Topic: PC BSOD after New Belfryboy Logger Installed

[alexstaar]

Shortly after purchasing a new USB logger for my Davis VP2 from Belfryboy, my PC started crashing intermittently. I have a Dell XPS 410 purchased in the summer of 2007. It was my dad's old office computer that he gave to me when he didn't need it anymore. Being an old office computer, the hard drive had a lot of stuff on it, but had plenty of space on it; so I just went ahead and installed Cumulus and moved all my data over to the old hard drive. At the time, I was using a WL IP logger and it worked ok, but there were occasional connectivity issues and I wanted something a bit more reliable. I opted to purchase the new logger from Belfryboy based on all the positive reviews. I got the logger and set it up with the WL software without any issues and the logger was and still is working great with Cumulus! I really do like the logger, but I believe the driver for it may be causing the crashes since they started shortly after installing it. The crashes could happen as often as 2 or 3 times per day or it could go 2 weeks without crashing at all. All the STOP error codes are always different. The most recent one said Page Fault in Non-Paged Area, but there have been all kinds of errors that have showed up before. I have PM Belfryboy, but I figured I would start a new thread in case someone in the future had a problem.

I have a few computer savvy friends that have tried to help me troubleshoot the issue. We ran a bunch of memory and video card tests, but they all passed. I then thought maybe since the hard drive was so old and heavily used that I should replace it. So I bought a Solid State Drive and had Windows 7 installed on it (the HDD ran Windows Vista). After getting all the drivers installed everything seemed to be flawless, then just a few days later, the crashes started again. We then swapped out the video card, crashes continued. I changed the RAM sticks around, crashes continued. One interesting thing happened about a week ago... While I was out of town for a couple days, Cumulus suddenly lost contact with the console/logger while the USB was still plugged in and the computer hadn't been touched. I stupidly had it set to not restart if it lost contact with the station so all my data to WU was really messed up  When I finally got home to restart it, Cumulus wouldn't close. I tried using the task manager to kill it and it still wouldn't close. It just kept saying "Cumulus is Not Responding." So I unplugged the logger and it immediately closed. I thought that was a bit strange.

A few other things I should mention is that I have a Logitech webcam. I thought the problem was with that at first, but after unplugging it for several weeks, crashes continued. I also have a Weather Wizard III with WL serial hooked up through a serial to USB converter to WL 6.0.3. I have been running that set up well before I got the Belfryboy logger, so I don't think that is the issue. I have gone through all my drivers and they are all up to date.

Apologies for the long post, I've just been dealing with this for several months now and it's getting old. It just want to get to the bottom of it once and for all! Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[ValentineWeather]

Just a thought about the Logitech some others have reported BSOD and similar lock ups, try killing all Logitech processes running in the background. Unplugging camera may not do it.

See this recent thread http://www.wxforum.net/index.php?topic=27124.msg261344#msg261344

[Jáchym]

I would suggest the exact same thing I suggested in the other thread:



BSOD is most commonly due to HW problems, quite often some driver etc.

It would be quite useful if you wrote down the code of the error and posted it here. Also, usually after BSOD when you turn on your PC, Win loads and you get a message "Windows has recovered from a serious error...blabla" and you can view the log file, which also includes info about what exactly happened - or at least what caused the error, which can then be used to diagnose the problem.

[alexstaar]

I just exited out of the logitech software. I think it has been running in the background. I'll give that a try and see if it doesn't crash again. Just checked the .dmp files and all of them showed the crash was caused by driver "ntoskrnl.exe" and caused by address "ntoskrnl.exe+735c0". A few of them had 2 drivers as the cause including the one NT Kernel and System driver. The Bug Check String message is always something different, the crash from today said System Service Exception. So what is that driver that is causing the crashes driving? Is that what you meant by the code of the error? There are also a bunch of 0s and letters, would those be helpful to post as well? Thanks.

[ValentineWeather]

Ctrl. alt. del. will let you look at processes running. Problem is identifying all you need to kill, especially if it doesn't say logitech. It might be attached to multiple processes.
I would take the extra step and uninstall software for now. Then double check processes running just to make sure nothing is tagged with logitech still running.
 
If problem continues after uninstall you have a different issue.

[alexstaar]

I uninstalled all Logitech drivers and programs yesterday. I checked the task manager processes and there was nothing on it mentioning a webcam or logitech. Windows crashed again this morning with a Blue Screen (occasionally there is no blue screen, it just freezes the screen and the data stops flowing to WU). I will leave the webcam unplugged for now, but that further solidifies my thinking that the webcam is not causing these crashes. So now the question is how do I isolate and find the driver that is causing these crashes? Would the only way to determine if the logger/logger driver is causing crashes be to unplug it for a period of time? I would hate to have my weather station offline for that long...

[ValentineWeather]

Only thing I can think of is try a restore point sometime ago before it started having issues. I'm sure others may have ideas also.

