bad device driver...

[kpgirl]

I have a GW computer with AMD processor, Radeon ATI 32MB SDR, Hitachi/LG DVD and CD-ROM, LexMark Z42 printer, and XP OS.
My system crashes INconsistently and often, and i am unable to load new software (ie... .NET) more often than not. Crashes while loading software are also inconsistent.

The only consistent factor is that after crashing MS tells me i have a bad device driver. I have the most current drivers that i know of for all my hardware and have made sure that they are the recommended drivers for XP.

Has anybody experienced anything similar or does anyone have any info that would help me to determine which driver is causing my problems? (or if its really a device driver at all?)

Any help would be great!!

 

[dave holbon]

Without knowing anything about your machine, bad device drivers usually hail from hell in the following order: -

1. Video drivers or anything connected to an AGP slot
2. Printer drivers
3. BIOS out of date (Technically now a set of device drivers in firmware)

First thing I’d do after the above is go into your BIOS and select “Load Optimised Defaults”.

Make sure that AGP 2 (for now) is selected, disable fast AGP writes.

If you have a sound card installed make sure that the on board sound is disabled, if you have an internal modem then COM 2 must also be disabled.

Resource conflicts prevent a device from working.
If two devices are in conflict for a system resource, try any of these strategies to resolve the problem:
1. With PCI devices, try swapping cards, two at a time, between PCI slots. On some motherboards, IRQs and other resources are assigned on a per-slot basis, and moving a card can free up the proper resources. Check the motherboard documentation to see which IRQs are assigned to each slot and experiment until you find an arrangement that works.

2. If the conflict is caused by a legacy (ISA) device, replace it with a Plug and Play-compatible PCI device.

3. Use jumpers or a software utility to change settings on a legacy device so that it reserves a different set of resources. You will need documentation from the manufacturer to accomplish this goal.

If you have problems with PCI devices, the device itself might not be to blame. When drivers and ACPI BIOS code interact improperly, conflicts can result. Check for an updated hardware driver (especially if the current driver is unsigned) and look for a BIOS update as well, as already mentioned.

Please post you exact machine spec's.

 

[WAM]

just about everything on your computer has a device driver associated with it, so youd probably need to elaborate on the error messages.

If your getting frequent INconsistencies there could be more than just drivers causing problems...you may find it best to do a complete re-install of winxp, but only after youve exhausted all other possibilities...i am assuming the sytem worked ok at one point in time right?

 

[kpgirl]

Hey thanks for the help. Some simple changes to my bios fixed the major problems. (I've re-installed XP several times over past months without any effect... I also flashed my bios to a newer version awhile back. Had to flash it back to the old version. Good ole Gateway products...)

I still have some problems to resolve but your input was really helpful.