The poop hit the fan last night. Here's what happened.

I purchased an OEM 750GB hard drive because I need more space on my desktop system. I have also been in "housekeeping mode" the last few days, installing new drivers for things have stagnated for a while. I have a Matrox TripleHEad2Go Digital Edition that I use in single-screen mode on the Windows desktop. I want to send 1280x960 through the TripleHead2Go, at an ideal refresh rate of 85 Hz (I still use CRTs).

The old version of GXM software (Matrox's configuration utility for the TripleHead2Go) didn't allow 1280x960 at all, so I installed the latest GXM. This offered 1280x960, but only at a 60 Hz refresh rate. On a 21" CRT monitor 60Hz is painful, so I moved along on my search. I installed the latest TripleHead2Go firmware, backing up my older firmware. However, during the firmware install the screen connected to the TripleHead2Go went black and never displayed an image again. I found the firmware update window hiding on this screen, dragged it over to a working monitor, and saw that it wanted me to restart the system. So I did.

When the system POSTed after the reboot I turned it off and put in the new 750 GB hard drive, since I don't power down a lot. Booting up again, the monitor connected to the TripleHead2Go worked outside of Windows and I could see the Windows XP splash screen. However, the system blue-screened after the splash screen and rebooted. At first I thought that the connection of the new single SATA HDD had messed with my bootable RAID 0 array, so I disconnected the new hard drive and booted again. Another blue-screen. I also tried to boot to Safe Mode with the same results.

Then I figured that the TripleHead2Go may somehow be causing this. I suspected that it wasn't working right, but didn't think what amounts to a monitor could blue-screen Windows XP. Despite this I disconnected the TripleHead2Go's USB cable and also unplugged the DVI cable feeding the TripleHead2Go. Now my system was in a state where only the existing hard drives were connected and the new primary display was a monitor connected to my primary GPU's other output. This should cause no problems whatsoever, but still the system blue-screened after the Windows splash screen. Again I tried Safe Mode and still got blue screens.

Since I want to get in the habit of drive images for quicker OS rebuilds and since I just got this big drive with which I can implement a better backup scheme, I decided to reformat and reinstall Windows, which would give me a baseline Windows install that I could feel comfortable making an image of (something I could not say for the existing install).


So, I connected the TripleHead2Go in full, connected the new 750 GB hard drive, popped in the Windows CD, and let it do its thing. Installation was uneventful except for the fact that it was stretched over three monitors (something the TripleHead2Go can do at very low single-screen resolutions). The first thing I did in Windows was install the onboard ethernet adapter from the motherboard CD, then go to Windows update. Windows got some minor updates and rebooted, then I went back to Windows Update and installed SP2. At the same time I downloaded and installed the nVidia 191.07 drivers, the latest, so I could get normal resolutions back and stop the stretching.

When Windows rebooted after these installations it again blue-screened. Thoroughly frustrated at this point, I started memtest and went to bed. I woke up this morning to see zero errors after 15 passes.


What's going on here? What should I do next?
My other hardware is:
Intel Core2Duo @ 2.53GHz
Asus P5K Pro MB
4GB DDR2-1066
640MB 8800GTS
128MB 8400GS
2x36GB Raptor HDDs in RAID 0
Audigy 2 ZS

I can tell you Win 7 has a built in imaging system that I've read was bought or licensed from Acronis and absolutely works great. I installed Win 7 on a 320Gb drive and imaged it. Then changed my drive to a 1Tb and restored the image to that drive. Beautiful.

Okay...

Adding the new 750GB Drive IMHO had nothing to do with the initial BSOD. My usual operating maxim is that BSODs happen when bad drivers are added (or incompletely installed).

The only software you changed was the TH2G, and even as you unplugged it you had left the drivers on the system. Maybe completely removing those in Safe Mode would have spared you the reinstall.

For the new installation to BSOD again is more than a curious coincidence. Again, I would say totally disconnect the TH2G, uninstall the Nvidia drivers, see if you can get a normal boot. Then work your way from there.

Also, what files are in your C:\WINDOWS\Minidump directory? What does the Blue Screen actually say (can you get a digital photograph?) I have software at work - sadly I'm currently on sick leave, but I could do that remote for you - which reads these minidump files and gives a probable cause. We can work from there.

Speedbump, I'm not sure the new W7 imaging system (which already was in Vista) is really from Acronis. It's different in how it uses the native VHD file structure. But a great tool, I completely agree with that, and more than plenty of function for my monthly drive image backup.

But I couldn't even boot to Safe Mode.

With the reinstall I also cannot boot to Safe Mode, so I can't uninstall anything.

Can I access these files through the Windows XP CD's recovery console? Because otherwise I have no way of accessing the contents of this folder.

Oh sorry, I overlooked that you couldn't get into Safe Mode either. My bad. Makes my question my guess of Display/TH2G Driver as culprit since these should not be active in Safe mode, IMHO.

I'm not really good with the Recovery Console Commands, so my best bet (other than a new reinstall) would be to mount the disk externally or in a second system and get to these files. It's not guaranteed that they will tell us something, but usually they give a reasonable close guess - either the name of a driver file, or some memory problem or what else you may have.

Easier maybe to try and read/photograph the actual BSOD message for now.

OS partition is a RAID 0 array - not mountable in another system...

