Dell Dimension E510, iastor.sys, Windows XP blue screen error, stop code 0×000000D1

visitors: Thanks for coming by. If you’ve experienced the problem described below, please leave a comment and Digg this story. Dell is aware of the problem identified here, but rather than take the proactive step of notifying customers who purchased susceptible systems — namely, data loss and/or a system crash from which you potentially cannot recover — they are addressing the problem only too late: when people call to report the problem.

Update in June 2008: This post has steadily drawn over 10,000 visits per month for the last year. Dell, if you’re out there and you’d like me to link to some concise troubleshooting information on your site, please email me at ydeologi [at] gmail [dot] com.

Summary as of 12/28/06: IASTOR.SYS is a driver provided by Intel to Dell as an interface to the on-board Intel storage controller used on motherboards in Dell computers. Simply put, it is software that allows Windows XP to communicate with a computer’s hard drive. Since I posted this article in April, I’ve had over 6,000 hits specifically on this topic, all from people researching the same basic problem I encountered early this year. Some salient points:

So far, it has only been reported as a problem in Dell systems; I don’t know if the driver is being used in other manufacturers’ systems, but I suspect that if it is, the version being provided to Dell by Intel is different.
This problem has been reported on many of Dell’s desktop product lines, so it is not limited to one type of system.
Sometime in late 2005/early 2006, Dell began offering an option called “DataSafe”, where a PC is shipped with two hard drives arrayed in what’s called a RAID mirror; each hard drive contains an exact copy of the other so that in the event that one fails, the other lives on (and your data with it). To implement this, a few RAID compatible components are needed: the disk controller, the system BIOS, and a Windows device driver. RAID is very old, tested technology; the only new concern here is Dell’s use of it in their home market PCs. From what I’ve observed, the problem certainly seems to be most common in systems shipped with DataSafe enabled, but because the new device driver for the controller is also used for systems that weren’t ordered with the DataSafe option, the problem can show up for systems without DataSafe as well.
It has been reported as a conflict with many different system devices, but especially video cards, sound cards, and network interfaces.
Manufacturers like Dell depend on their suppliers to provide both reliable hardware components and software drivers to operate them. But companies like Dell are also responsible for testing the reliability of such components and their interoperability prior to releasing them for sale.
Systems with bad drivers have been reportedly shipped as early as January 2006 and as late as October 2006.
If this is, in fact, a problem for every Dell system shipped with IASTOR.SYS this year, then even after Dell and Intel work out a patch, it will have to be installed on every affected computer, or those computers will remain at risk for data loss and system failure.
Intel released updated drivers in May 2006 which many have reported fix the problem, but Dell had not updated the drivers on their own website until posting a solution in late October/early November 2006. It is possible that even the drivers Intel posted in January fixed this issue, but that is not confirmed.

begin original story: If you have a Dell Dimension E510 or 5150 purchased in the last few months, you may experience a BSOD (blue screen of death) error in Windows XP related to a resource sharing conflict. I’ve read about errors related to IASTOR.SYS, an SATA controller driver, coming up a few different ways, but never quite in the way I saw it recently: under Windows XP Media Center with an SATA RAID mirror and an ATI TV Tuner add-on card.After the Windows splash screen, you’ll get a BSOD with a DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL error focusing on IASTOR.SYS, probably with stop code 0×000000D1. After enough reboots, the system might not even show the blue screen error, just reboot. Safe Mode doesn’t load the OS, either — just reboots. Booting into a recovery console is not helpful for rebuilding. Trying to update the IASTOR driver (which pertains to system with the 82801GR chipset, or related) manually without the OS accomplishes nothing.

Dell’s support technicians only recommend backing up your data and reinstalling. I usually don’t spend a lot of time, if any, calling Dell’s horrible level 1 support, but I thought I’d try a few times over a few days (even after I had it fixed) to see if some were better than others. (A note about Dell support: their Silver/Gold technicians are fantastic, but the Average Joe with an E510 won’t have access to them.)

The fix in this case: Open up the computer and remove the TV Tuner add-in card. That will alleviate the resource sharing conflict and allow the system to boot normally. Download and install D5150A05.EXE from Dell (a BIOS update that came out earlier this month). Also download R114566.EXE, which will update/reinstall your chipset drivers. After implementing both of those updates, put the TV Tuner add-in card back into the system and power back up. The system should work normally.

All in all, this is pretty routine troubleshooting; I won’t often post about fixes for specific issues, but I’m curious to see how many people are searching on the net for this particular problem. If you do post here about your experience, please be sure to include the date you purchased your system; I’m curious if they’re still shipping new systems with this problem.

Update 5/15/06: Turned out that wasn’t the end of the road. About a week later, trouble resurfaced when one of the drives in the RAID experienced corruption. Dell shipped out a replacement HDD which I’ve installed but have yet to incorporate into the RAID as yet. Right now, the system is using just one of the two drives, seemingly without incident. I don’t have a lot of confidence that rebuilding and using a RAID mirror will work properly until I see a new driver posted on their website. In any event, the BIOS update probably didn’t do anything except remap resources long enough for the system to boot… only for the resource conflict to re-emerge shortly thereafter.

Update 6/5/06: After hours of wasted time on the phone with technical support, explaining the problem and the process over and over again, not to mention transfers into supervisor queues only to languish on hold and eventually be disconnected… this system has been accepted for a free return and exchange by Dell’s Escalation team. A couple hundred people have searched the net for this problem and found this site. I wonder how many are having this problem, and I wonder if the “identical replacement system” they send out will have updated drivers or different hardware.

Update 7/3/06: I’ve yet to find any official word from Dell commenting on their awareness of this problem, but reports of the problem are out there everywhere. This must be a massive support headache for them. I have a few clients with the problem who have received replacement machines and have yet to experience any trouble; soon, I’ll post whether they replaced the offending hardware component, or if there’s a driver or BIOS update on these new machines that’s solved the problem. There aren’t any updated drivers on the Dell support site, from what I can tell.

Update 7/15/06: As you can see from the comments, a Dell technician has dropped by the site while searching for a solution to this problem. They don’t have a solution in the Dell Knowledge Base, but at least we can confirm they’re aware of the issue now; hopefully, they can work something out with Intel quickly.

Update 7/30/06: Amazingly, months later, Dell still lists the old, broken drivers on their website. As many readers have reported, using an updated Intel driver seems to repair the problem. This isn’t a Dell supported driver, but then, their supported driver is broken.

Update 10/11/06: A great post today from Edd gives hope that people experiencing this problem might not have to repair the IASTOR driver to correct this problem. (This is especially good news for people who are already experiencing the problem and can’t boot the OS.) I haven’t tested it yet, but it’s the kind of thing that shouldn’t cause any harm. When you first boot the computer, when the Dell logo appears, hold down the F2 key to enter the BIOS. Go to the section for your hard drives, and change the SATA operation type to “COMBO” instead of “RAID”. These instructions aren’t exact because I don’t have a Dell BIOS in front of me to check it, but I’ll try to test and post step-by-step shortly.

Update 11/9/06: Someone from Dell support has kindly posted a Dell support document in the comments below. It looks like they’ve gotten around to addressing the problem. While this won’t help all of the people whose systems have shipped with the problem until they run into it, at least they’re aware of it now.

