jeffreyac
Mostly Harmless
Hi all,
Not sure if anyone out there may shed some light on this, but this issue has me completely bamboozled, so I'm hoping someone may have some insight.
This is going to be long, I'm afraid, as I'm going to try to mention both what my system is doing, and what I've already tried, in an effort to give you the complete picture - my apologies in advance for the Wall of Text!
OK, my system is an Asus G2S series, 2.2g intel core duo processor (T7500 if I remember right), 2G ram, with an NVidia GeForce 8600GT, that I purchased about 5 months ago.
The issue: Recently, I had a crash dump while trying to update Vista. A few weeks later, the system crash dumps again, this time while running an automatic update for a MMORPG that shall remain nameless...
On a whim, I try the autoupdater with Civ IV:BTS, too - and, sure enough, running the autoupdater causes an immediate crash-dump to the blue screen of death. Though the computer boots and runs normally, and can be used for surfing the net, it's only partially usable for Civ (until I need to download something) and completely unusable for my other favorite game, and I'm very frustrated!
So I dive in. I re-check Vista updates - the system says it's got a fully updated copy of Vista, complete with SP1. A virus scan yields clean results. All drivers for all systems are up to date.
Now I'm really confused, so I think, well, maybe I'm just unlucky and both games have become corrupted at the same time - I'll uninstall/reinstall to see if that helps - and I discover another crash. Simply the act of going to the control panel and selecting the 'programs and functions' (I think, used to be the 'add/remove software' for XP, may have the name wrong here) causes the computer to crash immediately while trying to populate the program list. This means I can't uninstall, either - so now I'm very concerned!
I research the error code I get on the crash-dump (0x000000007F) with Asus tech support and they say it's a possible indication of a hardware problem - either a memory error or a corrupted harddrive. So I take the computer back to the electronics store I got it from and (after a brief argument over supprt issues, as I was trying to do this under a manufacturer's warranty and hadn't purchased their over-rated 'extended warranty' option) we come to an agreement - I'll pay $60 (
) for a system diagnostic, but if it's a hardware issue it'll be covered under warranty and fixed free.
I get the computer back - the diagnostic showed absolutely nothing physically wrong with any part of the computer.
We also do some preliminary checks of possible trouble spots (registry errors, for example) and though a few are found, it's not too bad - so I'm back to being confused. OK, I figure this rules out everything except the one thing I was worried about the most - vaunted Vista has failed me. After consultation with tech support, we conclude the only thing left is a complete reinstall of Vista.
I pull what data I can off the computer, and get started. Vista seems to install fine, and the computer seems to be fixed when I am done with the reinstall/patching. I get my antivirus up and updated, and again all seems smooth. I reinstall my games...
...and the cycle starts again!!! Again, the games won't play/won't update - and though Vista seems to be behaving itself a little better (for example, I can get to the programs through the control panel now) there still is clearly something not right, as updates still crash to blue screen (with the same error code, I might add)
So here I sit, not certain of where to go. I could spend another whole evening reinstalling windows again, and try again to pinpoint at exactly what point the system blows up (in my haste last night, I installed both games, so I'm not certain if it was one or the other specifically that caused the issue, or something completely unrelated....). Or my other idea was to go grab one of the inexpensive tune up/registry repair programs out there and giving the registry a better look, thinking maybe it's something in the registry when the games try to update that's getting messed up.
I forgot to mention, I had upgraded the RAM to 4g (2xkingston 2g sticks) about 2 months ago, but when this trouble started I pulled the chips and reinstalled the factory ones in an effort to see if maybe one or both of the Kingston sticks were bad - right now, the computer is still acting up with the factory chips, and that's what's listed above f=in the specs - the 2G that came with it... As far as I know, if the problem still exists after I swap the memory, that's an indication that it's not actually the RAM causing issues, but I thought I'd mention this in case I was missing something - and yes, the new chips are the proper speed/type for the machine, PC5300 DDR2 667MHz.
But, truthfully, I'm out of ideas. Manufacturer won't help, as the diagnostic said it's not a hardware problem. Doesn't seem to be viruses, bad drivers, hardware - that leaves software, but i can't understand how a complete reinstall of Vista followed by a clean reinstall of the games in question could cause this.
If anyone has any thoughts or suggestions, I would greatly appreciate it - though I do use the computer for work stuff, the reason I got a higher end one was primarily to play games - so I feel like it's essentially worthless to me. I mean, sure, I could do work - but what fun is that??
On another (possibly unrelated) note - the second install of Vista did not seem to grab SP1 - it says it's got all the updates, but I don't see SP1 in the update history list.... Is SP1 still active for Vista?
Not sure if anyone out there may shed some light on this, but this issue has me completely bamboozled, so I'm hoping someone may have some insight.
