Windows 7 Crashes Every Morning

[H2SO4]

Twist #2

I received this BSOD this morning:

0x9c? You didn't perchance install XP on that machine, did you?

0x9C is to XP what 0x124 is to Vista and Win7. Both of those stop codes are triggered by a (hardware) "Machine Check Exception".

 

[ndfan1993]

No, but Windows 7 Ultimate has the XP mode....would it have to do something with the virtualization?

Note: I have not messed with the BIOS or overclocking with this machine - other than installing software like Office this machine includes all the factory settings.

 

[H2SO4]

No, but Windows 7 Ultimate has the XP mode....would it have to do something with the virtualization?

No, there's no link to virtualisation. I'm just surprised because I've never seen a 0x9C on a post-XP machine before.

It doesn't make any difference from the troubleshooting point of view. Both 0x124 and 0x9C are machine check exceptions (MCE).

Note: I have not messed with the BIOS or overclocking with this machine - other than installing software like Office this machine includes all the factory settings.

That's the thing - MCEs are not caused by anything you installed. You could collect the worst malware on the planet, breed it, select it for virulence, let it loose one the machine, and it still wouldn't be able to directly cause a MCE. That error report comes from the hardware.

 

[ndfan1993]

Finally got someone that spoke English at HP Customer Support and low and behold they might have actually helped - there was recently a BIOS update for my machine (10/13/2009) that is supposed to fix problems with stability and start-up issues. I am not currently at my machine so I am not sure if this will be the fix but it could be a start....will keep you posted.

 

[ndfan1993]

Installed it, they were holding it for the official release of Windows 7 so while it was "released" on 10/13 today was the first day it was made available....how kind of them....we will see tomorrow morning if it did the trick.

 

[ndfan1993]

So far so good this morning - it was powered down for a good 6 hours last night and hasn't crashed this morning....one weird that I did notice was that before updating my BIOS it prompted me if I wanted to restore my BIOS to original factory settings - almost as if something had been modified or was corrupt....

 

[ndfan1993]

I will give it about 5 days and if I have no more problems feel free to close this thread....thank you for your help!

 

[usasma]

From the documentation on the STOP 0x9c bug check:

Note Starting with Windows Vista, this bug check (0x9c) is no longer supported, and has been replaced with bug Check 0x124: WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR.

Did this occur in Windows XP, Windows Vista, or Windows 7?
Can you please upload the minidump file for this event?

 

[ndfan1993]

Still good...feel free to close, looks like the BIOS had an issue and the fresh version worked.