your hardware.

If it is bad hardware replace it and reload OS. Now would be a good time to ditch XP and move to windows 7.

[Kevin G.]

OP: Your stop code indicates this is a hardware problem. Test your memory (memtes86+) and your hard drive (GWScan). A lot of times memory will have 1 bad spot so you can install windows, use it for a long time, and your only problem will be random intermittent blue screens and app crashes.

I am a bench technician and there is proper diagnostic procedure. Believe me, test your hardware.

If it is bad hardware replace it and reload OS. Now would be a good time to ditch XP and move to windows 7.

+1 You can test different software setups and get different results, which all end up failing somehow. TBH, it sounds to me like your power supply is going bad. If you know how to use a multi-meter you can find directions on how to manually jump the PS to allow testing the 3, 5, and 12 volt rails. It sounds like the 3v rail is getting weak. Running a failing PS will eventually cook whatever is on the rail that is failing. We've had 5 dell power supplies die at work.

One other option is to swap your SATA cables for new ones. I have had them go bad and cause issues at boot-up.

Evict all dust bunnies from the case.

I've learned that hardware tends to cause more issues with booting than software from building some toys.

Current computer.

[wgnoyes]

OP: Your stop code indicates this is a hardware problem. Test your memory (memtes86+) and your hard drive (GWScan). A lot of times memory will have 1 bad spot so you can install windows, use it for a long time, and your only problem will be random intermittent blue screens and app crashes.

I am a bench technician and there is proper diagnostic procedure. Believe me, test your hardware.

If it is bad hardware replace it and reload OS. Now would be a good time to ditch XP and move to windows 7.

Thanks but I already dealt with this. Click The hardware I'm running now is the same as the Dec 14th 2nd crash. The only difference now is the operating system (Win7 Ultimate). I think there were bad MS updates that killed the system. (XP System was running fine before, I applied driver updates to sound card to fix annoying static, and then the system promptly crashed hard during the "you must restart to complete this installation" phase and was unrecoverable.)

Since then I had a bad issue with Win7 forgetting about my printers; THAT's been resolved. (Cindy had tried to print something weird.)

But I'm worn down, and it takes a lot to wear down an IBM mainframe MVS systems programmer. It's a coin-toss whether my next machine will have an apple embossed into the side of it.

And free-to-download penguin operating systems need not apply.

[wgnoyes]

Damn! Water-cooled machines! (Okay, I know it's not water.) Of course, I also cringed way back when I first heard about water-cooled mainframes, but got used to it. (You could top one off with a jug a Crystal Springs!)

[wgnoyes]

...

But I'm worn down, and it takes a lot to wear down an IBM mainframe MVS systems programmer. It's a coin-toss whether my next machine will have an apple embossed into the side of it.

No longer a coin-toss. I have a 2011 MacBook Pro 13.3 i7 sitting here next to me. The same Dell Win7 desktop as described above will be replaced with a 2011 iMac 21.5.

[Kevin G.]

Damn! Water-cooled machines! (Okay, I know it's not water.) Of course, I also cringed way back when I first heard about water-cooled mainframes, but got used to it. (You could top one off with a jug a Crystal Springs!)

I don't buy the expensive non-conductive computer cooling liquid. It's just not as effective as a good old proven 50/50 mix of distilled water and ethylene glycol. A lifetime's supply costs 1.99 and it glows!