Will Not Boot - Bad Pool Header

I am trying to troubleshoot my husband's computer. It is a Dell Inspiron with Windows 7. It was working fine yesterday and shut down fine. This morning he turned it on and it would not start up.

After pushing the power on button, the Starting Windows message appears for a while and then there is a quick message about a Bad Pool Header. It says:

A problem has been detected and Windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer.
BAD_POOL_HEADER
If this is the first time you've seen this Stop error screen, restart your computer. If this screen appears again, follow these steps:

Check to make sure any new hardware or software is properly installed. If this is a new installation, ask your hardware or software manufacturer for any Windows updates you might need.

If problems continue, disable or remove any newly installed hardware or software. Disable BIOS memory options such as caching or shadowing. If you need to use Safe Mode to remove or disable components, restart your computer, press F8 to select Advanced Startup Options, and then select Safe Mode.

Technical Information:
*** STOP: 0x00000019
Beginning dump of physical memory
Physical memory dump complete.

Contact your system administrator or technical support group for further
assistance.

**********************************************************

My husband says he has not installed anything lately - he has only had the usual updates. It dumps before it can crash. It then offers the option for Startup Repair. We have tried this at least 5 times and it cannot repair it.

I hit the F8 key when starting up and was able to get to the Advanced Boot Options screen. I selected Last Known Good Configuration (advanced) and there was no last configuration to choose.

I used the F8 key to get to the Advanced Boot Options screen again. Here I sit wondering what is the next best option. Should I select Safe Mode and try to do a repair? Other? Do I need to go back to the factory version?

Thanks in advance for your help. We live in an isolated area and would appreciate FREE help or FREE tools first.

B.J.

Thanks for the replies so far to the Bad Pooler Header problem.

I pushed F8 when turning on the power. It got me to the Advanced Boot Options screen. I selected Safe Mode. I was able to access the Control Panel and Recovery which gave me the option of System Restore. When I clicked on Open System Restore, a window came up labeled Restore system files and settings. Below that heading is a red circle with an X in it and the message "No restore points have been created on your computer's system drive." What can I do from here? Please be specific. I have some experience troubleshooting computer problems but am not an expert, just a regular user. Thanks so much. BJ

I was afraid that it might come to doing a factory restore. Fortunately, my husband does not have a lot of files saved on the laptop. It's a pain to have to reload specific software, but it can be done with minimal pain if that is the only option that remains.

However, I do have one more piece of diagnostic information to consider.

I ran a Performance Diagnostic and got error code Ox8007045D. I found these instructions on the Internet for the error code relative to someone else's posting:
8007045d = "ERROR_IO_DEVICE - The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error."
possibly your hard disk is going bad. run a full chkdsk as follows:
open "My Computer".
right click drive C:, select "Properties".
click tab "Tools"
click "Check now"
check *both* check-boxes, and click start.
follow instructions to restart windows.
before Windows reloads, it will run a full chkdsk, which might take an hour or more. take note of any significant errors reported: if it says it has replaced bad clusters in files, those files might now be corrupt.
if there are very many errors, you should consider backing up your data files, reformatting, and installing a fresh version of windows.
**********************
I clicked on the Check Now and it said it could not run it while the computer was in use. It gave an option to reschedule later. When I clicked on that button, the window closed but it appeared as if nothing further happened. I was in Safe Mode. So, I shut off the computer and tried to restart it to see if anything would run to check the disk.
I turned the laptop on again. I saw the Dell logo, then Starting Windows for minutes. Then I got a blue screen with white lettering saying bad pool header again and the option to Launch Startup Repair (recommended) (rather than to start Windows normally as the second option). Startup Repair was launched with attempt at repairs.
The message was:
“Startup Repair cannot repair this computer automatically. Send information about this problem (recommended)
Then it says:
“If you have recently attached a device to this computer, remove it and restart your computer" (NOTE: this does not apply to our current situation). "If you continue to see this message, contact your system administrator or computer manufacturer for assistance.”
So, I am back where I started when I posted the initial problem in this thread.

Any other thoughts about how to repair this without going to factory reset?

Thanks so much to all of you who take the time to respond. Your assistance is greatly appreciated.

BJ

Its nice that you googled the blue screen error and tried to look for the answer but the problem is that every blue screen has a different hex code witch means that your solution will be wrong on some occasions. What I would recommend you doing is to run a memtest 86 (PassMark MemTest86 - Memory Diagnostic Tool) and see if its a ram problem.

Thank you, bigmck, for your recommendation about imaging. I imaged my laptop but my husband had not gotten around to doing his. I agree it is the way to go. Thanks for the information about the web site. Once we get out of this mess, I will suggest that we image his computer.

Tyrandis, thank you for your suggestion. I am starting again with troubleshooting this morning and am unable to even get to Safe mode to check the memory as you suggest. I am able to turn on the laptop, press F8 to get to the screen where I can select Safe Mode. When I select Safe Mode, I see a Loading Windows Files screen and after a page or so of entries, it stops (while loading drivers) and says Please wait...at the bottom of the screen. It appears stuck since I have been waiting for well over 5 minutes and nothing is moving. Any suggestions?