- What is a blue screen error?
- Check Problem Reports for problems and solutions
- Troubleshooting common blue screen error messages
- Find information on a blue screen error
- Reset or reinstall Windows 10
What is a blue screen error?
When Windows encounters certain situations, it halts and the resulting diagnostic information is displayed in white text on a blue screen.
Blue Screen errors occur when:
- Windows detects an error it cannot recover from without losing data
- Windows detects that critical OS data has become corrupted
- Windows detects that hardware has failed in a non-recoverable fashion
Check Problem Reports for problems and solutions
Windows 10 crash errors are collected in Problem Reports and referenced against other crash data that is available online. To access Problem Reports, follow these instructions:
- At the desktop, click the Search the web and Windows box and type "problem reports".
- Select View all problem reports to see a list of errors that have occurred on your computer and possible solutions for them, such as updating drivers, flashing your system BIOS, or checking for updates to the software.
- Under the Source column, look for Windows and under Summary, look for Shut down unexpectedly.
- Right-click the line item and select Check for a solution.
Note: You will need to be online in order to view solutions.
Troubleshooting common blue screen error messages
Whenever a critical error is detected in Windows, your Windows PC restarts itself to prevent any further damage to your computer.
This is a safety measure integrated into Windows. In order to further analyze the STOP or BSOD error, we need to know the Error code and information associated with the error.
This information is displayed when you turn off the automatic restart. To turn off the automatic restart, follow these steps:
- Click the Start button, then type "advanced system settings".
The System Properties window appears. - Click the Advanced tab.
- Under the Startup and Recovery section, select Settings.
- Under System failure, uncheck the box next to Automatically restart.
- Click OK, then click Apply and OK to complete the update.
UNMOUNTABLE BOOT VOLUME
INACCESSIBLE BOOT DEVICE
These two errors have similar causes and the same troubleshooting steps apply to both of them. These stop codes always occur during the startup process. When you encounter one of these stop codes, the following has happened:
- The system has completed the Power-On Self-Test (POST).
- The system has loaded NTLDR and transferred control of the startup process to NTOSKRNL (the kernel).
- NTOSKRNL is confused. Either it cannot find the rest of itself, or it cannot read the file system at the location it believes it is stored.
When troubleshooting this error, your task is to find out why the Windows kernel is confused and fix the cause of the confusion.
Things to check
- The SATA controller configuration in the system BIOS If the SATA controller gets toggled from ATA to AHCI mode (or vice versa), then Windows will not be able to talk to the SATA controller because the different modes require different drivers. Try toggling the SATA controller mode in the BIOS.
- RAID settings You may receive this error if you've been experimenting with the RAID controller settings. Try changing the RAID settings back to Autodetect (usually accurate).
- Improperly or poorly seated cabling Try reseating the data cables that connect the drive and its controller at both ends.
- Hard drive failure This may be correctable data corruption, not disk failure. Contact CyberPowerPC support for more detail help.
- File system corruption Launch the recovery console from the Windows installation disc and run chkdsk /f /r.
NTFS_FILE_SYSTEM
This stop code indicates the NTFS file system driver encountered a situation it could not handle and is almost always caused by 3 things:
- Data corruption on the disk
- Data corruption in memory
- The system completely running out of memory (this typically only happens on heavily-loaded servers)
Things to check
- Reseat the memory and all drive data cables to eliminate data corruption issues stemming from poorly or improperly seated hardware.
- Run a complete memory and hard drive diagnostic. The quick test will not be thorough enough here. You need to run the full system diagnostic.
- If those diagnostics pass, run a full file system check from the Recovery Console (chkdsk /f /r) to detect and (potentially) fix any corrupted data.
- If none of the above solves the issue, reinstall Windows.
- If that does not fix the issue, replace the hard drive.
SYSTEM THREAD EXCEPTION NOT HANDLED
KERNEL MODE EXCEPTION NOT HANDLED
These two errors indicate that a program running in the kernel encountered an unexpected condition it could not recover from. They have identical troubleshooting and resolution steps, and you will probably need to use the Windows Debugger to find out what caused the error.