[Jáchym]

I uninstalled all Logitech drivers and programs yesterday. I checked the task manager processes and there was nothing on it mentioning a webcam or logitech. Windows crashed again this morning with a Blue Screen (occasionally there is no blue screen, it just freezes the screen and the data stops flowing to WU). I will leave the webcam unplugged for now, but that further solidifies my thinking that the webcam is not causing these crashes. So now the question is how do I isolate and find the driver that is causing these crashes? Would the only way to determine if the logger/logger driver is causing crashes be to unplug it for a period of time? I would hate to have my weather station offline for that long...

Which is exactly why I suggested right from the beginning to have a look at the error code and dump file....

[alexstaar]

Jachym, here are the most recent crash error codes from this morning...

Time: 8:42am
Bug Check String: ATTEMPTED_WRITE_TO_READONLY_MEMORY
Bug Check Code: 0x000000be
Parameter 1: fffff880'056b48b0
Parameter 2: 00000000'7bc63121
Parameter 3: fffff880'04653f80
Parameter 4: 00000000'0000000b
Caused By Driver: nvlddmkm.sys
Caused By Address: nvlddmkm.sys+a68b0
Crash Address: ntoskrnl.exe+735c0

I would say about half of the Bug Check String messages say "System Service Exception". I can also upload a .dmp file if anyone has the ability to dig deeper into for me

[Bushman]

nvlddmkm.sys is a video card driver.  Maybe corrupted?  Reload the card drivers.

[alexstaar]

I can try to update the video card driver again, but we swapped out the video card for one we know works well and the crashes continued so we put the original one back in.

[alexstaar]

The crashes are not all caused by the same driver. Here's a full list of all the drivers the crashes have been caused by according to the .dmp file while running Windows 7 on the new SSD:

afd.sys
dxgmms1.sys
iaStorV.sys
Ntfs.sys
ntoskrnl.exe
nvlddmkm.sys
USBPORT.SYS
win32k.sys

The last four are the most common. Here are the crashes caused by drivers from the old HDD running Vista before I swapped everything over to the new SSD running Windows 7:

(blank)
hal.dll
NETIO.SYS
ntkrnlpa.exe (this was the very first crash)
usbehci.sys
win32k.sys

[alexstaar]

Upon some more interrogation of my devices list, I checked the drivers used for both of my USB to Serial converters attached the my PC (the Serial WL from the Wizard III and Belfryboy logger from the VP2). Both of the converters had the driver "serenum.sys" listed among others. I have a feeling that driver would run into a problem if both software programs used (WL 6.0.3 and Cumulus) were trying to summon data via the same driver from 2 different devices simultaneously. However, none of the .dmp files have listed that driver as the cause of the crash. I do have 1 serial port on the PC (my original laptop I used did not have one, so I had to get the converter) so if the devices can't share the driver, that is an option.

[Bushman]

DBAN.  Start with a new clean install.  You could waste a lifetime sorting the drivers out.  Add new stuff one-at-a-tiime.  And check HW compatibility first (video card etc.)

[alexstaar]

If you read my original post, when the crashes started I was running Windows Vista on a HDD. I swapped everything over to a SSD running Windows 7. A clean install did not have any affect on the crashes. The crashes started again shortly after installing Windows 7.

[hankster]

If you read my original post, when the crashes started I was running Windows Vista on a HDD. I swapped everything over to a SSD running Windows 7. A clean install did not have any affect on the crashes. The crashes started again shortly after installing Windows 7.

If you changed the HDD and OS then I would say there has to be a hardware issue and not a driver issue. I'd start by resetting the BIOS to factory than maybe swapping memory out. I could be the video card or any other accessory card installed. The computer is 8 years old and has been heavily used. You might just have to consider it could be something like a motherboard gone bad and figure out for yourself if it is worth trying to repair.

Heck, you could get a new laptop or desktop for $300 that would outperform that XPS 410.

[alexstaar]

I have considered replacing the motherboard. That is a somewhat involved process and since the computer is so old, I haven't been able to find readily available new motherboards for the XPS 410 at a reasonable price. It hasn't crashed for a couple days now. When it crashes again, I will try using the serial port to plug the Wizard III directly into instead of running it through a usb converter.

[Bushman]

I have found that resurrecting old hardware simply ain;t worth it.  Take the SSD and W& and pop them onto a new white box.

[alexstaar]

A computer savvy friend of my refurbishes and sells computers. I'll probably just end up buying one from him and swap the SSD over. I agree, Bushman. By time I spend time and money on this older computer, I might as well just buy a cheep but reliable computer from him.

[alexstaar]

Just an update to this thread... I purchased a refurbished computer from a friend of mine and moved over all of my data. Upon opening up the computer that was crashing intermittently, we noticed 2 capacitors on the motherboard that were leaking out of the top. It's possible those could have been the culprit to the random crashes and that coincidentally started happening at the same time of the new logger install. All is well with the new (refurbished) computer!