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You’re currently reading “Dell Dimension E510, iastor.sys, Windows XP blue screen error, stop code 0×000000D1,” an entry on Things Worth Knowing

Published:: 04.26.06 / 7am

Category:: Technical Support

Installing Windows XP with AHCI support for Dell XPS 400/9150 Systems (so far)

WARNING!!: This is an extremely long post, due to the fact that this is a somewhat complex solution that required an even longer than needed amount of time invested in discovering it.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

After many months of trial and error, research, and trying solutions that just didn’t quite work. I’ve finally managed to find a solution that fixes my problem! With the combination of massive amounts of trial and error, and tons of persistence, and the help of all the posters out there posting their solutions, and THIS wonderful site, I think I’ve found a solution that will work for anybody experiencing the same exact issue as I (and apparently many others) have been. And I am writing this for those who may not be “technically savvy” to the extreme.

My Issue:
Now, I usually build my systems myself, but this time I did not want to deal with the hassle of having individual bits and pieces being shipped to me at once and at different times (sometimes getting left on my doorstep for anyone to take), not to mention Dell was throwing in a nice flat screen monitor…hey why not! I thought! Dude, I got a Dell.
Like many others who tend to be somewhat technically savvy, the first thing I do when I get a new system, is wipe the drive and install a fresh copy of the Operating System. This ensures that I know exactly what gets placed on the system (well, as much as Microsoft will allow) and exactly what should be running in the background, etc… The new Dell Dimension XPS-400/9150 I purchased (now quite a few months back) was no exception to this rule. I figured I’d dump the crappy Media Center Edition they shipped with the d*** thing, and put my personal copy of XP Professional on instead. Since I do development work, I need IIS installed anyway.

So my nightmare began…

I attempted to perform a new installation of XP Professional only to learn Windows Setup did not even think I had a hard drive.
Reboot, check BIOS, flip it to ‘Combination Mode’, Reboot, Try Again…
This time Windows Setup actually acknowledges that I have a hard drive! Woo hoo!
Setup completes successfully, and reboots the machine.
Windows boots no problems, runs a little sluggish, but runs none the less.
I installed all the drivers for the system, Reboot a million times for driver installations and automatic updates, Reboot again after all installations and updates are done, enter BIOS, flip back to AHCI mode, Reboot.
Windows XP Logo appears and Windows begins to load…
And well, we all know what’s next…
Blue Screen of Death mentioning a STOP error of 0×000000XX. (I use the X’s because I got different STOP errors during the entire process of troubleshooting this. In this particular example, it was 0×0000008E.).
Attempt
Back to ‘Combination Mode’…Windows Boots, but runs sluggishly.
Anyway, long story short, I continued to experience this mind numbing problem and many similar problems while trying various solutions for the several months after purchasing the system and up until a little while ago. But somehow I managed to finally stumble across a solution that has finally worked, and if it worked for me, it’s gotta work for someone else who might not have as much persistence and patience.

Anyway, on to the solution:

The ultimate goal behind this is to create a slipstreamed version of XP with the LATEST Intel Matrix Drivers already installed along with the latest SP2. It seems like a pain, I know, but it’s apparently the only way you’re going to get your system running correctly. If you managed to get Windows installed in Combination Mode like I did, you can do this on your current system.

1.)Items You Will Need That You Can Not Download:
1.Licensed copy of Windows XP
2.A blank writable CD for creating a new Windows XP CD from your Licensed copy.
3.Software that burns ISO images (I used Nero).
4.A blank floppy disk (and a Floppy Drive if you don’t have one).
2.)Items You Will Need That You Can Download:
1.Service Pack 2 for Windows XP (The EXE file, NOT the Automatic Update).
2. nLite (www.nlite.org) for automating your slipstream process. (Freeware)
3.Intel Matrix Storage Manager for Floppy (Latest: Ver. 6.1 August 2006 as of this document).
4.Intel Matrix Storage Manager for Windows (Latest: Ver 6.1 August 2006 as of this document).
5.Intel Chipset Drivers for your System (Mine is the 945P).
6..NET Framework 2.0 (for nLite operation).

Now on to the slipstream process:

Step 1.) Put your Licensed copy of XP in your CD-ROM drive, and copy the entire disc to a temporary folder on your hard drive. (I copied mine to a folder on my Desktop called “WinXpPro”).

Step 2.) Insert a blank and formatted floppy disk into your floppy disk drive. Then run the Intel Matrix Storage Manager for Floppy to extract the drivers to the blank floppy. (Don’t ask me why they didn’t just zip the stupid files, they just didn’t!).

Step 3.) Copy the Intel Matrix Storage Manager for Windows and the Intel Chipset applications to a temporary media. (i.e. USB Drive, Burn to a Disc, somewhere OTHER than the current drive). You will need them after you get Windows installed.

Step 4.) If you haven’t already, install nLite. If you have, skip to Step 5.

Step 5.) Open up nLite, select the folder you copied your Windows XP disc to and wait while it processes, then select at least the following options from it’s list of abilities:
1.Integrate Service Packs.
2.Integrate Drivers.
3.Make Bootable ISO Image.
You can select others if you like, but I’ll leave their functionality how-to’s up to you.
Click the ‘Next’ button to continue.

Step 6.) You should get a window asking you to browse to the file that contains your Service Pack that you downloaded. Do so now, and add it to the list. Then click ‘Next’ again.

Step 7.) You should get a window asking you to install your custom drivers. Select “Install Single Driver” from the list at the bottom, and navigate to your floppy disk you just made.

Step 8.) Select the ‘iastor’ file from the two files that may be listed as drivers. One will say ‘hdc’ and the other will say ‘SCSI Adapter’ in the ‘Type’ column in your list after you add it. Make sure you added the one that says ‘SCSI Adapter’, if it doesn’t, remove it and select the other.

Step 9.) Proceed to the next step.

Step 10.) Eventually you should come to a screen prompting you to make your ISO image file. Do so now and save it to a location you’ll remember later. Then click the ‘Finish’ button to complete the slipstream process.

Step 11.) Using your favorite CD burning software (I used Nero), burn the ISO image to a CD. (Now, when I say ‘burn the ISO image’, I don’t mean ‘COPY’ the image…I mean make sure the software you use ACTUALLY opens the ISO file and burns the files it contains to a CD.).

Step 12.) You should now have a bootable Windows XP CD containing the latest Service Pack and your Intel Matrix Storage drivers.

Step 13.) Stick your CD in the CD-ROM drive, and remove your floppy disk from the floppy drive. Reboot the system (if your using it, if not just Power it on.).

Step 14.) Enter the BIOS and switch it to Autodetect/AHCI. (The factory default! Yes!!!)

Step 15.) Boot to the Boot Menu and select the CD-ROM from the list.

Step 16.) Proceed with Windows Setup as normal. When selecting your adapter, make sure you select the correct driver for your chipset and obviously select the AHCI unless you have RAID drives setup, which you wouldn’t, or you wouldn’t be reading this now, would you?

Step 17.) After successful installation, install the Chipset drivers FIRST, then the Intel Matrix Storage Manager for Windows.

Step 18.) Install all of your other drivers and updates.

Step 19.) You should be good to go, because if you made it this far, you’ve obviously gotten further than before and haven’t experienced the same problem!! Congrats!

