This will deliver a longer and more detailed report that may offer possible clues. If this happens then click in the command window immediately above the status bar, type the commandĪnd press. Occasionally WinDbg can't name any file at all, or just chooses a core Windows DLL.
#How to diagnose blue screen windows 7 drivers
If the program has identified software or drivers that you've installed then you might want to try uninstalling or updating them, just to see if that fixes the problem.
If this happens then Google for the file name, and find out where it's originated. Normally you'll get an answer within a few minutes, though, a line near the bottom of the Bugcheck Analysis that says something like "Probably caused by: thisfile.sys".
#How to diagnose blue screen windows 7 Pc
If you're analysing 4 GB of RAM on an underpowered PC then it might take a very long time to complete, even hours, so you might want to leave it running overnight. WinDbg provides very little feedback to tell you what it's doing, unfortunately, and you might think that program has locked up. The program will immediately begin analysing the file. Then launch WinDbg again (Windows Vista users should right-click its shortcut and select Run As Administrator), click File > Open Crash Dump, and open the file \Windows\MEMORY.DMP. Now wait until a blue screen crash occurs, and your PC has rebooted. Click OK when you're done, then click File > Exit, selecting "Yes" when asked to save the workspace (which means the symbols path you've just added). In the box, say, and symbols will be downloaded from and stored in the c:\symbols folder. The debugging tools need to download data called "symbols" from Microsoft to help them make sense of your crash file, and you'll give them the appropriate URL here. Right-click Computer and select Properties, click Advanced System Settings > Startup and Recovery Settings > and make sure "Write debugging information" is set to "Kernel memory dump" or "Complete memory dump".Ĭlick Start > All Programs > Debugging Tools > WinDbg, then select File > Symbol File Path. You'll need Windows to save your memory when crashes occur to provide information for the debugger, so it's important that Windows is configured correctly.
The debugging tools aren't quite as reliable in the Windows 7 beta, but can work according to our tests, so if you're trying to diagnose problems with the beta then they may be worth a try. The program works on everything from ancient Windows NT 4 PCs right up to Windows 2008, so you shouldn't have any problems. Download the Debugging Tools from their home on the Microsoft site.