This is part 2 of the series. I’m assuming you’ve already read Part 1.

In Part 1 we brought up the Windows Advanced Options Menu:

We selected the option “Last Known Good Configuration (your most recent settings that worked)”, but that still hasn’t worked and your Windows XP computer still won’t boot: Either it’s crashing with a BSOD as it boots up, or it’s just not working at all well when it has apparently booted up fully. – The screen is scrambled, there are things missing, whatever.

This time we’re going to try something else. Does your computer crash and restart or go to a BSOD? Does your computer automatically restart when it crashes? There’s nothing wrong about that in itself, but if it does so then you don’t get the chance to read the data presented on the BSOD. The first thing we need to do is to stop the computer from automatically restarting every time it crashes, in order that you can study the BSOD.

If the computer doesn’t go to a BSOD or automatically restart, but just doesn’t work properly when it’s fully booted for whatever reason then see Part Three of this series. (Still to be written at time of writing: It won’t be long before it’s produced though.)

Go to the Windows Advanced Options Menu and use the up and down arrow keys to select “Disable automatic restart on system failure”. Press Enter¬. Allow the computer to reboot and to crash again. You should now be able to study the blue screen. (BSOD)

On the blue screen you’ll see the reason why the computer crashed, some tips which might or might not help, and some “Technical Information”, aka gibberish. The gibberish is probably the most important part of it all. First, though, try following the stated tips to whatever extent possible. I suggest photographing the blue screen with a digital camera: You might need the information later on, and the screen might not be accessible at the time you need it.

If that particular computer is the only one you have then you’ll need to use a neighbour’s computer, or an internet cafe’, public library computer, whatever, for the next bit: –

Type the stop error code into Google.

You’ll find the stop error code in “Technical Information” on the blue screen. In the example above the stop error code is the alphanumerical sequence 0x000000D1 : -

***  STOP  0x000000D1   (0×000…

Type that code into Google and it’ll return reams of information on the error; exactly what it is, what it might be, what causes it, what people think, …

You might even find a solution there. If it’s a driver issue, however, you need to identify which driver it is that’s causing the BSOD to occur. When you’ve done that we need to remove that driver before we can restart the machine and boot into Windows proper. To do this we go into the Windows Advanced Options Menu, and use the up and down arrow keys to select “Safe Mode”. Press Enter¬.

Safe Mode is a mode where Windows runs without loading all the drivers. Essentially it loads a minimal set of drivers that are essential for it to operate, and no more. On the basis of that, ‘chances are that the driver causing the BSOD won’t be loaded, and therefore Windows will boot into Safe Mode.

Whilst in Safe Mode, having identified the driver that’s causing the issue; go into Device Manager and remove that driver. Having done so, restart the computer.

Depending upon which driver it is; Windows will either reinstall one that works from the i386 folder on the hard drive and load it at boot, or it’ll start without it and let you know. If it starts without it then the piece of hardware that the driver pertained to will be severely limited in function if it works at all. It’ll be using any default driver that comes with the OS. You’ll need to manually reinstall a driver in this case – But I do suggest that you go to the device manufacturer’s website and download/install the latest driver for the device in question.

If the driver was a specialised keyboard or mouse driver then you may have to do a repair reinstallation of Windows before you can load the new driver.

A graphics card should still work in a very limited fashion using the default drivers that come with the OS. To get it working properly again you should install the latest driver from the manufacturer’s website.