Thursday, September 1, 2011

Why Do BSOD's happen?

In Windows XP, stop messages generally take one of five forms:
1. Software errors during Windows operation. Software or device drivers installed in your computer may have errors or problems which cause a stop error, either constantly or under certain conditions.
2. Hardware errors during Windows operation. If a hardware device malfunctions or is removed during the operation of Windows, or if your hardware does not fully support the operations that XP expects it to support, a hardware stop error will occur. Outdated BIOS information on older computers might also be an issue.
3. Installation errors. The Windows XP installation process is the most sensitive time for hardware and disk errors. If there is a problem with your computer's hardware configuration or the media you are using to install XP, a stop error will likely occur.
4. Startup errors. Corrupted system files, hardware and driver errors can all cause Windows XP to halt with a stop message without correctly booting into Windows. An error of this sort will almost always require troubleshooting before Windows can be loaded correctly.
5. Intermittent errors. The most irritating type of stop message, these crop up consistently but apparently randomly. The most likely culprits for this include: defective system memory, an overheating processor, dead or dieing hard drive or faulty software and device drivers.


What can you do about them?
As you are probably aware, Windows XP can crash in all sorts of interesting ways. Even though it is massively more stable than its predecessors (Windows 2000, Windows 98SE, Windows 95) people are still finding new and interesting ways to blow it out of the water.
Given the range of possible crashes and stop errors, it's difficult to come up with a precise set of instructions for every possibly BSOD. Websites do exist which contain lists of known stop errors and some potential solutions, and we would advise you to check them also in your quest for a cure. Try here or here for starters.
The goal of this Guide is not to provide specific instructions for fixing each possible Blue Screen Of Death issue.
Rather we aim to provide a generic set of troubleshooting steps which will allow you to analyze and hopefully identify the cause of the error and correct it. If we do not cure your issues, by the end of this section you will certainly be armed with more information about what is causing them.
There are a few basic steps that you should always take in the case of a Blue Screen Of Death appearing.  Let's look though them now...

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