I have been experiencing system lock ups and the famous Blue Screen of Death about 1 3 times per day for over a month. Since I started keeping a log on Dec 13th I have had 16 lock-ups, 23 BSODs and 1 instance where the computer spontaneously rebooted.
I am using Windows XP on a new Dell XPS400 with an 80 Gbyte hard drive, 1 Gbyte RAM and MS Windows XP Media Center OS. I have talked to Dells support dept numerous times. They had me perform a RAM test and a hard drive test and neither indicated any problems. Based on the error messages they said I had some software which was not behaving properly or was colliding with the OS or some other software. But they could not tell me which application was the culprit.
On Dec 17th they walked me through resetting the system to the state it was in when I received it mid Nov. I re-installed the applications I normally use and the next day it locked-up and had one BSOD and these problems continued as before.
The lock-ups occur when the computer is idle, i.e. not running any of my applications except the 50 or so processes running in the background.
The BSODs have occurred when I played Spider Solitaire (resident on the computer as delivered), internet activities and Windows Explorer. The error messages mentioned a hex addressed ending in 07E, 08E, 0BE, 0BF, and 0D1.
Two times the message stated that the error could have been caused by file intelC52.sys. (There are three instances of this file in the PC).
I have concluded that Dell can not solve this problem so I am seeking help.
I looked on the web and found several registry cleaners. I downloaded one which found some stuff but nothing changed.
So, what should I do? Is there a list of applications which are incompatible with XP? Should I get a program like Norton Utilities? Is the registry likely the culprit?
What about viruses, spy ware, adware? Is there some magic utility which can find the problem?
Please help.
