Way off topic

[Walker]

Sorry guy's (Pavel  ) . I know this isn't an A-V question, but does anyone know what a "Special Pool" means??

I've had a blue screen which suggested enableing special pool to catch an offending driver before it gets to a crash.

Anyone know how to enable this?

Thanks for any info and sorry if I out of order for posting  

[trigger]

Never heard of it, but a google search on "Special pool" and crash reveals this microsoft article. Maybe it is helpfull: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/q192/4/86.asp&NoWebContent=1

Peter

[Vlk]

Actually not off-topic at all...

Special pool used to be quite a useful debugging aid in the times of Windows NT 3.x-4.x and early days of Win2K. The idea behind it was very simple: to tag each allocated memory block by an identifier so that if a crash occurs, the system may be able to identify who's block it (roughly) is (normally, memory blocks are anonymous).

For more info, please refer to http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=188831 . This article also contains instructions on how to turn this feature on.


With the arrival of Win2K, and mainly XP, MS actually gave us a much more powerful weapon to fight device driver failures - the Driver Verifier. To run this tool, type

verifier

to the Run box, and follow the on-screen instructions. While this tool is mainly aimed to developers it can also provide some help to the rest of the world.

Be warned, though -- whenever the Driver Verifier finds something suspicious, it invokes a blue screen! Really.

The bottom line is, don't do this unless you know what you're doing.
(so do I understand it correctly that your new hardware has not yet arrived... )

Cheers,
Vlk

[Walker]

Thanks VERY much Peter and Vlk,

That's really interesting stuff (to me anyway   ) and I appreciate the responses.

I'll check out the links and no doubt Vlk my brain will tell me not to try it, but my curiosity ....     is another thing  

I'm SOooo glad you asked about the new machine Vlk    how many guesses do you want  

[Walker]

Just thought I'd pop back and say thanks once again fellas <joking>

You've managed to do what Pavel has been trying to do for weeks.... keep me off the forums for a few days... (while I digest all this info) <still joking Pavel > .

Which great Antartic explorer said.... "I might be gone for some time"  

[Walker]

Hi guy's,

Finally ploughed through it all and surprisingly understood most of it in the end... I think the alcohol helped   .

I can also confirm your 'warning' Vlk. I couldn't resist trying it and I didn't have to wait for a blue screen.... it repeatedly 'booted' into one. By this time I was fed up and drunk and couldn't be bothered to find out what a wps??nt driver was.  

Seriously, thanks for the info guy's.

Walker.

[Walker]

Vlk,

Just as a passing comment   ... what does ashMon2.sys do. Verifier didn't seem to like that and when microsoft got hold of the mini-d the reply was... "This error is currently being researched". Obviously I don't think they have picked up loads of avast errors and it's just a general reply, but wondering what the file does?.

Walker.

[Vlk]

Well, aswMon2.sys is the core of the Standard Shield -- this is where it's implemented, actually.

Send me the m-dumps, I'll try to have a look at them...

The Verifier does like aswMon2.sys on our machines, to be frank....

[Walker]

No problem.... I'm always assuming it is this machine  :'( :'( :'(