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A BSOD with a difference :)

| Wednesday, November 19, 2008
If your PC dies with a BSOD specifying the error:

*** Hardware Malfunction
Call your hardware vendor for support
*** The system has halted ***

NMI: Channel Check / IOCHK

Visit http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315223 and download Windows Memory Diagnostic tool from here:
http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp

When I got this error the first time, I simply restarted  the PC and it was fine for a week. This morning it came back with a vengeance - rebooting wasn't an option as I was getting a string of BIOS beeps (indicating a memory problem).
I had to reseat each and every memory module, one-by-one until the BIOS beeps stopped and the PC could be started. Next step will be to burn this memory diagnostic tool onto a disk and do a check. Another day's work :)

2 comments:

pchelptech said...

In the end, I actually had to run the memory diagnostic tool, but this showed no issues, even after 8 passes.
The problem returned a few times, but eventually I solved the problem simply by running a full, deep disk defrag with JkDefrag-3.34.
I haven't seen the problem in well over a month of use.
Touch wood.

pchelptech said...

After 14 months in the clear, this BSOD has occurred again.
Now, after several attempts to restart, the BIOS spits out 4 expletives and then nothing but a noisy fan can be heard.

Now I have to find the IT Guy with the keys to the case padlock, so I can start reseating the adapter cards and memory modules.

Awesome. How I love a crisis.

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