Hi,
I have a problem that I have never experienced before. It's puzzling me as I am still unable to pinpoint the problem.
Originally about 2 days ago I started getting random crashes. ALL of them took me to BSOD and had the error code X08e but I never had to patience to wait for a memory kernel dump and I just restarted manually. however I remember the message and one of them was caused by sfsync02.sys (Starforce protection)

Today I found out that my system is actually not stable and will randomly crash. I first noticed it when I was playing a game and the sound of the game started looping, but I didn't have a full freeze (picture and looped sound) so I thought It was the game that was about to crash, however I attempted to start task manager and I froze. I brushed it off (even though I've never seen a sound freeze/loop without video freeze also) and manually restarted.

Then I was listening to a music track while surfing the net and all of a sudden the music just started looping...but the web browser was still responsive, so I started task manager and attempted to kill the media player, but I got as far as "are you sure" before losing video response.

The 3rd time It happend was the WEIRDEST out of all. I was again listening to music and reading some google news when the sound/music started looping. This time I reacted fast and attempted to kill the media player. I failed but something I have never seen occurred. I still had video response but my computer was dead. nothing clicks evething frozen but still was able to move the mouse and chit numlock/capslock and they too responded. I waited for about 3-4 mins and nothing happend and I kept clicking my mouse to see if it will freeze the mouse/scree but it didn't.

Here's what I did so far to try to get BSOD and a mem dump and/or fix the issue


I ran verifer and  had all the drivers loaded and restarted...computer was slow as *censored* however I couldn't get it to freeze until i went on the game  (but it did not take long, I would say about 5 minutes) and I was unable to get a BSOD

I uninstalled the Starforce Drivers with the driver removal tool from their site. I did a test and I got a hang/freeze in the same fashion.

I ran a mem test/ CPU stress test for 20 minutes and there was no issues . no memory read errors and my cpu didn't break a sweat. couldn't get it to BSOD. thought the problem disappeared. However the problem still occurs.

I suspect this is a soundcard issue in either it's hardware or software. I would like to know what I can do to diagnose my soundcard or if anyone has some suggestions on how to successfully BSOD my pc or fix my issue.

Again the issue is Sound looping followed by a video/input freeze 5-10 seconds later.


Thank you in advance

Sytem Spec:

WINDOWS xp 32bit  pro sp3
2gb ocz 1066mhz ram
3ghz q6600 cpu
AuzenTech Forte Low Profile  soundcard
ati 4890 1gb ram videocardJust want to update people that I may have figured out that it's something to do with the Soundcard "Doubly Digital Live" In windows XP

Also to my surprise I booted into windows 7 and I am not seeing any crashes and I have been abusing the soundcard for the past hour...with the same driver package installed on win 7 as win xp

I am REALLY confused right now, But at least happy to know that my soundcard is working hardware wise.The sound card may require older drivers written specifically for XP on the XP side...Thanks for the reply Patio

I just wanted to mention the vendor has the all in one driver for all OSes , I cannot choose one for xp. Also that doesn't explain how the card has been working fine for the past 2 MONTHS since I bought it.I would run checkdisk just to be sure your hard drive isn't causing some of the problem.

Hi,

I ran a chkdsk on my HDD that the game is on. I also ran a chkdsk on the drive the system root is in.

There is no errors, or doesn't seem to be.

Also I ran windows 7 partition and started the same game on that same HDD, game ran for hours. no hickups

I thought my HDD was going out like a champ (been with me for a while) but it's still going strong from my peliminary testing.

Also I hear no clicking, no spin up/down nothing out of the HDD's when the sound freeze starts.


Speedtest 4.40 says my 3 HDDs have no issues Hi, I just ran a program to clean up my registry but I backed up my registry before doing so because I know these programs are not usually realiable. I thought If there was an issue I would just boot up into safe mode and restore etc.

Now my windows xp will not boot up in any mode :/. I went into recovery console and it says error reading disk. But I went into windows 7 and there's no problems. currently I am error checking the HDD that has win xp on it.

Maybe the MBR got messed up somehow?

Any ideas?I wish this forum had an edit function so you dont post 3 times in a row

Anyways the XP was not booting up due to my camera being plugged into the USB half way. it was messing with mup.sys .

So now I'm back on there..

I feel like i keep solving my own issuesI'm raising this thread from the dead.

Since I cant find a solution to my problem, can anyone give me advice on a program that can export/import registry?

I'm thinking that I should just reinstall windows XP SP3 without a format and then import the registry from old windows to new one, as this solution may keep my programs running. I wouldnt import windows registry, just the software.

Well you moved faster than we did...so no you weren't talking to yourself...
ERUNT will backup/save and restore an existing registry...however this needs to be done while XP is in good shape and is bootable so that' option is out of the question...
There is another manual method used by booting to the Recovery Console.

If you are comfortable with command line options  Here Ya go...

If that's not your bag then a  Repair Install of XP  would be the way to go...

NOTE: I suggest reading thru it and printing out a reference copy before attempting it...done properly ALL your data and apps will be intact...make 1 mistake and ALL your data and apps will be gone but you will have a fresh XP install...

WARNING: Depending on your setup the Repair Install may affect the dual-boot setup but that can be dealt with after the fact... Quote from: patio on May 19, 2010, 06:16:48 PM

Well you moved faster than we did...so no you weren't talking to yourself...
ERUNT will backup/save and restore an existing registry...however this needs to be done while XP is in good shape and is bootable so that' option is out of the question...
There is another manual method used by booting to the Recovery Console.

If you are comfortable with command line options  Here Ya go...

If that's not your bag then a  Repair Install of XP  would be the way to go...

NOTE: I suggest reading thru it and printing out a reference copy before attempting it...done properly ALL your data and apps will be intact...make 1 mistake and ALL your data and apps will be gone but you will have a fresh XP install...

WARNING: Depending on your setup the Repair Install may affect the dual-boot setup but that can be dealt with after the fact...