Windows Stability

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#1 Post by **jdhurst** » Thu Aug 16, 2007 8:02 pm

I read a lot in here about stability and crashing.

I have been running NT-based systems since 1999. Except for SP5 for NT4 that caused Autochk to run for nothing (a non-crashing Blue Screen) that did not occur in SP4 or in SP6, I have not had an NT-based system Blue Screen and crash on me. That is almost nine years now. And the desktop systems (two of them) ran or are running 7x24 non-stop. (I have had occasional hardware problems)

Am I alone in this claim?

... JDH

#2 Post by **tomh009** » Thu Aug 16, 2007 8:11 pm

Bad hardware (and drivers) can cause any OS to crash. Most of my blue screens on desktop systems in the past could be traced back to failing hardware.

On my X31, the only blue screen I can think of was triggered by the third-party Omega drivers. Then there were times when some poorly-written drivers would hog all available CPU and I would need to power cycle to get out of it. Ugh.

No problems on Vista yet, but it's only been about two weeks.

#3 Post by **jdhurst** » Thu Aug 16, 2007 8:42 pm

My two desktops were/are: (1) an IBM 300PL that came with NT4 and a free upgrade to Windows 2000 which I exercised and (2) my current IBM NetVista A30 that is still running. IBM Desktop drivers have always been excellent for me, and I do attribute my crash-free success to the IBM hardware. For the same reason, I only use ThinkPads. ... JDH

#4 Post by **tomh009** » Thu Aug 16, 2007 9:08 pm

On the desktops, the only problem drivers were the video drivers in the early days of NT. Otherwise ... bad memory will cause problems anywhere. As will flaky disks.

#5 Post by **carbon_unit** » Thu Aug 16, 2007 9:34 pm

jd: you are probably much more careful with your system than the average user. The user and the hardware are most of the equation. It takes a user to install crappy software like "butterfly screensaver, "Stop sign software", etc.

arni · #6 Post by **arni** » Fri Aug 17, 2007 3:10 am

Every driver or software update can affect your system stability. Especially when installing software that will integrate deeply in your system like AV, Firewall, etc.

Software is written by people, and people make mistakes... But i think that when you are carefully enough installing and running your computer than you won't fall into one of all these pitfalls with bluescreens and system hangs.

But considering that software release cycles are tremendously increasing the chances are high to put out a crappy version that's not tested well (we see it with all the problems at this time with drivers, vista, etc.). It's sad but true. The products will be finished and shaped at the customers.

ashleys · #7 Post by **ashleys** » Mon Aug 20, 2007 2:11 am

Been with NT based OS since 1997.
Biggest problem in those days were drivers for peripherals.
I remember I had a choice of about two printers that were supported on NT4.

Upgraded to W2K about 6 months after it came out and then this year upgraded to XP.

Only remember two BSOD, one was bad RAM that caused a Page_Fault_In_Non_Paged_Area and one was caused by bad drivers from Nokia for their phone<->desktop link software.

mattbiernat · #8 Post by **mattbiernat** » Mon Aug 20, 2007 4:33 pm

my BSODs
1. I removed my IPOD (which I use for back up) during windows update (when I was shutting down my TP). My XP was then unrecoverable and i had to do R&R.
2. huge freeware games
3. after doing stupid things when experimenting with windows

Techgurl · #9 Post by **Techgurl** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 1:47 am

Been working on NT, Windows 2000, XP and Windows 2003 and Metaframe servers and workstations for ten years for large corporations and I have seen lots of blue screens.

Some just do it in the middle of the night, some just for no apparent reason. Even some of the Windows 2000 stuff I run at home will just decide to blue screen then be fine for months.

No apparent rhyme or reason to it.

ashleys · #10 Post by **ashleys** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 6:11 am

after doing stupid things when experimenting with windows

Well I discounted those

The only other problems I can remember were when testing RAW disks with VMWare. I seem to remember boot disk inaccessible was rather popular

#11 Post by **jdhurst** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 7:31 am

I use virtual machines for doing dumb things (I do lots of silly things, just not in a production machine). I never used RAW disks, however. ... JDH

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