I hope that my time invested in developing this solution helps some of you. And I hope, in the future, Dell takes note of these irritating setbacks that come bundled with their systems.

-Steve Antonucci

Michael 06.21.06 / 10am

Hi, I’m quite surprised to find this website because I have exactly the same problem with my dell Dimension 9150 (bought in France.. in US > XPS400)
And I’m disapointed that the only way to remove the problem is a replacement…. I’m using Windows XP Pro SP2 and I had that BSOD three times and don’t know what to do…

Jens 06.28.06 / 1pm

having the excact problem on a dimension 5150.

No additional equipment in the PC - but still the same problem

Have tried out the BIOS upgrade - does not work.

Phillip Ruan 06.30.06 / 10am

I had the exact same problem with my system, which only has a video card and a firewire card add on. My system is 5150, same as E510 but it is giving me trouble since first week of getting this system.

Cary Formhals 07.04.06 / 12pm

I also am having the same problem. On July 3, 2006 my wife said she left the computer ( Dell xps 400 windows media center) and went in the next room for less than five minutes when she came back the famous blue screen was there. I can not accomplish any kind of work around but I have not tried removing the tv tuner card and downloading drivers. Thank You so much for Things Worth Knowing. One thing to note is I did not have any problems with this computer until two weeks after I installed a Western Digital SATA hard drive.

I just took the tv tuner card out and that did not solve the problem. I then left the tv tuner card out and took out one stick of RAM. Still nothing. I put that stick back and took out the other stick. Windows XP started up normally at first and then went into a checking file system mode I have never seen before. This mode indicated the type of file system is NTFS. The volume is dirty (whatever that means?). It checked files, then went on to check indexes, and then descriptors. After that it booted up normally. Now I am going to see about downloading the drivers. Thanks once again.

Louis 07.05.06 / 10am

I too purchased the E510 with RAID mirroring and have been getting the blue screen of death lately. I have had three sessions with Dell Level 1 support and “GOD THEY SUCK”. I was promised by the technician on three occasions that the solution he was providing would fix the problem. The first was to increase virtual memory, the second was to do an XP restore, and the third was a complete DELL PC restore. I did the Dell pc restore last night and I am eagerly waiting for the Blue Screen to return!!! I don’t have a TV Tuner card but do have an IEEE 1394 card installed. My stop error is: STOP: 0X0000007E (0XC0000005, 0X00000000, 0XBA4FFA8C, 0XBA4FF788)

cheryl 07.05.06 / 8pm

My sister purchased an XPS 200 last April. Today a blue screen appears with this technical information: STOP: 0X000000D1 (0X00000018, 0X00000002, oX00000000, 0XF73AF25F)
*** iastor.sys-Address F73AF25F base at F73A0000, DateStamp 42b2df42.
The message also indicates to remove any newly installed hardware or software and to disable BIOS memory options such as caching or shadowing. I have installed a brother MFC-3220C printer. I don’t know how to remove the printer i installed. Please help.

Robi 07.12.06 / 12am

The other large related problem to the move SATA controllers and hard drives is that if you ever have to reinstall your OS and don’t have the DELL Restore CD specific to your machine (which by default they don’t send you, and you have to pay extra for), but you do have the OS CDs which they must give you, you can’t install Windows because Windows Setup doesn’t see a hard drive! Well the hard drive is there, but the the drivers for the hard drive controller are not, so it amounts to the same thing. Those drivers are not on the OS CDs. Ok you say, we’ve seen this idiocrisy before, go to dell.com get drivers etc.. sure, you get the driver for the SATA Controller from the now new SATA section of the driver downloads, but wait, they give you the R99740.exe file. Ok, you run it and it wants to make a floppy. A floppy?! Come on, these days all new systems from DELL do not come with a floppy by default. It’s an extra option. Same thing with PS2 port, so don’t even think about being able to use your PS2 Keyboard or mouse. So how the heck are you supposed to install Windows without drivers without a floppy drive, with a driver on a floppy?
Be thankfull the motherboard still has the floppy drive connection port. Grab a nearby PC with a working floppy drive, disconnect it’s floppy cable from the motherboard and attach it to yours. Turn on the machine with the floppy drive and then yours. Make sure to go into the BIOS (F2) and set the floppy drive from USB to Internal. Then proceed with your install and don’t take out the floppy until you first reboot, because for some stupid reason it will want to copy the drivers twice.
Isn’t this a little too much trouble for the level of technology that we’ve achieved? For pete’s sake it’s 2006. Come on DELL, clean up your act.
Same with Microsoft.. our floppies today are our USB sticks, so why not let Windows treat them like floppy drives and get drivers off of them? Why does DELL insist on making drivers only writable to floppies? I’d like to extract the drivers whereever I please.

These would be things worth knowing, and now you know just a little bit more.

Marshall 07.12.06 / 6am

That’s a good point I forgot to mention - the SATA driver isn’t bundled with the operating system, so if you want Windows Setup to recognize the hard drive, you must load the driver manually.

The floppy drive requirement is a problem with Microsoft’s Windows Setup generally, not Dell. Unless your system’s BIOS allows for you to map a USB stick to the A: drive, you must use a floppy disk.

Cliff 07.12.06 / 11am

Same iastor problem with a 9150. No HD found when tring to repair. will try adding driver files to cd and update the oem section on cd.
This is rediculous

Marshall 07.12.06 / 11am

There is something a bit ironic about having to go to extra trouble to reinstall the very driver that causes system crashes in the first place…

Don Royer 07.13.06 / 7pm

Having the same issue with an XPS 400. System hangs after rebooting and connects to the network. Disconnect the network cable and the system stabilizes. Plug the network cable back in and all works fine until I put a heavy load on NIC such as doing a file transfer.

Robi 07.14.06 / 1am

Must be the onboard NIC, swap it with a pci or look for firmware updates, mobo updates..

Marshall 07.14.06 / 6am

It’s not the onboard NIC if he’s getting the BSOD with “iastor.sys”. It might be the case that the NIC is the issue in a situation where you don’t know there’s another problem, but as we see in other examples here, “iastor.sys” is a driver that appears to create resource conflicts with just about every other system component.

Dan Royer: Did the BSOD mention iastor.sys?

Don Royer 07.14.06 / 11am

That is correct. The BSOD specifically says “iaStor.sys”. It’s really pissing me off. I update the BIOS and the drivers to the latest and it still is happening. I am going to dig into it further to see by chance if some “virus” has latched onto my kernel but I seriously doubt it.

Brent reynolds 07.14.06 / 7pm

I am actually a Gold Level Dell Technician in Nashville, TN, and I happened across this site while attempting to dig up info on this same issue for one of my customers. It would seem from my research thus far that the IASTOR.SYS file is part of the Intel® Matrix Storage Technology. I have not yet figured out what the cause of this issue is, or a sound resolution for it, but figured I would let you guys know what I know at this point. If I happen across more info, or a valid fix, I will post it here for all of you.

Sorry you guys are having trouble! I’m dealing with it now, too!

Brent Reynolds
Dell | Nashville
Americas Client Services

Brent reynolds 07.14.06 / 8pm

UPDATE: Fortunatley for me and this customer, they had backups readily available (as everyone should), and they opted to just go ahead and wipe the hard drive, and reinstall windows. Of course, if you do not have backups, then I do not have a fix available for you at this time.

