My computer will randomly crash about 2 minutes after I boot it up. Sometimes it will show a blue screen and dump the memory, but the majority of the time it goes to a black screen with streaks of random colors across it (not a screen saver). I cannot press anything to get out of it. And can't figure out why this keeps happening. any suggestions?

Hi,maybe the systemis overheated. check all case, cpu, video cardfans. "clean them"check hardware issues like memory modules, video card. reset bios windows 7 will not crash easily...

Have the same problem, removed excess drivers, removed AV (if KIS, also remove the keys from by means of a regedit) and Anti spyware, it looks a lot more stable now. If it keeps happening, try reinstalling win7.I suggest you do a chkdsk /f, memory check, turn on boot log in msconfigOverheating is definitely _not_ a problem on my machine.

j3gb3rt said: My computer will randomly crash about 2 minutes after I boot it up. Sometimes it will show a blue screen and dump the memory, but the majority of the time it goes to a black screen with streaks of random colors across it (not a screen saver). I cannot press anything to get out of it. And can't figure out why this keeps happening. any suggestions? HiSome things to consider.Did this installation of Windows 7 ever work OK, or did this behavior start as soon as the beta was installed?You mentioned "Random", does this eventually happen every time you start the computer?If it originally worked OK, whatwas changed just prior to when this behavior first started? Did you update any hardware drivers, such as the Video Card?Did you add any hardware, such as a TV card or other multimedia hardware?Have you checked to make sure you have all of the latest drivers for the installed hardware?Let us know.Thank You for testing Windows 7 Beta Ronnie Vernon MVP

The original installation worked fine for about 14 days.At aroundthe same timeI installed the Kaspersky v8 for Windows7. That worked okay too. The trouble as far as I can see started last Saturday. What would happen was that I tried to update teh NVidia drivers through windows update but they failed. Afterwards, first FireFox (sorry) would crash continually. Then after that, explorer.exe would start crashing and restarting over and over again, usually after just one click after opening an explorer window. After that I saw a great many BSoD's, most of which were a bit vague: Page in a non page environment, something to do with memory. I didn't have time to write them all down as it would just dump the memory and reboot. I did save the last crashdump. The last time it happened I was trying to open windows mail, which didn't want to come to screen, while I was running a macro in Excel. The process for Windows mail was loaded, I did check in the Taskmanager, I tried opening it again and it crashed.Since then I removed KIS, Spybot, the K-Lite codec pack, opera and FF just to be sure. I'll reinstall one after the other to see what happens.

By what you typed in your original posting, I believe your failed NVIDIA installation via Windows Update is the root cause. First, download the production Vista drivers for your particular video card straight from the NVIDIA site. Dont install them yet. Go to Device Manager and delete the video card. Windows will prompt you if you want to remove all of the drivers. Select yes and reboot. Upon the reboot, your screen will probably look really bad. Now, run your downloaded, production Vista drivers and reboot when prompted.

Could be, but itdoesn't explain explorer crashing, it also doesn't explain firefox crashing, and it doesn't explain the BSoD's, there's absolutely no screen freezing up involved here. Plus the drivers never got installed, they just failed on initialising install after download. I'll reinstall the WHQL pack from the nvidia website just in case, I'll update on that...ps. didn't read properly, don't want to be a t*t

Do you have another OS installed? If you do, does the same thing happen? If you don't have another OS installedtry an OS that will run off of a CD like an Ubuntudisk. This sounds like a hardware problem (probably the video card) that is heat related. Note that if a part like a capacitor or IC is failing the temperatures need not be high totrigger thefailure. Running a different OS for an hour or so will help to confirm if it's a Windows problem or a hardware problem.Kerry Brown MS-MVP - Windows Desktop Experience

@Mjwsje1980 The video card is a critical, key component of the computer with as much a priority as the CPU. A bad video card or video card driver can cause all of the application crashes you describedespecially BSOD errors. You dont have to have a frozen screen for the problem to be video card related. A failed video driver install does not mean that there was some driver files copied resulting in a possible version conflict. You cant make the assumption that is not the problem when you start to experience issues following that particular action. The one mistake a lot of people make is updating a video driver without first removing the old one. Both NVIDIA and ATI highly recommend in their readme files to remove the old driver first, reboot and then install the new driver followed again by a final reboot. Installing a critical component such as a video driver over an already installed driver can (not necessarily will) cause odd, hard-to-isolate problems of varying degrees. You was not being a t*t. I fully understand. Kerry Brown makes also makes a very good point. Some while ago, Dell GX270 computers would lockup, BSOD, freeze, and experience any number of problematic issues. The culprit turned out to be bad capacitors on the motherboard. Dell even admitted to knowing that there was a bad lot of capacitors in the field; therefore, they replaced the motherboard even though the system itself was out of warranty. After installing the new motherboard, the systems in question did not experience any more problems. Keep us updated on what happens.

@ DarienHawk67Thank you for your sound advice, I took it. Uninstalled the old driver (and software to be on the safe side) Rebooted first, then installed the Vista production software, rebooted again. Windows hung on reboot, and crashed two minutes after typing in password. The BSoD was a bit more descriptive this time; memory failure, so I'm running a memory check from safe mode, it's still doing that, I'll post later with the result, but I think this definitely isn't a windows problem.@Kerry_Brown I'll install Ubuntu when it comes out of memory check, it's at 64% overall. So I'll post later, thanks :)

Hi,Done memory testing, I'm a bit embarassed now, it definitely was a hardware thing: the memory test came up with a hardware issue. I recently added 2 DIMM cards of RAM to my setup, updated the BIOS and it gave the correct reading. I just found out that for my motherboard the configuration of memory needs to be symmetrical, I just seated the two one gig cards in the extension slots, along with 2 cards of 512 each. I now took out the 2 x 512 and seated the upgrade in their slots. I then put it through its paces by installing need4speed while running a macro in Excel at the same time. Result: it's still a slow machine when loaded with tasks but it didn't crash and runs like a dream when loaded normally.Thanks for the support guys, I'll happily continue testing this beta and check back if my comments can be of use.

No need to be embarrassed. You would not believe how many problemssome that result in a new computer purchasethat are related to bad memory. Yet, when suggested to test the memory, most users will balk at the idea because it worked normally before. I would even go so far to say that testing memory should be an annual task.The good thing is that you have a good handle on your problem.I do have to ask, how did you install your memory? Use the below image as a refernce example.To ensure that you are getting the best performance possible, make sure your memory is installed in dual-channel mode (if your motherboard supports it).Best (Dual Channel)Yellow = 1GBOrange = 512MBYellow = 1GBOrange = 512 MBOkay (Single Channel)Yellow = 1GBYellow = 1GBOrange = 512 MBOrange = 512MB

When I upgraded it I just placed it side by side, so yellow held the 512 and orange held the 1, now I just removed the 512 cards altogether and seated the 1g's in there slots. Thanks for the tip, I'll try the dual channel set up tonight. The image is helpful, just my board isn't color coded. (the box being a modded Dell C521)

Thanks DarienHawk67, hardware errors are gone now, now I'm stuck with other BSoD's, had 0xBE, 0xC4, 0x7E and 0x01/0x4e now, posted elsewhere in misc.