Things to check
- If the Blue Screen message mentions a driver or library file, figure out what driver or application that file is part of an update or disable it.
- Update the system BIOS to the latest available revision.
- Uninstall any recently installed programs, and roll-back any recently installed drivers.
- Run diagnostics on the computer's memory.
PAGE FAULT IN NON PAGED AREA
This stop code means the system tried to access a nonexistent piece of memory, almost always due to:
- A driver trying to access a page of memory that is not present
- A system service (ex. virus scanner) failing in an exceptional way
- Faulty or incorrectly seated memory
- Corrupted data on the hard drive
Use the Windows Debugger to pinpoint the exact cause of these errors.
Things to check
- If the Blue Screen error mentions a driver or library file, figure out what driver or program the file is a part of and either upgrade to the latest version or uninstall the driver or program.
- If the error happens during the startup process, try booting to the Last Known Good Configuration.
- If the error started appearing after a program or driver was installed, uninstall that program or driver.
- Try running a full hard drive and memory diagnostic after reseating the memory and hard drive data cables.
DRIVER IRQL NOT LESS THAN OR EQUAL TO
This stop code indicates a driver tried to access a certain area of memory when it should not have, meaning there is a flaw in the driver itself. The goal of your troubleshooting is to find that driver and either disable or replace it. Use the Windows Debugger to troubleshoot this error.
Without the debugger, you are limited to uninstalling/updating/rolling back the driver that contains the driver file the Blue Screen mentions.
For more information, refer to CyberPowerPC article, "How to repair the Windows Blue Screen error "STOP 0x0000000A: IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL"
THREAD STUCK IN DEVICE DRIVER
This Blue Screen error indicates that a device driver-almost always a video card driver is stuck waiting for something (usually a hardware operation) to happen. Most of you have probably seennv4_disp.sys associated with this Blue Screen.
Things to check:
- Ensure the video drivers are updated to the latest CyberPowerPC version.
- The system BIOS is fully up-to-date.
- If both the video driver and the system BIOS are fully up-to-date, check with the manufacturer for recent driver updates.
- As a last resort, try exchanging the video card.
BAD POOL HEADER
A BAD POOL HEADER error indicates that your computer is not allocating memory correctly. This is usually caused by a bad driver, but can sometimes be caused by software or faulty memory. To remedy this issue, try the following steps:
- Update all drivers to the latest version.
- Update any software used at the time of the crash.
- Run the Windows Memory Diagnostic Test
- Open the Control Panel
- Click Administrative Tools
- Click Windows Memory Diagnostic.
[You can also launch the tool by entering "mdsched" in the search bar.] - Select "Restart now and check for problems" or "Check for problems the next time I start my computer" [If you opt to restart and run the tool now, just be sure to save your work and close any open programs for before doing so.]
- Select your memory test options and run the test [Once the machine restarts, the tool will launch and run the memory test. You can press F1 to change the test options or just let it run with the standard settings.]
- Let the test run [The test could take a few minutes.]
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Once complete, Windows will continue its startup process and a pop-up will eventually appear showing the results. You can also view the results by opening the Event Viewer, clicking Windows Logs, clicking System, and then selecting the most recent log with MemoryDiagnostics-Results as the source.
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If there are no problems, you'll see "no errors". If you see anything else, it might be time to replace your RAM or contact CyberPowerPC for more help.
Find information on a blue screen error
If these solutions have not resolved your issue, refer to Microsoft's article, "Troubleshoot blue screen errors" for further options.
Reset or reinstall Windows 10
If the previous troubleshooting could not resolve your issue, it may be necessary to restore your computer to factory settings. To restore your computer's operating system and software to the original factory settings, refer to CyberPowerPC Knowledge Base article, "Reset or reinstall Windows 10 on a CyberPowerPC computer"
Article Version DK.01
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