Considering that all OEM manufacturers cannot be held liable for data loss, it is always a good idea to backup files on a regular basis - that way if you do encounter an issue such as this, you can bounce back within a day. I sincerely hope that those of you without backups will be able to fix this issue without loosing any data. You can be assured that we know about the problem, and so does Intel, and any solution that is found will be added to our Knowledge Base.

Best of luck!

Brent reynolds 07.15.06 / 11am

MORE INFO: I thought it might be worth mentioning that this error occurs regardless of the system model or type. The issue is tied to a software problem within the Intel chipset drivers, and not to hardware.

Shanon 07.16.06 / 5pm

I frequently receive this error on my Dell XPS 400 while capturing video with the Dell installed single TV Tuner. It occurs when I manually hault the recording process. It does not occur when I use the timed recording process. I assumed it had something to do with the capture card configurations I set up in NeroVision as this error does not occur when I use the MCE environment to record from the capture card.

Steve kochmaruk 07.16.06 / 11pm

Can anyone tell me how to do a lean restore without Restore disks—-Is it built in?—-CTRL and F11 do not work—-How do I get my system off this damn blue screen???

Marshall 07.17.06 / 6am

Steve: If you don’t have your system restoration discs, you may have to reinstall your system from the Windows XP operating system CDs. Which version of Windows XP do you have?

Bill Graham 07.17.06 / 11am

I received the same type of bios error. I think you are right.

Allen Lobus 07.18.06 / 6am

Sure glad I saw this blog! I was going crazy! Been to Dell Chat sessions with 4 different techs, and still no resolve! They seem to hide under the fact that my system was not purchased with Raid option, so the problem was not their’s to fix! Now let’s get real! After enabling the RAID 1 option in the bios, I attempted to re-install WIN XP MCE from the OS CD and same blue screen of death occurred. So I decided to download the controller drivers from Intel’ website and insert them with the F6 key on Microsoft Install screen (at the beginning of the installation for those that don’t know), says that the Windows embedded driver was newer. I still used the driver from Intel, but same outcome. BSOD! Actually, I didn’t know that the SATA controller was on the MS CD. Actually had a decent Dell tech last night in chat, but he just confirmed that I was doing the RAID install correctly. Still no resolve.

John 07.18.06 / 4pm

Having same problems with iastor.sys here, with an XPS400 purchased on 29 June 2006 (system was built by Dell on 23 June 2006). BSOD happened 3 times today within a 5-hour span.

Vlad 07.19.06 / 10am

Same problem with Dimension 9150. BSOD at least twice a week.

Vlad 07.19.06 / 3pm

I am getting BSOD about twice a week with my new Dimension 9150 Windows XP PRO

Here is what I did:

Dimension 9150

1. Run XP051A05.exe. BIOS update http://ftp1.us.dell.com/bios/XP051A05.EXE
2. Restart.
3. Run infinst_autol.exe
http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/filter_results.aspx?strTypes=all&ProductID=2115&OSFullName=Windows*+XP+Professional&lang=eng&strOSs=44&submit=Go%21
4. Restart.
5. Run iata60_enu.exe
http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/detail_desc.aspx?strstate=live&productid=2529&dwnldid=10749&agr=n%E2%8C%A9=eng&prdmap=2529
6. Restart.

Done!

Will see if it will help with our problem. Before every time I tried to defragment the drive it would give me BSOD. Now Defragmentation completed fine. Like to see if it help anyone else.

James 07.19.06 / 3pm

I recently put together a new Intel based PC with everything new and glorious you could possibly find…. then I hit F6 to load drivers, I pick them offr the floppy - works fine… setup starts… Cannot Copy File: iaStor.sys etc etc… then it goes on to complete setup. I’m just thinking, well F, this isn’t going to work out well since it missed a critcal system file, which turned out to be the raid driver LOADED from my floppy!! On bootup I get the BSOD after windows splash about check disk and hardware problems and system stop. There needs to be a MS/Dell/Intel FIX for this now. The only info I got on it from the intel site was in reguards to unattended instals… I might have to get a ripped unattended install and edit the ISO to actually get the drivers loaded. I’ve put about 8 hours of work into trying different OS’s and various install fixes and raid configurations both in non-os and OS invironments. Complete bullshit. Windows will not load the raid driver I point to specifically on the floppy.

Marshall 07.19.06 / 3pm

Vlad’s posted a link to a driver provided directly by Intel. Chipsets are often customized for OEMs like Dell and, as such, usually require customized drivers certified by the manufacturer… but seeing as how the driver Dell supplies has some obvious problems, this one’s worth a shot. Please post your results!

Tim 07.23.06 / 2pm

Having the same problem with a Dell 5150, only i think i’ve experienced ever stop error there is. I get the BSOD on a regular basis when using ‘certain’ programs and they are almost always different errors. You’d think with it being such a known issue, Dell might do something about it.

Tim 07.23.06 / 4pm

I’ve discovered a solution which works for me. The ‘certain’ program was azureus bittorrent client. I’ve started using utorrent and i haven’t had a stop error at all (keep in mind i’ve been using vlc player and i’ve been surfing the net whilst using utorrent and my pc hasn’t crashed. I’ll give an update if i do crash

Steve A. 07.24.06 / 5pm

Having the same problem here, Dell XPS-400.
Attempting to do a clean installation of Windows XP Pro.

Downloaded drivers for my system (ver 5.0.x), attempted to install via Floppy (F6) on Setup, used both the one on the disk AND windows default. The one on the disk ended in bsod before Setup could even start, the windows default actually allowed Setup to complete then bsod on initial boot into windows.

Downloaded the newest set of Intel Matrix Storage Drivers (ver 6.x.x), same results.

What good is a driver that causes an error even before you get to use it?! How did this past the Quality Control checks of whoever develops the damned software?! I know they didn’t actually attemp to use it, or they would most definitely come across this problem.

System runs in Combonation mode just fine, except if you attempt to install Linux, it won’t find the HDD.
Autoraid/Else ATA runs fine, but causes general instabability in both Windows and Linux.
Autoraid/Else AHCI causes BSOD in Windows no matter what, but Linux runs great with no instabability.

Would LOVE a solution soon. Thank God for this blog, been pullin’ my hair out over this one. The best part is, the system comes initially setup in AHCI mode…how the hell did the technicians pull this off?!

Billy Joe Jim Bob 07.25.06 / 7pm

I recently decided to change the drives out in my Dell XPS gen 5 running raid 0. The PC had previously been running server 2003 with an odd mix of drives and I wanted to replace them with all the same size. Plugged in 3 matched Seagate 80 gigs and formated with XP Professional. No problems with the format, everythings running smooth until I decided to pull one of the 80 gigs for my Dim 8400.
I pulled the drive rebuilt the array and attempted to install XP Pro SP2 but no go. BSOD as soon as the OS begins the install routine. So I download the Intel Storage Matrix and press F6 on boot up - same rountine. Tried the same thing with XP Pro (no service pak), XP Pro SP1a all with same result.
So I go to the intel website for latest Matrix Drivers (iAstor.sys) and download all 5 versions going back over a year - still won’t install!!!!!

