DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

[handle789]

Hi,

OS: Windows 2000 advanced server

I got this error when pressing F8 to boot into safe mode or when running Windows Setup after doing a Repair Installation of the OS.

STOP: 0x000000D1 (0x00000000, 0x00000002, 0x00000000, 0x00000000)
DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

Several months ago I tried to install an old Acer Scanner, ScanPrisa 640P. I downloaded the scanner driver from somewhere on the internet and installed it. The installation was not successful, as the scanner never worked. There isn't any entry in Add/Remove Programs or Start icon to uninstall anything from this scanner.

Then a couple of months ago when I had an opportunity to go into safe mode by pressing F8 I ran into the error above.

In the process of troubleshooting, I used another windows 2000 advanced server hard drive from another machine, sticked it into the problematic server, and was able to boot into safe mode multiple times without any problem.

This seems to point to some sort of software or registry problem, rather than hardware. But I don't know what drivers and DLLs that need to be removed and all the places where they reside. I don't know what registry entries are involved either.

I read these articles below but haven't found good clues yet.

http://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=308429

http://www.thinkdigit.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-1549.html

Any better suggestions? Thanks.

 

[kmcferrin]

Check and see what file name is listed in the error message. Usually it is a DLL file of some sort. This is almost always a driver error that is causing the crash. Usually it happens with buggy drivers, or installing a piece of software that overwrites a driver file with an older version, etc. Installing the latest version of the driver often times fixes it. Sometimes you will need to reinstall the most recently installed Windows service pack to resolve the issue.

 

[handle789]

Thanks. Unfortunately there wasn't any driver name in the output. I reinstalled SP3 but that didn't help. I also ran windows repair a few time, using both the fast and manual approach. Actually it's getting worse after running the repairs. After the fast repair windows tried to run Setup and the blue screen DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL would show up again. The manual repair got windows out of the Setup mode to continue booting. But now Outlook express could no longer load, MSOE.dll could not be loaded.

 

[xmsre]

Grab the memory.dmp file and load it into windbg. After setting the path to the symbol server, do !analyze to find the likely culprit.