Thinkpads Forum

System: X61, WinXP SP3, ThinkVantage Access Connections v5.12

My X61 is great. I have multiple offices and travel quite a bit for my work. On-the-road performance is excellent. However, in one of my offices I have an X6 Ultrabase and every time I place my X61 into it, after a few seconds I get a BSOD. After the reboot everything is fine.

I use ThinkVantage Access Connections for switching between various network configurations and I'm 99% sure that this utility is the cause of my problems. The BSOD occurs every time as the new connection (through the Ultrabase) is established.

Things I've tried: a second Ultrabase (ruling out hardware issues in the base), every available update from Lenovo and Microsoft, docking in standby and "live", and every switch I can find in Access Connections.

I'd be grateful for any help I can get from this forum.

If you disable both network interfaces (From Network Connections - the "Local Area Connection" and the wireless one) (right-click, toggle each to disabled) just prior to docking, does it still crash the O/S with a STOP error? I'm thinking a possible explanation is a device driver that doesn't like to change states - suspend/hibernate or dock/undock. I've seen Access Connections do funny things, but I haven't seen it be the root cause to cause a PC to restart from a bugcheck. Though I don't rule it out. I have seen failing motherboards do this. I've also seen the symptom follow a speecific docking station that is going bad. Some of the other guys like Bill Bolton see more computers on a day-to-day basis and can perhaps add some more to the discussion.

Thanks for the reply. I'm now in a different office until Sunday but I'll try disabling all network interfaces before I dock.

There is a bug in the microsoft xp kernel that creates this behavior when docking adds or switches to a secondary (external) display. I fought this as well until Microsoft posted a hotfix.

Take a look at the article -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/959252

and see if that doesn't fix you up. If you're running an outboard display, this is most likely what's happening.

Cheers,
Acey

Thanks so much for trying to help. I *am* running an external display so I was quite hopeful that this would solve my problem. When I went to the KB article I was a little dismayed to see that the reported error code doesn't match mine (I've been getting 0x0000007E and the hotfix relates to 0x0000008E) but I installed the patch anyway. Alas, I still got my familiar blue screen when I docked this morning.

During the day I had to go to a meeting and come back again. Sure enough, another blue screen when I redocked. I've seen a new code this week though and the error message read as follows:
Still hoping the collective wisdom and experience of the experts gathered on this forum might be able to shed some light on this. Failing that, it's going to be a complete reinstallation which is such a PITA.

Thanks again AceyMan for the hard work and PM.

This post makes me think that the problem might be related to the wall jack I'm using. I've got all the same errors listed in my event log.

Also, these errors appear around the same time as my machine crashes:

BREAKING NEWS:

I've just discovered the following "information" message in my system event log at the same time as every crash:

Still getting my BSODs every time I dock. I've removed VMWare Player because of various indications that this was the issue but the problem remains. Does anyone have any other ideas?

I am sometime so absorbed in life that I just work-around some computer problem without even realizing I have a problem. I currently use the dock only to watch movies. No external monitor attached to the dock, I still have VMWare player installed and I do not have Access Connections installed. For roughly the past 2 weeks (don't really recall when the problem began), every time I attach the computer to the dock I get a BSOD. Reboot solves the problem. The message I get is that there is some bad memory and the OS is protecting me from it. (Sort of sounds like the government.) I am running WinXP SP3, with 3 Gig of memory. It may be a hardware memory problem or it may be that some memory address, which use to be available for apps, is now verboten due to a 'security' improvement.

Sometime after the arrival of Windows 95/98, I realized that the majority of my computer problems were related to MS and other companies implementing DRM improvements, though the companies seemed reluctant to accept credit for their labors. This century, most of my problems seem related to security 'improvements'.

You could try swapping or reducing the installed memory to see if the problem lessens.

Based on some advice from here I have uninstalled Sonic DLA. This morning I've had 2 successful docks without a BSOD. I've had the issue disappear for a day or two in the past before it recurs so I'm going to wait a week before declaring this "the solution". Fingers crossed though!