I recently decided to change the drives out in my Dell XPS Gen 5 running raid 0. The PC had previously been running server 2003 with an odd mix of drives and I wanted to replace them with all the same size. Plugged in 3 matched Seagate 80 gigs and formatted with XP Professional. No problems with the format, everything’s running smooth until I decided to pull one of the 80 gigs for my Dim 8400.
I pulled the drive rebuilt the array and attempted to install XP Pro SP2 but no go. BSOD as soon as the OS begins the install routine. So I download the Intel Storage Matrix from Dell and press F6 on boot up - same routine. Tried the same thing with XP Pro (no service pak), XP Pro SP1a all with same result. **Note that between the time of the original format and the last format I upgraded the bios from version A03 to A04.
So I go to the Intel website for the latest Matrix Drivers (iAstor.sys) and download all 5 versions going back over a year - tried each several times and the OS still won’t install!!!!!
By now I’m a little torqued but I’m not quitting till I find something that works. So I try Win2k with iAstor 5.5 from the Intel website - OS installed without a hitch. That’s okay I guess but who wants to run Win2k? Next idea; install WinVista Beta - that also installs and runs fine without a hitch. The problem is only half my software works : (
So Burt Reynolds if you’re reading this post what’s so different about Win2k and WinVista that they don’t exhibit the same problem?

Simon 07.26.06 / 9am

How about this as an example of a typicall unhelpful DellTechSupport comment -

“The issue you are describing is software-related.

Unfortunately as we are hardware support we can only offer basic software troubleshooting. You can contact software support on 0870 6000 159. Please note that software support is a chargeable service. Alternatively you may find a solution on the Microsoft knowledge base found on the below URL or you could check on search engines such as www.yahoo.com or www.google.com for ways on which to resolve the issue yourself.

I have taken the liberty of doing this for you:

http://www.softwarepatch.com/windows/winxp-stop-error-aec.html

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=330182

http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic21621.html

If you have any further questions or concerns please reply to this email.

Regards
Paul McAllister
Dell E-Support
Dimension/Inspiron ”

Of course if I could only get my computer to boot up at all (this posting is being done at work) then I might be able to tell if this was of any use!

P. Zipf 07.29.06 / 10pm

My BSOD took me about 4 months to solve, but solve it I did. I simply went to the Intel site and downloaded the latest version of their storage manager and all was well. It was version 4 that was soooo bad. As soon as I put in version 5, all was well again and no more BSOD.

Jim 08.02.06 / 9am

I’m facing the same BSOD on an E510 with Dell’s 160GB “DataSafe”, no floppy drive either. The computer worked great until we went on a 4 week vacation. Turning on the computer after the vacation, it booted fine the first time. A Microsoft automatic updates were done, which I believe was just the “Genuine Windows Validation…” only. I rebooted the computer since the email didn’t come since my cable modem was not on. At first, the computer frose in the bootup process with no indication as to why. I was sucessuful in getting safe mode started 2 times after that. But then the BSOD is now present, and nothing seems to let me get back to safe mode and potentially extract the data. So much for Dell’s “DataSafe”. I contacted their online support, and was told to do a Ctrl-F11 which would fix the problem. I didn’t do that yet since I would really like to extract the data somehow.

I’ve thought of trying to put the hard drive in another computer and copying it that way.
Some have said that they installed the latest Intel Storage Manager, but since I can’t get the computer to boot up at all, I don’t know how i could do this.
I’ve thought of pulling out or disconnecting one of the hard drives and hoping that it might boot with just one drive.
I’m wondering if I can boot off my Dell “OS Reinstall CD”, but based on the posts above, I’m thinking that I have no way to actually get this computer back up without a Ctrl-F11.

Did I mention that this is my wife’s computer, so as a result, since I have not fixed this yet, she is not happy. This is much worse that if it was my computer.

Any other ideas…

Jim

Marshall 08.02.06 / 9am

This problem seems to be most common on systems with DataSafe (RAID) configured. The good news is that, most of the time, your data can be saved — it’s just that Windows won’t boot.

To save your data, take out one of the two hard drives and connect it in another computer. (If you’re not comfortable doing this, you can buy an external case for your hard drive that connects to a computer via USB. Make sure you get the right case for your hard drive type. Most new Dell systems ship with SerialATA (SATA) interfaces, but older ones might still have IDE interfaces.)

Mark 08.02.06 / 11pm

I got a new computer out of them.

And no, you don’t have to have the resource CD for your computer. If you bought a computer with RAID-1, and you pay for the OS CD, the drivers for RAID control are there.

Install the OS by booting to CD, deleting and recreating partition, and continue as normal.

If your computer is BSODing out of the box, send it back. This is clearly a DELL problem — not yours.

Best of luck…

~B.

Adam 08.03.06 / 6am

Having the same problem as well. Only occurs when I push the HDD to the limit (like doing a ghost image, or copying everything on HDD across network). BSOD, with same error message.

Tony Lu 08.16.06 / 2am

I experienced the same BSOD problem (iastor.sys , error :0X000000D1 (0X00000018, 0X00000002, oX00000000, 0XF73AF25F) on Dell 5150c desktop today. And I turned to China Dell for further help, but the horrible level 1 technical support wasted my time. Finally, I fixed the issue by myself:

—unload the hard disk, then plug it to another desktop.
—it will let you do the disk scan ( acutally do some disk checking).
—after that, load it to the original desktop, the system booting up and running without issue.

wish It will help someone out on this case!

Steve A 08.17.06 / 5pm

Okay, been doing a little (actually a crap-load of) research. This problem has still not been resolved, and I’m going on a couple of months now (I love punishment and pain apparently)…this is rediculous!! No help from Dell of course, they don’t seem to have a clue. But, I did peruse their forums and found the following article. I will attempt this solution tonight and post my results. Going to try slipstreamin’ the drivers onto a WinXP Install CD and see if that works.

What I’m finding out slowly is that the Intel Matrix Storage drivers don’t seem to be digitally signed, and so when installing Windows, even if you specify the drivers from the floppy, Windows loads its own default drivers because the Intel drivers fail the digitally signed validation test. The only way around this at this point (as far as I’m aware) is to slipstream the correct drivers onto the installation CD and over-write/remove the in-correct ones. I will let you all know what I discover…if you don’t hear from me…it didn’t work. lol!!

If anyone else has found a “WORKING” solution, please post it so the rest of us don’t work ourselves into an early grave!

Here’s the article I found on Dell’s forum.
Cleann Install Can Be Done on 9100/XPS

Tim 08.18.06 / 1pm

I experienced this BSOD on an XPS 200 running XP Media Center. This system did not have a tuner installed - just a simple base system, everything on the motherboard.

While I have resolved it (I hope), I am posting this in hopes it may help others, as this thread helped me locate the resolution.

Problem started when the sytem totally failed (no video, no post error beeps, nada. Power switch glowed amber, none of the diagnostics lit on boot - even when I unplugged the memory and SATA drive).

Called Dell, went through the 30 minute phone call dance, verifying that it was indeed Tango Uniform (DOA). They send a tech with a motherboard and power supply. Same problem - so tech requests they send a new CPU. Next day, new tech installs new CPU and RAM. So now, the only parts of the original system that remain are the SATA drive, DVD and case.

System complains during boot of no floppy (which does not exist), modify BIOS settings and it boots without error. Quick disk check, software restart and tech leaves. A little while later, I power off the system- and it is not powered on until the following day, at which time this BSOD appears during Windows startup.

