Windows 7 BSOD at start up 3 to 4 times per week.

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parishpete

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Sep 30, 2010
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Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium
Version 6.1.7600 Build 7600
Asus M4N78 motherboard
Nvidia Geforce 9500GT
2 x Seagate ST3500418AS 500Gb disks striping RAID
1 1Tb Freeagent Pro ESATA
LITE-ON DVDRW SOHW-1693S ATA Device
Optiarc DVD RW AD-7241S SCSI CdRom Device
System Type X86-based PC
Processor AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor, 3200 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 4 Logical Processor(s)
BIOS Version/Date American Megatrends Inc. 1103, 28/04/2010 updated today
SMBIOS Version 2.5
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "6.1.7600.16385"
Installed Physical Memory (RAM) 4.00 GB
Total Physical Memory 3.25 GB
Available Physical Memory 1.91 GB
Total Virtual Memory 6.50 GB
Available Virtual Memory 5.04 GB
Page File Space 3.25 GB

My PC was bespoke built 11 months ago by a local shop which unfortunately went bust a month later after 15 years of trading. It is the fourth they had built for me and the other three have all been superb.
I have suffered a BSOD at power up several times each week since it was a fortnight old. It was built into an existing case and save for the front USB port, the Lite-on DVD and the case fans, the rest was new. Though the keyboard & mouse have only just been updated a month ago.
The First BSOD came after connecting a rear USB port from the old case so I removed it but I think it was a red herring.


In the new build I installed all my software and only some Bluetooth drivers showed up as unsigned. These I later uninstalled in case they were the culprits. No change.

The BSOD’s continued, culminating in Win7 declaring itself non-genuine which even Microsoft could not sort out and required a clean install last May. It has done it again once since May but that was overcome by re-entering the key.

Following rebuild I put the software back in stages (all regular stuff; Office 2007, Photoshop Elements, Powerdirector, Itunes. No games or suchlike. The BSOD’s continue to this day.

Very occasionally, perhaps twice since May, a BSOD has occurred while running an application but otherwise once up and running it behaves perfectly.

I sense that since there have been a number of auto disk scans, that the striping RAID array on one of the 2 Disks is at fault. I know that Nvidia chipset and Raid drivers are up to date and the Bios is fully up to date as of today.

The minidump files and driver & system data are attached. All help gratefully received

Pete
 
Solution
T
Wow! Bsod machine you have there! haha Welcome!

Let's move on to fixing this, shall we?

First and foremost: Uninstall the AVG in safe mode with this tool:

AV Uninstallers - Windows 7 Forums

Reboot and install MSE to replace it.

-----------------

Your Broadcom Bluetooth drivers are too old. They must be updated:

btwrchid btwrchid.sys Mon Feb 26 00:08:38 2007
btwaudio btwaudio.sys Mon Feb 26 00:07:42 2007
btwavdt btwavdt.sys Mon Feb 26 00:06:24 2007

----------

Your Logitech QuickCam drivers are too old and must be updated:

LVUSBSta LVUSBSta.sys Fri May 11 19:40:49 2007

Link Removed

--------------

This ATK0110 driver is so old from 2004 that it will drive any Win7 PC bonkers. Install this to update it...
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Yeah, you could try a restore to see if the Realtek shows back up in the device manager now that you know the external hdd was the cause of the bsods.
 
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I just logged into safe mode and a message came up to say audio drivers installed successfully. back into Win 7 proper and they aren't.....

Pete
 
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Torrent

Just a note to apologise for taking up so much of your time. I didn't expect for one moment that the driver issue would be so resilient to repair.

In the 20 odd years I've run windows machines I've never come accross such an insurmountable problem.

What is odd is that the original drivers on the OEM disc fail to load also.

Other than Azailia Audio and the 2 choices of audio sets it gives there is no other reference to audio in the bios. I did make the mistake of seeting the defaults when I upgraded the bios but audio was enabled and OS PnP off. whether that has had any bearing on further installation I don't know.

I do hope you can assist further.

kind regards

Peter
 
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Cybercore,

It's fine except for audio. but then BSOD's only ever came at startup & the external was permanently attached.

It's just a thought, but OS PnP was set to off in the BIOS when the main chipset drivers were installed.

The chipset software also loaded Nvidia ethernet, SMU and away controls in addition to RAID & display. The first 3 weren't originally installed.

Does this have any bearing?

regards

Pete
 
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The chipset software also loaded Nvidia ethernet, SMU and away controls in addition to RAID & display. The first 3 weren't originally installed.

Does this have any bearing?
Click to expand...
Not that I have personally experienced this dependency, I don't think so. What is your sound card exact model, let's try to install the driver. Realtek, correct? 5.1 or 7.1?
 
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It's just on-board 8 channel audio, no card installed.

