Blue Screen During Format/Install

[rokerij]

I may not find the help I am looking for, but we have a machine that continues to give the blue screen. I get the screen during the install of 2000 or XP for that matter. I have used boot disk to wipe the drive clean and have reset the BIOS, have gone as far as removing the battery to reset the BIOS. The machine has been a problem child with blue screens for some time. I have removed all PCI cards and have just the CD, floppy and HDD attached. I get as far as copying files during the install and then the blue screen. The blue screen states:
Drive_IRQL_Not_Less_or_Equal

Any ideas? Bad mobo? Bad HDD?


thanks in advance


S.C. Albertin
Systems Coordinator/Newbie Tech
United Way

Help me to find my way, so that I may help others find theirs...

 

[htmlman]

If your computer checks ram when booting an it shows all ok then there could be an issue with a peace of hardware.
I would remove all the hardware except the keyboard, video card, mouse. Then try to install the OS. If the problem persist then find out the manufacturer of the hard drive and on another computer go to their site and download their tool to run a check on the hard drive.
When you have your tower open and power disconnected look at the mother board and see if any of the parts on the board look like they may have overheated.
Some times over heated parts will omit an oder from being over stressed. If they do look discolored or if the capacitors are bulging then it is time for a new mother board.

 

[rokerij]

video card is onboard, but how do you install if I remove the CD and floppy drives? Thanks. In the meantime I am looking over the mobo for damage, and looking up HDD manufacturer for scan disk utilities. Thanks again.




S.C. Albertin
Systems Coordinator/Newbie Tech
United Way

Help me to find my way, so that I may help others find theirs...

 

[chronos1]

i had something similar happen, and it was a problem with the RAM - try and change the ram (if you have any spare) - worked for me.

 

[htmlman]

leave the cd player hooked up and the floppy. Sometime hardware problems cause the system to not boot because of the overload they produce on the power supply.
I have a gate way that has 5 hard drives but if I hook all of them up and run the computer for a while I get cutoff of the power supply, since 2 are SCSI and run all the time.
If at boot your system does not check the memory then if there is more than one strip of ram you can pull one of them, with the power disconnected, and try it. It may also be the socket the ram sits in so the strip that is left and still fails move the strip that is left to another socket for the ram.

 

[rokerij]

Removed the floppy and modem, leaving only the hard drive and cd rom, this allowed a complete install of win2k. The machine itself is very slow. I will attempt to update to XP and post anything new. I appreciate all that you have done. Ran Memtest86 with no issues, so I believe it to be another problem. The processor is my first guess as the fan was not running when the machine was first brought to me. An overheat issue?

let me know your thoughts.

S.C. Albertin
Systems Coordinator/Newbie Tech
United Way

Help me to find my way, so that I may help others find theirs...

 

[htmlman]

Sounds like the processor may be cooked. You may be able to remove the heat sink and clean the baked heat sink compound off the processor. Reapplying new compound. An make sure the fan you put on works. Hopefully it will not be to late and the processor will have to be replaces. You may be able to get a used processor from another computer at a repair shop. Some times they have a few around from dead units.
Good luck