Windows will start in safe mode with networking, so I check the Dell site for new drivers - they are all quite dated. (Even older than the chipset drivers on the system).

In reviewing other threads on this problem, I found reference to new drivers on the INTEL site: http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/filter_results.aspx?strTypes=all&ProductID=2101&OSFullName=Windows+Server*+2003+Standard+Edition&lang=eng&strOSs=94&submit=Go%21

I first tried the Intel chipset ID utility (which gives an error when I tried to run it) - so I downloaed the above chipset driver install package and ran it. System restarted and it stayed on the Windows XP logo for over 5 minutes, then screen turned blue, but showed a registry read error (Not a BSOD).

Restart, selected ‘Last Good…’ and the original BSOD returns.
Restart, selected ‘Safe mode with networking’ - display shows driver list as normal for safe mode startup, but the process churns for 5+ minutes (hard drive remains active) vs the normal 45 seconds.

System finally continues and starts normally- even though I had selected ‘Safe Mode with Networking’ and it started loading in that mode (indicated by the typical list of drivers scrolling across the screen) - it took 10 times longer to boot and loaded Windows in standard mode.

The newly installed Intel software showed on startup menu, ran and showed the hard-drive, verified the dates of the driver as matching the newly installed ones. Restarted, powered-off and it seems to be resolved.

So, if you are facing this problem and do not want to wipe/reinstall, and can boot into safe-mode- try the above Intel drivers. Thanks to others who have posted info on this topic here and on other sites. The Dell techs were of no use and only wanted to walk me through a re-install (thanks, but no thanks Dell, I know how to install Windows - I do wish they had a process / test /something that I could pass so I could then buy-pass the usual ID-10-T filtering questions - (Is the power on, is the monitor connected, is the monitor turned on….) Yes, I realize they have to support plenty of people where this may be relevant, but don’t make everyone suffer through that.

Judging by the number of posts on this topic, it is a fairly common problem.

Dave 08.19.06 / 11am

I started experiencing the iastor.sys BSOD problem on a new (month old) XPS 400 several days ago. A few days before that, the PC started hanging when it was idle — nothing on the screen to indicate what the problem was. This problem started after I used Windows Update to install some XP patches and the Microsoft Update utility, so I wonder if there’s a connection.

At this point, the machine won’t boot, even in safe mode. In safe mode, it will display a list of drivers and stop (last driver listed is Mup.sys). If I try to boot Windows, either normal startup or last good config, I’ll get the Windows XP splash screen, and then it will either stop there or display the BSOD. This XPS is a basic config, no tuner card or other add-ons, so it’s probably not a resource conflict. The hard drive is the 250GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s model. I don’t have another desktop PC to try a hard drive transplant. I don’t have a bootable Windows CD, so I can’t try the access the hard drive by other means.

I called Dell Warranty Support yesterday, and it actually went pretty well. I got a human with no wait, and when I mentioned the iastor.sys problem, he didn’t seem to know about it, but did find a reference to the BSOD in his database. He eventually had me run the hard drive diagnostics from the boot device menu (which you get to by pressing F12 at startup), and the test reported a failure (return code 4). As a result, Dell is shipping a new hard drive to a local technician, who will come to my house and install it. I’m going to ask the tech to install the old drive as a second drive, so I can try to recover the data. If he (or she) won’t do that, I’ll hang on to the drive and do it myself. Based on other postings in the forum, there’s a good chance I’ll get the same defective iastor.sys driver on the replacement drive, so I’ll be real diligent about backing up the drive.

I came across this forum when researching this problem, and it was exactly what I needed. Thanks!

Adam 08.19.06 / 9pm

I just wanted to thank the author of this site for posting about this and keeping everyone updated. Luckily I caught it early and updated the Intel Matrix Manager after a couple of BSOD’s. I am glad, however, that I went for the “DataSafe” harddrive because one of the drives failed after this problem.

Dave 08.24.06 / 10am

This is a follow up to my posting from August 19. As I reported then, I had the iastor.sys BSOD problem and called Dell Warranty Support. They agreed to send a new hard drive to local technician who would come to my house and install it. I initially called on Friday 8/18, and was told I would hear from the technician no later than Tuesday 8/22 (two days ago). I also received an e-mail from Dell on 8/18 providing the dispatch number for the drive. The e-mail said I would receive another e-mail when the drive was actually sent.

As of yesterday, Wed 8/23, I had not heard from anyone or received another e-mail. When I initially called, the support technician gave me the extension of his manager, and told me to call that number if I had any questions about the case. I called yesterday, but only reached the manager’s voicemail, so I left a message. The e-mail I received from Dell aid I could reply to that e-mail and my reply would go to the case owner, so I replied and asked for an update on the status. I went to Dell’s web site to check the status of the service call online, but it gave me an error when I specified the dispatch number from the Dell e-mail.

Today is Thurs 8/24. I received no response to either my voicemail message or the e-mail, so I tried calling the manager’s extension again. Once again I got dumped into his voicemail, so I didn’t bother leaving a message. I decided to call the Dell Warranty Support number, and it didn’t take long to reach someone. That technician put me on hold to investigate the current status, and while I was holding, I decided to try to check my dispatch status online again. This time it found the information, which indicated the service call had been cancelled! When the technician came back on the phone, he also told me the call had been cancelled. I asked why, and he said someone decided that replacing my hard drive might not resolve the problem. I pointed out that (1) my computer was completely unusable, and (2) no one had informed me that the call had been cancelled. I asked to speak to the technician’s manager.

I was tranferred to the supervisor, Mark Herbert. He didn’t really have a good answer for why the call was cancelled. He suggested I try doing a restore of the original drive configuration using Ctrl-F11, but I pointed out that I wanted the opportunity to try to recover data from the drive, which I wouldn’t be able to do if I reset it. He did have me try one thing the original technician did not ask me to do, to rule out a USB device conflict: He asked me to get into the BIOS Setup, and switch the USB controller to No Boot. That didn’t make any difference. Mark said he would send a new drive, and the technician would come and install it either tomorrow or Saturday.

This is unbelievable. I’ll let you know what happens.

Carolyn Taylor 08.24.06 / 2pm

Have had the same problem with the intermittent BSOD on my XPS 400 purchased in Dec 05. DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL iastor.sys. Could not DEFRAG or complete and automatic backup to my SEAGATE Hard Drive, nor could I leave the computer in a wait state for any length of time…BSOD. Called numerous techs from DELL, needless to say….no help. Tried several things on my own…no help

UNITL…I found on DELLS website in Journal 06236GFRXB titled ” Why Does my Computer Freeze When I Run Disk Cleanup or Disk Defrag in Microsoft Windows XP. This procedure tells you to edit your registry and take out the COMPRESSED OLD FILES. I did exactly as it asked and I also noted that there were old MCAFEE files…sorry folks I am not a fan and tried my best to uninstall it and all of the other software that Dell included but it doesn’t appear it was a total success. So I removed the McAfee and Corel residue….rebooted my machine and I don’t know if it is going to last, HOWEVER….I did a complete Backup to my Seagate and a complete DEFRAG without the dreaded BSOD….hope this last for me and hope it may help some of you. BEWARE….take caution when editing your registry be sure to back up the registry file first. I will be watching the blog to see if it works for you. Good Luck

Elizabeth Dell 08.25.06 / 9pm

I have only had my INSPIRON E1505 for only a month and the damn screen came up on the second day. I called tech support and after five tech and 12 hours on the phone my computer was unusable. They unistalled stuff then reinstalled stuff.

