Hey guys. I am trying to figure out a problem to my sons computer. Figured I would post on here while researching the problem to see if I can narrow the search or get an answer quicker.

Basicly my son started complaining the other day his computer wouldn't work anymore that it kept getting this Blue screen. I knew right away this wasn't going to be good. Sure enough whenever we turn it on windows starts to load but before it loads up all the way it goes to the BSOD with an error code 0x00000024 (0x001902fe, 0xefcfa54c, 0xefcfa248, 0xf73f48ba). From what I have found so far it could be a corrupt ntfs driver or a bad HD. Problem is I can't download any type of utility or run anything since I can't get windows to load all the way.

A little history on the computer,

It's never connected to the net and is only used for my sons games and nothing else. It's a dfi board(can't remember exact model) with integrated radeon 3200 graphics. Athlon 64 3000 cpu and 1 512 munshkin stick of ram. It's got a 80 WD HD in it. the computer is a little over a year old.

I am thinking of trying a fresh install since he has nothing valuable to loose on the pc but it may not work if the HD is going up. Any thoughts on the direction to go in from here.

Does it have a floppy, or do you have one you can put in temporarily, you can use the wd tool to check the hd before you go through the format/install process.

I know you're a smart guy nelson so you've probably already tried, but in case you haven't... try booting windows in safe mode.

If you can manage to get into windows, download the debugging tools and check those minidumps.

Some good reading on this subject RIGHT HERE (be sure to read post #22).

 Most of the time when I see the BSOD it's either a driver or a bad sector on the hard drive.  Follow the above information and try first starting in safe mode, if you can't do that, either run diagnostics from a bootable floppy or burn one from an ISO onto a cd.  If you have access to neither of those, boot to the windows cd, go into the recovery console, and run a chkdsk /r so that it can scan for bad sectors and mark them so that they are no longer in use.

lol I am so lazy. I spent several hours searching and reading stuff. I finally just stuck the xp disc in and booted with that and hit the repair option. So far so good but I have a feeling that this fix may be short lived and the problem will resurface. I had all intentions of going through the correct steps to actually fix the probelm and not just work around it but ran out of patience. Eerything I read sounded like to much work. I may be going back and trying some of the stuff mentioned anyway though.

By the way I could not boot in safe mode either and no floopy but I could easily borrow 1 from another system if need be.

 well that was short lived. I guess I didn't fix much at all. Windows boots fine now but whenever he goes to play a game it starts then blue screen with white blocks across it.

SO I did the chkdsk ?r thing in recovery console and this is what I got:

chkdsk is performing additional checking or recovery...

chkdsk found and fixed one or more errors on the volume.

78140128 kb total disk space

55539336 kb available

4096 bytes in each allocation unit

19535032 total allocation units on disk

13884834 allocation units avaliable on disk

So does that mean it fixed the problem? I guess that means it found and marked bad sectors right so it will just ignore those sectors from now on?

Edit: Well it's def not working now. Can't boot into windows anymore unless in safe mode. I keep getting a bunch of random error codes. so far I have gotten a 0x0000008e and a 0x0000007f error code. I am thinking maybe it's the RAM from what I have read so far on these codes and the fact that I am getting different codes each time. Running memtest now.

run memtest86 on it that will fix solve if its the ram or not. But its sounding like it might be a HD going bad. I would try a fresh install if its not the ram. that will tell you if its the HD becasue it won't load windows. Do a complete format on the HD if you do chose this option

 well memtest has ran through without a glitch so it's not the mem. I was thinking it was driver related but if it was I wouldn't be getting multiple error codes would I?

Edit: HMMM, I formated and did a fresh install with no problems. I installed all the drivers off the disk. I then installed zoo tycoon 2 for my son and 1701 AD. Now here is where it gets weird. I haven't had a BSOD since the new install but the screen has flickered randomly a few times(goes black for 2-3 seconds then comes back on). It also 1 time stopped all signal to the monitor(got the no signal writing on the monitor) and it didn't come back. The computer was still running like nothing happened but no video. I restarted and it started back up like nothing was wrong. Then after installing 1701AD the game just closes out randomly for no reason and goes back to windows.

So I am wondering if maybe there might be something wrong with the integrated video on the MB. I guess the next step is to drag his computer back into the office and hook it up to the modem and download updated drivers, bios and windows updates and see if the problem is still present. I guess I know what I will be doing tomorrow night

i dont think its a driver issue. Since you said it has just games on it and your son has nothing on it to lose other than saved games, it might be a good idea just to wipe the HD and start over. I do it about once every 1.5 year.... it keeps the system nice a fast too, gets rid of all the junk that get accumulated in windows...

 ^^1 step ahead of ya Der^^ . The only annoying part is being constantly pestered to install ALL of his games again. he's got more games then I do.

Ha yea i know that feeling, but I never instal all the games i had on my system before. Most of them i never play again after beating them unless they are really good, then i find the motivation to beat them all over again. Hope the clean install helps get his system up and running again.

 we'll see. I can't do anymore with it tonight since it's in his room and he just went to bed so I will mess with it more tomorrow. Hopefully some updates will iron some things out.