Sick Computer Hardware?

[SirToppamHat]

I would normally consider myself reasonably adept at fixing PCs, but mine has been acting-up for a few weeks and I am about to admit defeat.

Every so often various programs announce that 'an error has occurred and the program needs to close. No possibility is offered of saving. In addition, the PC occasionally simply shuts down, without warning, as if the power has been cut.

I am running XP-PRO, fully updated, and have already removed most of my hardware in an attempt to isolate the snag, but so far without success.

The latest error message allows me to see the error report that microsoft want me to send as follows:

BCCode : 1000008e BCP1 : C0000005 BCP2 : BABD5CE0 BCP3 : BABD5CF0
BCP4 : 00000000 OSVer : 5_1_2600 SP : 0_0 Product : 256_1

Can anyone give me any clue as to what this coding means? At the moment I only have a graphics card, network card and one x 160 GB HDD, which had been completely reformatted following FDISK action. I have tried with a different HDD and even tried substituting the RAM; neither of these things have improved matters.

Any assistance much appreciated to avoid me throwing the PC through the window!

Regards

STH

[BRL]

Hi. You could have a virus/trojan type of thing. Have you updated your virus scanner and done a full scan? Also try doing a hijack this and posting it herfe.

Good luck!

PS, update all your drivers too........

[SirToppamHat]

BRL

In short, yes. When the fault first occurred all my drivers were up-to-date and since then I have completely wiped the HDD, minimised the hardware and completely reloaded Windows etc.

I've had another close down after the first post, with the error code:

BCCode : 1000008e BCP1 : C0000005 BCP2 : E16FB7FB BCP3 : BA98E91C
BCP4 : 00000000 OSVer : 5_1_2600 SP : 0_0 Product : 256_1

I think the problem may actually lie with the processor (AMP XP2000+) which might be overheating, as it's been running at about 63 degrees celsius. I have just given the heatsink, fan and processor a thorough clean and then reinstalled it with a fresh layer of conductive paste.

We'll see whether this makes a difference!

[Conan the Librarian]

Smells a little like a dodgy RAM chip possibly. If you have two banks of RAM take one of them out and run on reduced RAM to see what happens. Then swap it out, to try and verify performance against both RAM and the sockets, too.

While you are at it, after having earthed yourself against the PSU (do leave it plugged in !!) just lightly press chips into sockets in case thermal creep has dislodged something or other over time. Also, disconnect and reconnect any leads, to check if there is an intermittent connection.

It might not be any of this, but I have seen similar situations to this more than once and it is not a bad place to start the detective work if it is a hardware fault.


Do let us know how you are carrying on.

Good luck,

Conan

[stickyb]

I would suspect a dodgy driver.

Check out this link

http://aumha.org/win5/kbestop.htm

Also, search the msoft support forums for 0008e

[Mac the Knife]

Build and run Memtest86 - http://www.memtest86.com/ - simple to do.

A lot of unstable systems these days are caused by mismatched or misconfigured RAM.

Some time ago I checked all of my (I though pretty stable) systems with Memtest and was surprised to find errors. Adjusted RAM timings (and replaced one dodgy stick) and they've all gone from pretty stable to rock-steady.

If Memtest shows no errors then you have other problems.

[SirToppamHat]

Thank you all for the advice.

I have actually swapped over memory sticks - I have a dual system that can accept SD RAM or DDR RAM, though not simultaneously. Still the problem occurred, but that was before I cleaned the processor up and, in the process, moved the processor sensor slightly away from the chip and have since had no problems (he said, desparately looking round for a piece of real wood to touch!). The overall effect seems to be that the processor is running cooler (the sink and fan were very clogged with dust) and/or the BIOS is believes this is the case. I wonder whether the motherboard might have been shutting itself down to protect the CPU?

I have also removed one of the two HDDs out of a removable caddy, in an effort to prevent it getting quite so warm

I am slowly reinstalling all my software, but will check the RAM as suggested by Mac the Knife, and also follow-up stickyb's suggestion. I will let you know how I get on.

Once again, thank you all for taking the time to post.

Regards

STH