I had recently got married and I tried to down load my wedding video so I could edit it and after working on it for sevral hours and saving it multple times the blue screen came up and deleted everything even the stuff I saved. So I called dell in a frantic and they sent me a new hard drive saying this would take care of the problem…. NO… didnt help. they then sent me a mother board, prossesor, memory. And six hours after the tech installed the parts the SCREEN CAME BACK. Now if I am understanding this corectly didnt they basicaly give me a new computer?

Does anyone know what

STOP:0X0000008E
Dumping physical memory
physical memory dump complete

MEANS BECAUSE DELL ISENT SAYING.

Now they want to send me a new computer but if I am having all this trouble then I think I will ask for my money back and get a toshiba.

Dave 08.26.06 / 12pm

Here’s another update to my posting from Thursday 8/24. Today is Saturday the 26th. On Thursday, Dell promised me my new drive would be installed either yesterday or today. This time, they actually did send the drive to the technician, who received it yesterday. This morning, Dell called me to follow up, and asked if I had heard from the technician yet — I had not. Dell gave me a phone number to contact the technician directly, which I did. I was told they don’t work Saturdays, so the soonest I could get the drive installed is Monday.

I explained to Dell on Thursday that I would be out of town this coming week, and they assured me I would be able to get the drive installed today, if it didn’t happen yesterday. The technician told me they have to ship the drive back to Dell after 5 days, to avoid getting charged for it, so they can’t hang on to it until I’m back in town. They said I had to call Dell and open a new service call.

I called Dell again, and there’s nothing I can do until I get back in town, at which time I have to call them again and open a new service call. Plus, I’ll have to make arrangements to be home during the week so I can have the technician come over.

Meanwhile, I was able to boot with a Knoppix Linux CD and verify that the data on the hard drive is intact. If I can figure out how to get Knoppix to recognize my external Maxtor USB drive, I can copy my data from the old drive before it gets replaced, which will make things simpler. I don’t have a bootable Windows CD, and the Dell doesn’t have a floppy drive. I may also try replacing the iastor.sys and associated drivers with the newest versions from Intel, to see if that lets me boot off the original drive. It seems the Intel drivers are only available as part of an install package, so I have to see if there’s a way to get the driver files without actually running an installer.

Stay tuned…

Elaine Gittus 08.26.06 / 7pm

I have just spent 2 hours online with a Chat person at Dell. I have an XPS 200 computer, and the BSOD tells me that I have the same problem that all of you have been complaining about! After 2 hours, we did NOT get the problem fixed!! I am ready to go out and get an HP!! They are going to send me restore CD’s, but unfortunately, I will lose everything that is stored now on my hard drive! I am not happy at all!

But I am glad to see that there are others with the same problem, so I am not losing it . . . .

Steve A 08.31.06 / 12am

I apologize, on my last post I said the website that links to nLite is
www.nlite.org, in my haste to get this solution out, I did not verify the address. It is actually http://www.nliteos.com/

I apologize for the inconvience, this site apparently does not allow you to edit your posts!!

-Steve

Marshall 08.31.06 / 8am

Steve -

Thanks very much for the detailed post. I’ll be posting a wrap-up of everyone’s experiences and fixes shortly.

Stingray 08.31.06 / 4pm

I have had the same BSOD problem with my Dell Dimension 9150.

With the help of the information on this page, the Dell support rep and I were able to fix the problem without re-installing windows XP.

Without understanding the full details of what went wrong, I believe that the original Dell Intel Matrix Storage Manager Drivers were the source of the problem. (I had version Intel Matrix Storage Manager, v.5.1.0.1022, A03 ). We fixed the problem by replacing them with the updated drivers from Intel (version 6.1.0.1002)

Here is how I fixed the problem:

(1) Download the Floppy Disk Tool to get the driver files from Intel:
(I started at the link from a previous post:
http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/Filter_Results.aspx?strOSs=All&strTypes=All&ProductID=2101&lang=eng&OSFullName=All%20Operating%20Systems#DRV
)

I selected the 32-bit (I am running Windows XP Pro) Floppy Configuration Utility for version 6.1.0.1002 at:
http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&ProductID=2101&DwnldID=11310&strOSs=All&OSFullName=All Operating Systems&lang=eng

(2) Extract the files from the Floppy Utility (requires a blank floppy). My Dimension does not have a floppy drive, so I burned the file “iastor.sys” onto a CD. (You could use any removable storage media that is visible from the Windows XP Recovery Console).

(3) Booted my Dimension 9150 into the Recovery Console using the XP CD.

(4) Navigate to c:\windows\system32\drivers\ where the bad “iastor.sys” file is located.

(5) Rename “iastor.sys” to “iastor.old” using the command -> “ren iastor.sys iastor.old”

(6) Copy the new version of iastor.sys from removable storage to c:\windows\system32\drivers\iastor.sys

(7) Rebooted the machine into Safe Mode (This took 2 tries because I think the machine was performing Chkdsk on the drives the first time and forced a reboot afterwards.)

(8) From safe mode, I installed the Full Version of the Intel Matrix Storage Manager Driver (Not the Floppy Disk Configuration Utility) that I downloaded from:
http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=N&ProductID=2101&DwnldID=11309&strOSs=All&OSFullName=All Operating Systems&lang=eng

(9) Then, I rebooted my machine into Windows Normal Mode and everything seems to be fixed.

I was very happy not to have to re-install windows or lose any of my data.

I hope that helps.

Stingray

Will 09.03.06 / 10am

Yikes. I hope there is a simpler solution than Steve A proposes; i don’t have a floppy drive and i’m not that technically savvy.

My E510 gives BSOD with various stop errors 0×000000XX. Spent 4 hrs + with Dell Service and the only thing I’ve accomplished is to wipe my hard drive running recoveries.

Anxiously awaiting Marshall’s wrapup. thanks so much

IAN 09.03.06 / 11pm

I have owned several Dells, laptops and towers… all used. I reformated and loaded all OS and softwere on them. some needed drivers (fan driver for laptop, softwere patches for new PCI cards or MIDI divices, etc…) but these were used and I added cards, memory, drives etc… I paid little or nothing for them and cutomized them to my liking. No complants here, got what I paid for and I was happy.

HOWEVER…

I have just bought my first Brand New DELL… an XPS400, paid over $1600 for extra memory and dual DVD’s, digital widescreen etc. This was for my wife, I was in Oregon while she recived it in California, so uses it to work from home but is a pulg and play person. she hooked it up and the first thing she got was an error message RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX!!!

She was not happy, which means I am not happy. I got home and she let me know that for what I payed she did not want me to follow my normal MO (reformat and instal things to my liking). Dell’s customer service is a nightmare, they know nothing. I sometimes get the BSOD, somtimes just a driver error and sometimes it starts and actualy runs.

of course after many calls and an online chat I was told to restore my system. I told the tech, “If it did not work OUT OF BOX, how could restoring it to that Original config help in anyway. and yes I BU on a regual basis (its my MO).