This is going to be long, I'm afraid, as I'm going to try to mention both what my system is doing, and what I've already tried, in an effort to give you the complete picture - my apologies in advance for the Wall of Text!
OK, my system is an Asus G2S series, 2.2g intel core duo processor (T7500 if I remember right), 2G ram, with an NVidia GeForce 8600GT, that I purchased about 5 months ago.
The issue: Recently, I had a crash dump while trying to update Vista. A few weeks later, the system crash dumps again, this time while running an automatic update for a MMORPG that shall remain nameless...
On a whim, I try the autoupdater with Civ IV:BTS, too - and, sure enough, running the autoupdater causes an immediate crash-dump to the blue screen of death. Though the computer boots and runs normally, and can be used for surfing the net, it's only partially usable for Civ (until I need to download something) and completely unusable for my other favorite game, and I'm very frustrated!So I dive in. I re-check Vista updates - the system says it's got a fully updated copy of Vista, complete with SP1. A virus scan yields clean results. All drivers for all systems are up to date.
Now I'm really confused, so I think, well, maybe I'm just unlucky and both games have become corrupted at the same time - I'll uninstall/reinstall to see if that helps - and I discover another crash. Simply the act of going to the control panel and selecting the 'programs and functions' (I think, used to be the 'add/remove software' for XP, may have the name wrong here) causes the computer to crash immediately while trying to populate the program list. This means I can't uninstall, either - so now I'm very concerned!
I research the error code I get on the crash-dump (0x000000007F) with Asus tech support and they say it's a possible indication of a hardware problem - either a memory error or a corrupted harddrive. So I take the computer back to the electronics store I got it from and (after a brief argument over supprt issues, as I was trying to do this under a manufacturer's warranty and hadn't purchased their over-rated 'extended warranty' option) we come to an agreement - I'll pay $60 (
) for a system diagnostic, but if it's a hardware issue it'll be covered under warranty and fixed free.I get the computer back - the diagnostic showed absolutely nothing physically wrong with any part of the computer.
We also do some preliminary checks of possible trouble spots (registry errors, for example) and though a few are found, it's not too bad - so I'm back to being confused. OK, I figure this rules out everything except the one thing I was worried about the most - vaunted Vista has failed me. After consultation with tech support, we conclude the only thing left is a complete reinstall of Vista.I pull what data I can off the computer, and get started. Vista seems to install fine, and the computer seems to be fixed when I am done with the reinstall/patching. I get my antivirus up and updated, and again all seems smooth. I reinstall my games...
...and the cycle starts again!!!
Again, the games won't play/won't update - and though Vista seems to be behaving itself a little better (for example, I can get to the programs through the control panel now) there still is clearly something not right, as updates still crash to blue screen (with the same error code, I might add)So here I sit, not certain of where to go. I could spend another whole evening reinstalling windows again, and try again to pinpoint at exactly what point the system blows up (in my haste last night, I installed both games, so I'm not certain if it was one or the other specifically that caused the issue, or something completely unrelated....). Or my other idea was to go grab one of the inexpensive tune up/registry repair programs out there and giving the registry a better look, thinking maybe it's something in the registry when the games try to update that's getting messed up.
I forgot to mention, I had upgraded the RAM to 4g (2xkingston 2g sticks) about 2 months ago, but when this trouble started I pulled the chips and reinstalled the factory ones in an effort to see if maybe one or both of the Kingston sticks were bad - right now, the computer is still acting up with the factory chips, and that's what's listed above f=in the specs - the 2G that came with it... As far as I know, if the problem still exists after I swap the memory, that's an indication that it's not actually the RAM causing issues, but I thought I'd mention this in case I was missing something - and yes, the new chips are the proper speed/type for the machine, PC5300 DDR2 667MHz.
But, truthfully, I'm out of ideas. Manufacturer won't help, as the diagnostic said it's not a hardware problem. Doesn't seem to be viruses, bad drivers, hardware - that leaves software, but i can't understand how a complete reinstall of Vista followed by a clean reinstall of the games in question could cause this.
If anyone has any thoughts or suggestions, I would greatly appreciate it - though I do use the computer for work stuff, the reason I got a higher end one was primarily to play games - so I feel like it's essentially worthless to me. I mean, sure, I could do work - but what fun is that??
On another (possibly unrelated) note - the second install of Vista did not seem to grab SP1 - it says it's got all the updates, but I don't see SP1 in the update history list.... Is SP1 still active for Vista?
Going to try an uninstall/reinstall, but even without the patches I ought to at least get the game to start up. Right now, if you launch the game, the initialization screen appears, the resolution on my monitor gets reset, the screen blanks for about 30 seconds, and then pops right back to desktop.
