Computer Crashed. Why?
- Thread starter Keebler Elf
- Start date
McAfee constantly updates. I haven't done anything else manually. Windows might be automatically updating in the background, but I haven't seen any indication of that.
It's working again.
Looking at the Event Viewer, there were two Application errors this morning (one listed as category 100 and event 1000, and the second as category -- and event 1000). There was another McLogEvent 5022 error and also a MpfService event 2 error.
I've now uninstalled McAfee and rebooted and it's running fine. I'm going to run for a bit to see if it crashes (I doubt it will; it never seems to crash once Windows has fully loaded, it's only during the initial startup in the morning). If it doesn't crash, I'm going to reinstall McAfee fresh, reboot, and see if that has an effect.
It's working again.
Looking at the Event Viewer, there were two Application errors this morning (one listed as category 100 and event 1000, and the second as category -- and event 1000). There was another McLogEvent 5022 error and also a MpfService event 2 error.
I've now uninstalled McAfee and rebooted and it's running fine. I'm going to run for a bit to see if it crashes (I doubt it will; it never seems to crash once Windows has fully loaded, it's only during the initial startup in the morning). If it doesn't crash, I'm going to reinstall McAfee fresh, reboot, and see if that has an effect.
download the western digital drive test program to see if you have bad sectors on the drive, also maybe run memtest, free download but takes a while run.What kind of video card, drivers for these have been know to cause issues but if you havent updated drivers
cant see this being an issue. Just tryn' to help.
cant see this being an issue. Just tryn' to help.
Well, I unplugged everything but the primary drive and tried Repairing Windows. Seemed to work. I got to my desktop and it appeared as it did before. So I turned the system off, plugged everything back in (hard drives, adaptor cards, printer, etc.), turned the system on, and it crashed. 
So I turned off, unplugged everything but the primary drive, turned on, and it works again. So it looks like there's possibly a problem with the adaptor cards, the printer, or one of the hard drives.
McAfee is long gone so that's not the problem.
I think I've run out of troubleshooting juice so I'm just going to take it into the shop and let them figure out WTF is wrong.
p.s. in order to update drivers, do I need the hardware plugged in?
So I turned off, unplugged everything but the primary drive, turned on, and it works again. So it looks like there's possibly a problem with the adaptor cards, the printer, or one of the hard drives.
McAfee is long gone so that's not the problem.
I think I've run out of troubleshooting juice so I'm just going to take it into the shop and let them figure out WTF is wrong.
p.s. in order to update drivers, do I need the hardware plugged in?
Couple of things:
1) you don't have to physically unplug your hardware in order to stop windows from detecting it. You can simply go into you bios and stop the pc from automatically detecting your drives etc.
2) As stated during selective startup, you can deselect to load drivers for everything else. This way,you can boot up in diagnostic mode which means NO drivers. Then you can boot up while you add things like the video card, sound card, cd rom etc. You can find the culprit that way.
3) yes, you do need to have the various cards installed in order to auto update the drivers. You can manually install the drivers as long as you know what drivers you're currently running and what the details are for your hardware (ie: what vid card, sound card, cd or dvd rom etc).
Since you were able to boot fine using only your primary drive I'd say your problem lies with either of your secondary drives (hard or cd/dvd). If it is your secondary drive it may be bad sectors on it and running that western dig. app might find the problem.
1) you don't have to physically unplug your hardware in order to stop windows from detecting it. You can simply go into you bios and stop the pc from automatically detecting your drives etc.
2) As stated during selective startup, you can deselect to load drivers for everything else. This way,you can boot up in diagnostic mode which means NO drivers. Then you can boot up while you add things like the video card, sound card, cd rom etc. You can find the culprit that way.
3) yes, you do need to have the various cards installed in order to auto update the drivers. You can manually install the drivers as long as you know what drivers you're currently running and what the details are for your hardware (ie: what vid card, sound card, cd or dvd rom etc).
Since you were able to boot fine using only your primary drive I'd say your problem lies with either of your secondary drives (hard or cd/dvd). If it is your secondary drive it may be bad sectors on it and running that western dig. app might find the problem.
I too think it's probably the drivers for one of the hard drives (the cd-rom/dvd is working fine). Other than the printer, that's the only thing it could be.
The reason I think that is b/c both of my hard drives use adaptor cards. One card is for a SATA II drive (which my MB doesn't otherwise support) and the other is an expansion card for an IDE drive. The SATA II drive has given me problems in the past; if I manually installed the drivers there would sometimes be conflicts with Windows updates, causing Windows to crash. So the SATA II is my prime suspect at the moment.
I'm going to try and uninstall the drivers for the SATA drive while it's unconnected, then connect it and see what happens. Hopefully Windows will load fine and auto detect it and the drivers, or allow me to manually install the drivers without causing Windows to crash. The problem I have right at the moment is that I suspect as soon as I plug in the drive, Windows will crash upon startup. I'm going to try the IDE and SATA drives separately to try and further isolate the problem.
Oh yeah, and I scanned my primary drive with Western Digital's diagnostic tool and it checked out okay (no bad sectors).
p.s. I'm not taking it to the shop just yet Esco.
The reason I think that is b/c both of my hard drives use adaptor cards. One card is for a SATA II drive (which my MB doesn't otherwise support) and the other is an expansion card for an IDE drive. The SATA II drive has given me problems in the past; if I manually installed the drivers there would sometimes be conflicts with Windows updates, causing Windows to crash. So the SATA II is my prime suspect at the moment.
I'm going to try and uninstall the drivers for the SATA drive while it's unconnected, then connect it and see what happens. Hopefully Windows will load fine and auto detect it and the drivers, or allow me to manually install the drivers without causing Windows to crash. The problem I have right at the moment is that I suspect as soon as I plug in the drive, Windows will crash upon startup. I'm going to try the IDE and SATA drives separately to try and further isolate the problem.
Oh yeah, and I scanned my primary drive with Western Digital's diagnostic tool and it checked out okay (no bad sectors).
p.s. I'm not taking it to the shop just yet Esco.
I think I may have cracked the case. I added in my SATA drive and it works fine (as before). I disconnected the SATA and added the controller (expansion) card for the IDE drive and the drive itself and it crashes on startup. So I think it's either the controller card or the IDE drive that is the problem (funny cuz I was expecting it to be the SATA drive that is the source of my problems).
I'm wondering if the drivers were either corrupted or out of date. The card is an Ultra133 TX2 made by Promise Technology, Inc. I've downloaded the latest driver from their site but now I don't know how to install it. As soon as I plug in the drive, Windows crashes on startup.
Can I update the drivers without the drive and then plug the drive in and reboot? If so, how?
I'm wondering if the drivers were either corrupted or out of date. The card is an Ultra133 TX2 made by Promise Technology, Inc. I've downloaded the latest driver from their site but now I don't know how to install it. As soon as I plug in the drive, Windows crashes on startup.
Can I update the drivers without the drive and then plug the drive in and reboot? If so, how?
Okay, so it's either the controller card or the IDE cable itself. I plugged the drive in as a slave to my primary drive and Windows loaded normally and everything appears as it should. I was still using the controller card from back when I had another IDE drive and no space for another but now I have the space so I'm ditching the card. As an aside, the drive was always being detected during setup (i.e., on the loadup screen and in BIOS).
So, just out of curiousity, if I were to continue using the controller card, how would I go about installing updated drivers for it if everytime I connect the drive it causes Windows to crash?
And one final question: as part of my troubleshooting, I did a Windows Repair with the Windows CD. Should I be worried about that? I seem to recall reading that it's better to do a complete reinstall rather than try a Repair but, as it turns out, there probably wasn't anything wrong with Windows to begin with.
So, just out of curiousity, if I were to continue using the controller card, how would I go about installing updated drivers for it if everytime I connect the drive it causes Windows to crash?
And one final question: as part of my troubleshooting, I did a Windows Repair with the Windows CD. Should I be worried about that? I seem to recall reading that it's better to do a complete reinstall rather than try a Repair but, as it turns out, there probably wasn't anything wrong with Windows to begin with.
Keebler Elf said:
why would you continue to update drivers if the drivers you have work ? don't update unless it's broken.
there's an option in windows update, go to classic control panel, system, Automatic Updates Tab, check off download updates but let me choose when to install them. I always want to see what crap MS is installing or attempting to update.
MS Windows Update does not always have the latest drivers for your hardware. Check the manufacturers website as they may have drivers that are not MS certified but are perfectly safe. I have several drivers that fall into that category. Wouldn't you know it it on is also a SATA II card ? Another is a gaming keyboard.
Windows Repair is suppose to just reintsalls the corrupt dll's or exe files. Sometime when you get a bad disk sector and it happens to be where a important windows file is located and windows crashes. you should run chkdsk c: /f to mark the area as bad and run windows repair.
I would never reinstall an OS unless I have major problems, I have run repair a few times but that is just me as I see it as a waste of time and for those who don't know how to diagnose hardware or software problems.
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joebear said:
Because I've unplugged the adaptor card and if the driver problem is with the card, then I can't use it in future unless the drivers are updated. Currently I'm not planning on using it, but if I need to in future I'll have to update the drivers.
Keebler Elf said:
What you can do is download the drivers and keep them on a floppy disc in case you ever need them. DON'T load them onto your pc if you don't need them. (probably will cause conflicts if windows loads drivers for a piece of hardware that isn't there).
As for re-installing an o/s: I do that maybe once every year year and a half. Why? because when you install and uninstall apps they ALWAYS leave crap behind. Even apps like clean sweep don't clear it all out. In addition, whenever you use windows update it keeps all the old crap on your computer in case you want to use the 'go back' feature.
When you reinstall your o/s and use windows update it ONLY updates the most recent updates so you don't have any of the old crap hanging around.
Anyway, Keeb, I'm REALLY surprised your mobo doesn't support IDE inboard. That's the oddest thing I've ever heard and I've built about 5 pcs with various mobos from various suppliers. Do you have the model number of your mobo? I want to check this out.....
tboy said:
What do you mean? It does. The card is for an extra hard drive (i.e., there are already 2 IDE drives plugged into the MB and the card allows for additional expansions).
What good is having the drivers on disk if everytime I hook up the card it causes Windows to crash? I'll never get a chance to install them...
Keebler Elf said:
Ok sorry, I missed where you said you already had two IDE's plugged in. I thought you only had the sata plugged in for a good boot. Didn't realize you were running, what? 12 drives? 32? lol
Seriously, if windows doesn't boot with NO drivers for the card installed, it is a hardware problem not a software. With the new plug and play specs windows will realize there is a card there, but won't be able to use it until the drivers are installed. WHat it WON'T do is cause you any problems. What I would do is uninstall the drivers through control panel, make sure you copy the new drivers either onto a floppy disc or somewhere you can find them on one of your existing 27 drives, then re-install the card. Windows should boot fine this way and continue to do so. If when you install the drivers for the IDE card, windows experiences a problem, it is the card itself because it is only at this point windows will actually try to use the card.
If it does turn out to be the card you can always buy an external hard drive adapter case that uses your USB port(s). If you still have a problem this way, it is the drive.
Anyway, I have to ask: what are you doing with 4 drives installed? (2 ide, 1 sata and another IDE) Are they all like 40 gig or something?
Different drives for different purposes. I only have 3 now; thus my ability to not use the card.
