Blue Screen of Death Survival Guide

Picture this: It’s late at night, you’re sitting at your computer playing a game or working on a project when, suddenly, Windows freezes completely. All your work is gone, and you find a blue screen full of gibberish staring back at you. Windows is dead, Jim, at least until you reboot it. You have no choice but to sigh loudly, shake your fist at Bill Gates and angrily push the reset button. You’ve just been visited by the ghost of windows crashed: the Blue Screen of Death.

Also known as the BSoD, the Blue Screen of Death appears when Windows crashes or locks up. It’s actually a Windows “stop” screen, and is designed to do two things: tell you the reason for the error, and to calm your nerves, hence the use of the color blue (studies show it has a relaxing effect on people). Though Blue Screens are difficult to decipher, all the information you need to figure out what caused it is right there in front of you in blue and white—and that’s where we come in. We’re going to show you how to dissect the blue screen error details, so you can fix the problem that’s causing them.

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Airbot said:

more: Maximum PC

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swarfega said:

interesting, I have to say Ive not seen a bsod in windows 7 yet.

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TROUBLESHOOTING
WINDOWS STOP MESSAGES
Last updated October 18, 2007
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STOP Messages literally mean Windows has stopped! These appear only in the NT-based operating systems: Win NT, Win 2000, Win XP, and Vista. Most are hardware issues. STOP messages are identified by an 8-digit hexadecimal number, but also commonly written in a shorthand notation; e.g., a STOP 0x0000000A may also be written Stop 0xA. Four additional 8-digit hex numbers may appear in parentheses, usually unique to your computer and the particular situation.
NOTE: Many users search this site for the word minidump which often accompanies these Stop Message errors. The fact that a memory minidump occurred tells you nothing except what you already know — that there was an error. It is the name of the error condition and its 8-digit number that help you determine the actual error condition.
If a message is listed below, but has no articles or explanation (nothing but its number and name), post a request on the AumHa Forums asking about it. STOP messages of this type are rare, obscure, and usually only of interest to programmers debugging their code. Real-life scenarios of a computer user encountering them are unlikely, so I’ve made it a lower priority to document them here; but we’ll be happy to address this in the Forum (which also will tip me off that I should add more to this present page).

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Barman58 said:

Just wanted to add this link for anyone who does get a blue screen with a stop message ....

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Barman58 said:

Just wanted to add this link for anyone who does get a blue screen with a stop message ....

Troubleshooting Windows STOP Messages

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