Trouble activating Process Lasso 6

[vineyridge]

I got the program from Giveaways of the Day.  I've had it before on one other computer with absolutely no problems at all.

Computer is a very old (2000) Thinkpad 600x laptop, which has been a real workhorse.  Fairly quick and very reliable.  Very small HD and PIIIE processor.

After loading, installing and following the activation instructions, instead turning Process Lasso off and on, I just turned the whole computer off.  This morning I booted and all seemed fine.  The little Process Lasso graph was in the Task Bar.  I was connected to the internet through my dial up connection.  Left the computer for a moment, and when I came back there was a blue screen of death with the message that there was a page fault in a non-page area and computer was dumping the physical memory to save the machine.  The computer was locked up so I could not turn it off with the on-off button;  I had use reset to turn it off. 

Rebooted.  Process Lasso sent the traffic light icon to the task bar, but it did not turn into the graph.  Got an error report request from Microsoft, so I sent one, and got back a message that the error report was corrupted, which meant a serious software or hardware problem.  Exited Process Lasso and also disabled it from starting at boot.

I've just backed up the laptop in case there is something going on other than the install of Process Lasso, which is the only new software that has gone on for quite some time. 

I should probably mention that the laptop inexplicably closed a program called Speccy and something called WMI after I had closed Process Lasso but not rebooted.

[Hotrod]

I'm not familiar with the newer notebooks and pads, but on the older systems this sometimes could be fixed by doing the full 5 step error scan that runs at boot up before loading anything into memory.

[Jeremy Collake]

Any BSOD is caused by a fault by kernel mode code. A protected mode OS is divided into 'layers'. At the lowest layer is kernel mode code. At the highest is application level code. Process Lasso operates ENTIRELY at the application level. At that level you can NOT cause blue screens. Your BSOD could have been a hardware component overheating, a driver bug, or some random kernel mode crash - but not the cause of Process Lasso. If there was any possibility, I'd explore it, but I can tell you this right now.

[BenYeeHua]

I think the most possible that causing this BSOD is RAM.
As it will causing the minidump(error report) corrupt, and always the cause of the BSOD.
The only way to find out is using memtest86+ to testing the RAM.

[Hotrod]

Microsoft has a memory diagnostics tool that you can download to a CD or DVD and run at boot up before anything is loaded into RAM. There are different tools for each version of windows so just do a google search for "microsoft memory diagnostic" and choose the one for your system. Be sure it is hosted by microsoft to avoid malware.

[BenYeeHua]

After Google about it, I found it only support to check the first 4GB?

[Hotrod]

I checked again and you are correct. I never saw this limitation as I had only used it on XP systems previously. You could remove and install only 4G at a time to find the offending board. I did notice that even Microsoft's site recommends using Memtest86 first, and using their own utility as a second opinion.

[Jeremy Collake]

Yes, you guys are exactly right, RAM corruption is the most common 'deadly killer'. It can be caused by overclocking, or sometimes interference because your motherboard just can't handle that much RAM running at that frequency (though most motherboard's downclock/downspeed your RAM in those situations). That is why Microsoft added the Memory Diagnostic, something easily invokable within Windows, which induces a reboot and test. I should mention this more often to those who come to me with issues like this.

That is why high end servers have ECC RAM. That is, error correcting. They use a parity bit, e.g. hamming code. This single additional bit allows for correction of any other bits in the byte.

Back to CPU temperature: I would advise running a continuous CPU temperature meter. Perhaps I will add one to Process Lasso, though there are specialized tools that do very well. I like Open Hardware Monitor. It can display whatever in the system tray. After a while, the mere dust build-up in the heatsink, PSU, or case fan causes inadequate ventilation and overheating. Intel CPUs slow down a bit better than AMD CPUs, though both do slow down in overheating conditions. Still, if the CPU is overheating, other components may be as well. It takes a single byte to be corrupted to cause a crash.

[edkiefer]

memtest64 seems to be better at catching errors than others .

With ram so cheap and many using 8-32gig you have to be careful if your populating all 4 dimm slots or your using HD modulars .

example if you get 2x 8gig kits (4 sticks) with voltage of 1.5v and timings of 9, 9 ,9 in SPD ,you may have to up the Vdim voltage at bit (1.5-1.55v) or loosen the timings to get all the ram stable .

[BenYeeHua]

Yup, and I has seen many of them which buying 4 Memory Kit Ram and still getting BSOD which cause by RAM.

[edkiefer]

yup, could be a MB issue , plus now with Intel memory controller is on die and it seems to be more sensitive than NB types .

[BenYeeHua]

And the Power Supply too.