Computer crashes - BIOS error.

I have recently experienced a problem with my laptop where it will crash, and upon reboot it will bring up an error message about a BIOS error, it automatically opens up IE with this message:

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Consider BIOS upgrade

Microsoft is unable to determine the exact cause of this error. However, this problem was most likely caused by an error in your computer’s random access memory (RAM). RAM is the main internal storage area the computer uses to run programs and store data.

During the crash analysis, we noticed the basic input/output (BIOS) system version on this computer does not match the specifications for the central processing unit (CPU), also known as a processor, that is installed on your computer. This can occur when a newer processor is installed on an older system board or older BIOS. Using a BIOS that does not support the installed processor can result in Windows system crashes. Contact your computer manufacturer or motherboard manufacturer for an updated version of BIOS for your computer's processor.

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found at this URL: http://wer.microsoft.com/responses/...SGD=c5630d18-43e7-438b-a4d4-7ce2e358a2e3#here


it has happened 3 times now, and I just wanted to see if anyone has any suggestions on what I should do to rectify this problem.


Thanks!!

 

ok, so to use this program i need a blank cd (and don't have one), but i'm living a fair way from nowhere at the moment, going to take a few days to get one, any other way of checking it out? maybe i can rig it to boot of my USB stick? if so... how do i do that?

 

What model is your laptop? If you have more than one stick of RAM in there you could try using only one at a time to see if one is causing the problem.

SIW will tell you how much and how many sticks of RAM you have.

 

my laptop is a generic, in SIW it shows the manufacturer as "ECS".

I have two sticks of 512MB DDR RAM.

The problem seems to be intermittent - it hasn't happened since my first post. If I remove on of the memory sticks I'm not sure that it'll quickly or easily identify which one is the problem.

I think I'll go CD hunting today... Bound to be some somewhere...:major

 

ok, so i ran the test and it came up with 0 errors. good news?

 

Good news for the RAM at least.

Next up: Go here and look for your model, and see if they have a BIOS update available for you. Make sure you understand and are comfortable with all installation steps before you start; you don't want to brick your laptop!

 

ok, well i've got all the information i need for a BIOS upgrade but I might hold off doing it if the problem persists... the upgrade is only more recent by a couple of months.

thanks for all your help!!:wave

 

Good point. BIOS updates are like brain surgery, you want to be really sure they are needed before you get started. Apologies if I wasn't clear on that in previous posts.

 

Thanks for the tips. I can't think of anything recently added that may be messing it up, I'm pretty meticulous with my computer maintenance, I regularly run CC cleaner, Diskkeeper, AVG and Spybot. The problem has occurred twice whilst I was asleep, so the only thing that was running on my computer was uTorrent. I think it may be just my comp is getting a little long in the tooth, it's also noticably slower than it used to be (I'm guessing due to the constant Windows updates and such). It's around 5 years old now though with no major problems - I think I'm quite fortunate!

Just another quickie, how effective would a RAM upgrade be in speeding up my computer?

 

If you're running XP on your two 512MB sticks there's a good chance that increasing the RAM will speed up your system. Digerati posted some really useful RAM upgrade links a few days ago... I've copied them into this post for you.