It may be part of the issue where the DVD drives suddeny had no drivers, I presume this was down OS PnP being off. MATS cured that ok.

regards

Pete
 
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1. Uninstall your audio

2. Reboot

3. In SAFE MODE mode,Link Removed for Realtek

4. Install the latest, Link Removed

It's High Definition Audio Codecs you need, Vista, Windows7 Driver (32/64bits) Driver R2.52, 2010/9/6.
 
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The bad new is:

Torrent already suggested running Guru in safe mode which I did and swept all trace of Realtek.
Then I installed in normal mode the drivers you recommend (downloaded this morning).

Drivers weren't successfully installed.

I'll give it one more try and if it fails again I think a gamble is called for. Having set the BIOS correctly earlier today, I'll reinstall the Nvidia chipset drivers which should catch any PnP issues, then I'll install the audio drivers.

If that fails I'll set a restore point now & roll back the system to friday and see what happens

Do you agree?

regards

Pete
 
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I'll give it one more try and if it fails again I think a gamble is called for.
Click to expand...
That means your audio is not Realtek (perhaps Intel or VIA?), or is disabled, or broken.


WHAT IS DEVICE MANAGER CODE FOR THE HD AUDIO DEVICE?
 
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Torrent & Cybercore,

Good news. System restore has brought back sound! Though it is an MS HD driver which is in place. It has also put me back to where I started save for the Bios update.

I'll go through the raft of driver updates and set restore points before each change. If I mess up I can take a step back.

There are still some quirks. Aero seems to stop working now and again, sometimes needing a restart.

I think I can probably leave you in peace for a while!

One final question. As we've found, the Freeagent Pro is probably the source of my woes. It's probably my fault as I haven't installed the software (it wasn't properly supported for ESATA) and just let it connect as a drive though I assigned a permanent drive letter so that MS Synctoy could find it irrespective of other devices being assigned letters. I will see what updates are available.

When I tried to set chkdsk running on it the path chkdsk /r H: was invalid. any thoughts?

Thank you both so much for your patience and effort in helping me.

I attach the driver file since restore so that you can cast an eye over it.

Kind regards

Pete
 

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Now that sound is back, I'd simply try installing the Realtek driver from the linked page. Use the auto-installer version.

If H: is accessed as a normal drive in Explorer, no reason that command shouldn't immediately work well. Run the command prompt as administrator. Right click the shortcut and choose that to do so.

Perhaps make a screen shot of the invalid error as it might jog a memory...sometimes pictures can help better than the actual error message.

Very welcome...glad things are going better now.
 
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I think I've reached the goal. I'm back to where you wanted me to be but I can hear it!!

I attach the 'after' driver list. I know there are the few oldies in there but unfortunately they are part of latest software.

If the Cam drivers are still on the list ignore them, they've gone.

On the way through, the DVD drivers got knocked out again but MATS put them right.

I checked the seagate site. As far as I can see there is no new software for the freeagent pro which is considerably disappointing for a 3 year old drive.

I'll install the proper seagate software and see if it updates.

Many thanks

Pete
 

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Cool, yeah, there's a thing or two I don't like in there but if you aren't getting bsods, then no issue I suppose.

If there are any crashes, post them. Other than that, all that's left is to enjoy the machine bsod-free.

Good job.
 
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Tried installing seagate software, Win 7 didn't like it - BSOD - so restored back. There is no new software.

Currently running chkdsk on it (BTW correct format is chkdsk H: /r. not /r H lucky I still own a DOS manual!

I'll see what it has to say. I just have time to repaint the house while it's running!

I think the probem comes at shutdown and results in startup BSOD so if I do use the drive I'll disconnect before shutdown. I could try USB rather than ESATA connection. This drive never did have proper ESATA support.

regards

Pete
 
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Well the scan of the freeagent completed reporting no errors and no bad sectors.

The event viewer shows NTFS for this drive at RAID port 0. I can't help thinking it's a RAID/Non RAID issue in the way the disks are handled.

The drive is only 2 years old but in ESATA terms it was very early on and support for it was pretty dire. Unfortunately that situation hasn't changed.

I have started a thread on the Seagate forum to see what turns up.

I'll give it a break for a week or so and try it on USB connection.

Many thanks

Regards

Pete
 
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I just had to copy this to you. It is a quote from the moderator of the Seagate forum and relates to someone else's problem with the same model drive I'm using. enjoy.

"Part of the problem is that the FA Pro is the first generation of FreeAgent drives and is not really all that great with Windows 7. That is, we generally expect it to work but it won't always, and the software is even more problematic. Thing is, the software might work."

Clearly a politician!

regards

Pete
 
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lol yeah, right?

Thanks for the post telling what the deal is. What the heck is wrong with them?

Seagate, hire someone to write new software compatible with Win 7. [sarcasm] It's only been out since RTM over a year now. [/sarcasm]
 
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