Hi Joe. I wouldn't rule out the hard drive yet, you probably know XP has a lot of issues installing harddrives mid-setup when those HD's are in RAID/AHCI configuration. In fact, it sounds like either Windows or your BIOS changed a setting related to hard drive configuration. This would explain why you continue to get BSODs even after the hard drive. Note, I've seen related problems for AHCI drives, but haven't done RAID, so I don't pretend to be any authority on this issue...just trying to help =/

First off, try a fresh install with only a direct connection to 1 monitor (any that didn't go black), with the THG completely disconnected, although I don't think the firmware flash was responsible. Check that all drives are configured as RAID/AHCI (as appropriate) in the BIOS. Download any new RAID/AHCI/Storage drivers your chipset manufacturer has before the reinstall, and install them using the F6 floppy method when the installation CD loads. When you get to a working Windows, check device manager to make sure that Windows is correctly identifying the drives as RAID/AHCI and not trying to make the new one IDE. Also make sure Computer Management is seeing the drives period.

If that is working after a few reboots, image the drive before installing the THG. You might also want to research whether your board/chipset has any known quirks when it comes to having a RAID setup along with a single HDD operating on its lonesome.

Reminds me why I don't do Raid...

Can you get us the Blue Screen message/error code?

Phoenix,

Your breakdown seems like a good idea. I will tackle it over the weekend.


RSC,
The blue screen flashes very quickly and then goes away. I tried a few times to get a picture of it, but my reaction time isn't fast enough.

I've been using an OS installed on a RAID 0 array for 6 years now. I installed Windows 5 or 6 times on 3 different motherboards (all with different RAID controllers) and I've never had a problem other than the usual frustration of having to find and/or make the floppy disk needed for Windows installation.

Ah yes - the wonderful XP feature of automatically rebooting so you can't see the error message. The first thing you ought to do when reinstalling is to disable automatic reboot on error.

I'm afraid right now there's little left to do besides follow Phoenixs advice and start from scratch.

I agree along the lines of Phoenix:

Fresh install of XP (don't use your image since you've already experienced a failure with it) with the new OEM harddrive removed and TH2G unistalled. Bring yourself to a baseline condition were your sure everything is working correctly then install new harddrive, confirm operation, then TH2G, confirm operation, etc.

I doubt a bios setting was changed unless you've update that in your "housekeeping" mode.

If your still getting blue screens with a baseline install then I would suspect fist a fault with the RAID system. Blue screens during Win startup would indicate a drive error to me.

Hey Joe,

If your Windows works when you reinstall it, be sure to right click My Computer/properties/go to the Advanced tab/startup and recovery settings/select small memory dump (instead of the default kernel) and uncheck automatic restart.

If you can't get that far and still have BSODs, you can always access your drive from the recovery console, and copy the contents of c:\windows\minidump to a flash drive and email it to me so I can read the error code.

yes, mini-dumps save alot of time when it comes to the windows logo (oops I meant BSOD) on the screen.

Thanks for the advice, guys. This weekend was so busy that I hardly saw my computer at all, let alone tried to fix anything. Tonight's time is budgeted for reinstall(s) and troubleshooting, however, and I will be sure to follow all of the tips given. Will report back later.

Time for an update.

Last night I removed my secondary GPU and my sound card from my motherboard, then disconnected the TripleHead2Go and plugged in a single monitor directly to my primary GPU. The 750 GB HDD had already been disconnected.

I then booted to the Windows Recovery Console and ran a chkdsk /r on my RAID 0 array. At the completion of this I saw the message that chkdsk had identified some bad sectors and had repaired them. So far so good; maybe hard drive troubles were the root cause of my issues.

Then I reformatted (full, not quick) the RAID 0 array and installed Windows XP on it. I imaged this clean installation, then installed all of the Windows Updates. I imaged this state of my system as well. I set the system to not automatically restart and to store small memory dumps. I didn't see any blue screens or other trouble at all the whole time.

Then I shut down, connected the new 750 GB HDD, and rebooted. No issues there, either. The drive formatted without difficulty and I installed a few small apps on it (Firefox, AVG, etc.). Then I installed the 191.07 nVidia drivers and rebooted. All worked well here as well. I proceeded to install hardware and drivers for my sound card next, then put the secondary GPU back in and set up a multi-monitor environment.

Everything worked fine. Finally I put the TripleHead2Go back into the loop, and still the system booted fine. The only problem I have left is a weird one with the TripleHead2Go. It seems that it will display triplehead resolutions just fine on all screens (e.g. 3072x768) but will not properly display the equivalent single screen resolution on the center screen (e.g. 1024x768). Instead of a desktop image the monitor is just dark green (not off or on standby, though). I suspect this has to do with the newly flashed firmware that coincided with the beginning of all of these issues, but I have more playing around to do.

Glad to hear you are sorted. I'd have loved to see one of the Dump files, but I'm not good enough with the Recovery Console. Maybe Phoenix could explain the process here how to copy them over.

What are you using to image your drive, btw? Remember, never defrag the drive with the system images on it, those files love to become corrupt on defrag.

I bought Acronis True Image 2010 along with a second 750GB drive and an external enclosure.

When I get everything set up, Acronis will image my desktop drives weekly and store the images on the server. The server's RAID 1 array will also be imaged and stored on the external drive. Then the external drive will be removed from the house (stored at my office or at my parents' place) and I'll bring it back every once in a while to update the image archive.

Well, chalk part of this problem up to plain stupidity on my part.

The older TripleHead2Go firmware displayed a single-screen resolution on the center monitor by default. The new firmware displays this image on the left monitor by default, but this can be easily swapped with the Matrox software.

I didn't know (or more appropriately, forgot from a long time ago) that this occured, and thus I was left with a blank center monitor not understanding what was happening. There was never any firmware issue to begin with (which makes the bluescreen problems that much weirder).

Anyway, I'm getting all of my apps installed and soon I'll be back to normal. Thanks for everyone's help.