Tag Archives: 0x0000007B

Multiple hardware problems

Computer Aid Posted on by

Its rare to find a PC with multiple hardware problems, but this one is probably the worst I’ve seen.

Since the PC was kept in an air conditioned office, it was probably kept at a constant temperature, which helped mask many problems.

At first, the PC just wouldn’t start.

Push the power button, and nothing happened.

I replace the power supply, but while I’m changing the PSU, I notice that the video card has got some strange black marks on it…

It turns out that the video card had a burned out fan… literally burned! I don’t know if the burn marks are from friction, or from a short within the motor itself, but it might have been the cause of the power supply failure.

Anyway, I replace the video card, and then go to start the PC.

This time, it springs into life, and after the BIOS screen, It starts to load Windows XP…

And then I get a blue screen of death (BSOD). the error is stop 0x0000007b INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE

This means that there is a hardware problem with the hard drive!

I then take it back to the office, and a SMART test shows that it doesn’t have much life left.

I quickly decide to mirror it to a new Seagate SATA drive.

Luckily, the drive is not badly damaged, so the mirror process works correctly.

Now, I just let the system install the hard drive and video drivers, and its finally back to normal.

stop 0x0000007B

Computer Aid Posted on by

This computer had some problems starting… blank screen and not much else.

A look inside the tower showed a video card with a burned out fan… Now thats an obvious place to start.

Once I replace the vid card, the PC now shows a bios message, XP starts its normal boot, and then I see a BSOD (Blue Screen Of Death).

The message is stop 0x0000007B

A search around the net shows it can be caused by all sorts of stuff (virus, hardware failure, device driver problems).

In this case, the hard drive is the component to try.

I plug the drive into my workshop PC, run speedfan, and quickly see that the SMART settings indicate an imminant drive failure.

I quickly shutdown, restart using acronis, and clone the drive to a new drive.

Luckily, the clone is successful, and the customer computer is back up and runninng shortly after.

optima laptop data recovery 0X0000007B

Computer Aid Posted on by

A customer had an Optima laptop, but it wouldn’t boot into windows.

I looked at this laptop a few months ago, and removed a lot of spyware… so there might be some leftover effects of an infection.

At first glance, I see a brief blue screen.

I try safe mode, but I get the same problem.

After Pressing F8 and then selecting “don’t automatically restart”, I see its complaining about: 0x0000007B (ie a problem with the boot device).

I plug the hard drive into my desktop system, but it Slows down the normal XP startup (from a 1 minute startup time to over 10 minutes).

This normally indicates a failing HDD… or a severely corrupted one.

Using Xps disk manager, the disk shows up, but it has a partition type of “unknown”.

On top of that, the HDD makes continuous clicking and “startup” whirring noises… usually the kind of noises I come to expect from a failing HDD.

OK, I decide to try a repair installation using the Optima recovery CD… but it also reckons that the disk is unformatted, and only gives me the choice to format the drive, and then do a clean install of XP.

I call the customer and he say the important data has already been backed up, so I can go ahead and reformat.

At this stage, I’m still thinking that the drive is damaged, and it probably won’t complete the format… yet it formats correctly, and XP installs without any problem.

I do all the autopatcher updates, install antivir, windows defender, winpatrol, spyware blaster, and bhodemon… then do a disk defragment.

After all that, I’m sure there is no fault with the drive.

Yet the mystery remains: how did the drive get into such a strange state in the first place?