Computer Whizzes -- help please

[Erica]

So, I'm getting a BSOD ... on my brand new freaking laptop. It's just a little frustrating. I can obviously boot up, but it takes at *least* two tries. I thought I found the solution in a Symantic upgrade, but nope -- same BSOD error message.

I'm getting IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL (which I'm pretty sure is a hardware error, which isn't good, right?).
It's a STOP: 0x0000000A (0x00000000, 0x0000001B, 0x00000000, 0x81C28928)

I've been lurking around on some geeky forums and I've heard it might be bad RAM? But there's gotta be *some* way to fix it if I can get windows up and running, eventually. It's not even a huge issue. Everything runs fine, it's just a pain to take 5-10 minutes to start up.

I'm operating on Windows Vista Home Premium, if that helps at all. I'm sure that could be the root of the problem -- serves me right for getting a computer with a Vista OS... not that there were any other choices at Best Buy. OMG LOOK AT THIS WONDERFUL NEW OS THAT THEY HAVENT QUITE GOT ALL THE KINKS OUT OF YET!

Any help would be sooo soooo sooo appriciated.

 

[96 GTS]

One of your components has a bad driver, on that isn't Vista compatible. That would throw this error. Unfortunately, I have no way of finding which of your components is the problem.

Do you have any PCMCIA cards installed, something like a memory card reader or an external network card or something? If you do, take them out and see if the problem goes away. If it does, check for new drivers for them.

 

[Erica]

No external cards ... is there any way I can find out which driver is compatible? Or even better, just how/where do I find a list of the drivers I *have*, so I can try and figure it out myself?

(Thank you sooooo much, by the way)

 

[96 GTS]

Well, first off, run a windows update, they'll usually list the newest drivers for all of your hardware, if there's new ones out. I wouldn't usually recommend this, but since drivers are causing problems, I'd go ahead and update all of them. See if that fixes it. Post back here with the results.

 

[ACooper]

One suggestion to be sure it's a driver issue............Boot up in safe mode by pressing f8 while booting. If there are no issues then it is definitely a driver.

Then use Vista's restore point first as back as far as you can.......see if that works, if not do a complete restore. THis is all assuming that it worked right at some point (you may have done an update through vista or added software that is causing)

 

[96 GTS]

MAKE SURE TO BACK UP YOUR DATA BEFORE DOING A SYSTEM RESTORE!!!

I've had bad experiences with this, even if it says it won't delete your data, back it up anyway, weird stuff can happen with system restores. I can't stress this highly enough.

 

[Erica]

Windows Update didn't find anything of consequence... no driver updates.

Under device manager in the control panel, there's an "update device drivers" that just pulls up a device manager.... I could manually check for driver updates through that.

 

[GlassOnion]

Did it work before? Like have you gotten Vista up and running at some point?

I've been lurking around on some geeky forums and I've heard it might be bad RAM? But there's gotta be *some* way to fix it if I can get windows up and running, eventually.

Unfortunately if it's a corrupt component, no, there's nothing you can do through Windows. I had some RAM go out on me a couple years ago and got what it sounds like you're getting. The only way to fix it was to buy new RAM.

 

[Erica]

GO - I'm operating off the laptop right now. Vista is up and running. I get the BSOD, restart, get a prompt asking if I'd like to find out what caused the problem and see if Microsoft can fix it (NOT!) or if I'd like to just try and start normally... Usually I can start normally, but for some reason running the Microsoft diagnostic seems to "help" it start again. It can never "resolve the error," but it usually starts up just fine after *another* restart... It does work, it's just a pain in the behind to get it up and running.

 

[GlassOnion]

Yah, I'd bank on it being the memory then. That sounds exactly like what I had.

Eventually it would come up, only to fail a while later. Sometimes I could go for hours with it working fine, others it'd crash even before the desktop was fully loaded (if it even got that far). Eventually it will just fail all together and not load up until you change out the memory or whatever component is faulty.

Warranty?

 

[96 GTS]

I hope the module of RAM that's the problem is the one that you can replace...

AFAIK most laptops have the onboard RAM, then an expansion slot for more, if the RAM in the expansion slot is bad, you can replace it yourself, otherwise you'd have to send it back to the manufacturer for a repair

 

[Erica]

Just got it Thursday, so yes. I guess I know what I'm doing after dinner tonight.

Is there any sure fire way to tell it's the RAM? I really don't want to be computerless for longer than I have to be, and I'm sure the *Geek Squad* at our local Best Buy (the only option, unfortunately) isn't too able.

I installed some software I thought would obviously not be compatible with Vista and was able to restart once without the BSOD, but I got to cocky and tried it again -- and it was back.

I guess probably the best option at this point will be to just see if I can return the machine on spot and get a new one, hopefully with some RAM that isn't bad..

 

[GlassOnion]

Did you buy it online or at a chain store?

Most chain places (Best Buy, Fry's, etc) will replace it if it fails in the first 30 days.

 

[Erica]

Just a little bump to say thank you to all who helped -- thankfully it *wasn't* bad RAM and was just an incompatible driver.

After about an hour on the phone with HP support (and one extended warranty later -- 3 years additional [to the 1 year manufacturer's that came with the product] with a 2 day turnaround on *any* problem), popping the RAM in and out to make sure they were secure, restarting, restarting, restarting ("But I've done this all ready, I can tell you what happens" "I have to go through the diagnostic tree" ) I was instructed to simply do a complete restore, since there was no restore point (believe me, I created one once we got it up and running correctly again).

Thanks for the help guys, I probably would've ended up throwing the computer across the room if not for your suggestions. :hail: