Fatal Exception error on bootup

Hello, I have a Dell Dimension 4100 running on Win98SE. The other day I tried installing the software that came with my HP photosmart printer and have had nothing but problems since.

Now when I try to reboot/boot up it goes to blue screen with the Fatal Exception error 018F:BFF7668C. It takes several tries before it will boot up. It started happening when HP support services told me to run a SFC. The SFC found a corrupt file and I followed the prompts and when the computer rebooted it went to the blue screen with the above message.

My mouse is also acting strangely and yesterday control panel wouldn't shut down...just sat there on the task bar. I've also been having "spool32" errors pop up, which HP told me to do a registry fix for (I don't feel comfortable going into the registry).

Now HP support has given me the following instruction to alleviate the blue screen problem:

Right-click Start, and then click Explore.
> * Click Tools, click Folder Options, and then click View.
> * Verify that Show Hidden Files and Folders is selected and then click OK.
> * Locate and click the WinNT folder to open its contents.
> * Locate and click the System32 folder to open it.
> * Locate the file uhcd.sys. Right-click this file and select Rename.
> * Rename the file uhcd.bak.
> * After renaming the file, close all open windows and restart the
> computer. Windows will refresh the driver file uhcd.sys the next
time it is needed.

I'm not convinced I should try this because of the mess my computer is in since following their instructions. What exactly is the file they want me change the name of? I've uninstalled the HP software, but the problem is still there. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much.

 

Thanks for your reply TimW. Even after reading your link I'm not sure how to fix my problem. Should I go ahead and try what HP said about renaming the file? If not, can someone please explain what I should do to fix this. Thanks so much.

 

Actually, what they posted as the windows directory in inaccurate. Windows 98 uses the \windows directory. Windows 2000 uses the \winnt directory.

Other than that, it may be accurate. What may be in the system32 directory, may be in the system directory.