Windows XP BSoD with Aluminum Macbook

[Eric S.]

I used Windows XP on my Blackbook for six months without a BSoD. I got the Aluminum MB two months back, and up until a week ago I had seen only one. Now I have gotten three in the past week, the last one (yesterday) when the system was sitting fairly idle with no user activity going on.

When the BSoD occurs, the screen is filled with information but it only stays up for a split-second, so it's impossible to learn anything from it. One time after restarting I got a window that claimed the problem was due to a "device or driver" error but it was not able to determine which device or driver was at fault. I suspect that one of Apple's drivers for the new MB has a serious bug. Does anyone know of a way to gather more information after the system crashes?

My usual usage pattern is to use XP during the day at work and OS X at night at home, so the system is restarted quite often. I'm guessing that in the first two months that I owned this MB I mostly avoided seeing the problem just by luck. It's also possible that I was just lucky in never seeing it on the Blackbook in six months, but that seems highly unlikely. It's more likely this is an Aluminum MB issue only.

 

[derryquinn]

Could you post the STOP error?

It's most likely a program you installed or lack of RAM, though you say it was Idle so that sounds doubtful.

Maybe you could do a System Restore to before the issue started?

Also, please post pictures of the BSOD on the MacBook, I haven't seen one on the new Alumium ones yet

Seriously, please do.

 

[Eric S.]

Could you post the STOP error?

It's most likely a program you installed or lack of RAM, though you say it was Idle so that sounds doubtful.

Maybe you could do a System Restore to before the issue started?

Also, please post pictures of the BSOD on the MacBook, I haven't seen one on the new Alumium ones yet

Seriously, please do.

I'm not well-versed in Windows administration; I don't know how to do any of those things. Really.

What is the STOP error and how do I find it?

How do I get a picture of the BSoD? Like I said, it's on the screen for a split-second, not even long enough to read the first line.

It has 4GB RAM, so not likely a lack of memory. I haven't added any programs since I first set it up months ago. Pretty much all I've got is Firefox, Thunderbird, Quicktime (not the latest), Adobe Reader, iTunes, Safari (which I never use), iDisk Utility for Windows, Bonjour, Symantec AV. All of these I also used on my Blackbook. Oh, I did add the Cygwin shell stuff recently - about a month ago.

I don't know how to do System Restore either, although I have done that (or tried to) previously on my wife's Windows laptop. It sounds like a last resort but I might try it if the problem continues with this frequency.

 

[Zenor]

In order to restore:

Go to Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> System Restore*(Restore my computer to an earlier time)

and select a date(before BSoD).
You won't lose any files by doing so.

Hope that helps.