I will NEVER buy a New Dell AGAIN… a cheep or free used one I can tinker with yes, but for $1600 I feel VERY RIPPED OFF!!!

I have let Dell know and got no reply.

I am trying the various pathes I have read on this site.

THANKS FOR PUTTING UP THIS SITE!!!!

I will let you know if anything helps, If not I will try to send it back.

IAN

Em 09.04.06 / 6pm

Hey guys,
Try This one out…

When you get an error message 0×000000D1 beginning dump of physical memory or 0xD1 iastor.sys , try first to clear the event log in the Bios and then change the SATA Operation to ON instead of AUTODETECT and then reboot the computer, it is also recommendable to run memory tests and HDD test just to be sure it is not any other hardware problem.

Please provide feedback if this works… thanks.

Joseph 09.04.06 / 9pm

I am using an XPS just like Tim, and I downloaded and installed his file without any problems. Since then, I have let my TV run and I’ve had no problems (3 plus hours). I hope this works.

It may also be worth noting that I updating my DLA driver. I also have write combining disabled

PS, my problems have mostly been with my video adapter. My ialmrnt5 driver usually stops responding. Dell is sending me some discs that was/is supposed to fix the problem. However, if it does not return, then I won’t manually reinstall windows.

I’m using an XPS 200 to be exact.

BTW, I tried a few other things that did not work before I came across this site. I updated my video adapter and that did not work. I reverted to the orignal driver and that did not work. I tried using Windows version of the driver and that did not work. I reverted to the factory settings, and that did not work.

I currently am using the latest Intel Express Chipset Family. for my “Display adapter”. Dell thought this was the orignal source of the problem. However, it appears my problem was with the intel matrix storage manager.

(I bought my system about a month ago).

It’s hard to tell whether the problem(s) are with one particular driver or alot of drivers combined since people do alot of experimenting before they find a solution.

As I mentioned in my first post, I updated my DLA file because someone else did that and it worked for them.

Ake 09.05.06 / 7am

Because I am in a hurry to finish my work and need more computation power. I bought a dimension 5150 in late April 2006 to do my dissertation. When booted the computer very first time I notice many abnormal rectangular like picture at the back of the main view on the screen, then it disappeared. I thought this is some minor thing. Just within 24 hours after installing about 4 programs and accepted some windows update into the computer I start to see blue screen and still notice those weird rectangulars almost half of the time when boot my computer. Sometimes, I notice the screen say computer has to dump some data, and reboot automatically.

At that time, I didn’t want to return the machine because I was very busy then and really need to keep working on my study. I tried to ask Dell few times and they have no idea about this but ask me to reinstall all software and drivers. Once I know that this problem is permanent and want to return the computer, it is too late.

The problem still exists but cannot afford the amount of time it takes to solve this problem. I could not turn on my computer once becuase suddenly some main components of windows are missing and have to reinstall windows and lost all data because of this. About a week ago, I notice some sudden loud cranky noise from my computer and the computer get stuck and cannot reboot one time.

Now I just buy a new external harddrive and backup my data more often. Hoping that this machine will survive until I finish my study, find a good job and bought a new one from others, definitely not from Dell.

Aisling 09.05.06 / 8am

I can’t believe so many ar having the same problem as me! I have been working away on our new Dell PC for the past two weeks. This morning the same iastor.sys BSOD problem happened and I have been panicking ever since! The computer is attached to a very expensive piece of equipment which we can’t use because of the problem. I can’t believe Dell are ignoring this and are allowed to keep selling PCs.

Thanks to everyone who posted on this site and a big thanks to the person who set it up!

Just to add on to my previous email we are experienceing the same BSOD problem with a Dell Precision 380!

Jeff 09.05.06 / 7pm

My computer is getting the BSOD with the iastor.sys listed as the problem. It also lists Driver_IRQL_not_less_or_equal at the top. What can I do to get this back up and running. I have my hard drives mirrored, but what can I do to get booted back into windows. I get this error when I boot up normally or try to go into safe more or try to use last good config. I have a dell 9150 and this has really dropped a bomb on my productivity. Any ideas? Any suggestions? Someone help! WTF caused this…I was using a number of internet programs at the time…could that have caused this to happen?

Dave 09.06.06 / 4pm

Here’s another update on my continuing saga with Dell (the last update was on 8/26).

On my last full day out of town, Friday 9/1, I called Dell again to ask them to send a replacement drive directly to me, so that it would arrive by the time I got home. I didn’t want them to send the drive to a technician this time, since I’d only be able to have the drive installed during business hours, which means I’d have to wait until after Labor Day, and would have to be home when it happened. I spent 90 minutes on the phone talking to two different people, but Dell would not ship the drive so that it would arrive on a Saturday (business days only), and they would not ship the drive unless someone was home to sign for it (even though I didn’t have to sign for the computer). I finally gave up and told Dell I would call back sometime after I got home, most likely to make arrangements to return the machine.

After I got home, I decided to give Dell another chance, just because I didn’t want to deal with looking for a different machine. This time, I figured I just have them send the drive to a technician again, and work at home the day it would be installed. Just before I was going to call Dell yesterday, I received a voicemail message from the technician who was sent the drive before I went out of town. Since he knew I was going to be away, he took it upon himself to hang on the the drive until I got back, rather than return it to Dell as he was supposed to do. Finally, someone reasonable to deal with! (I only wish I had known this before I wasted 90 minutes of my vacation getting aggravated by Dell.) So, I set up an appointment for the technician to come over later this week and install the drive (hasn’t happened yet). I told him I wanted to keep the old drive long enough to try to recover my data, he said no problem, I had 10 business days to return it, and it wouldn’t cost me anything to ship it. Things are starting to look better.

Meanwhile, I’ve made a couple of additional attempts to recover some of the old data, but nothing has worked so far.

As always, stay tuned…

Dave 09.09.06 / 12pm

Here’s the latest update on my drive issue (last update 9/6).

Yesterday the tech came over and installed the new drive. He left me the old drive and showed me how to install it (pretty simple). He recommended getting everything configured before trying to install the second drive. I have 10 days to return the old drive, with pre-paid shipping.

I set up the new drive, and I checked the version of the Intel storage drivers it came with: It was the same version on my old drive, so Dell didn’t update the drivers as they had told me earlier. I updated the drivers using the utility from the Intel site:

http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=N&ProductID=2101&DwnldID=11309&strOSs=All&OSFullName=All

You just need to run the .exe and reboot.

I’ve run into a new issue, which I’ve tried to get help for on the Dell Forum, but no luck so far. I installed the old drive and enabled it in the BIOS, but it appears that the drive controller is pairing it with my new drive and treating them both as a pair. When I booted, I got a blank screen after the XP splash screen. You can’t disable the RAID feature of the drive controller or the drive, at least I haven’t found a way to do that anywhere in the BIOS. I just want the second drive to be regognized as such so I can copy files from there to the new one. Does anyone know how I can configure the drive to work that way? Both drives are 250 GB SATA drives and they have the same drive ID, which might be contributing to the problem.

If I find out how to resolve this elswhere, I’ll post the solution here in case anyone else needs to do this.

Brandi 09.11.06 / 2am

I didn’t read every comment, but the ones I did read were about Dells. I’m getting an error message on my HP laptop saying my iaStor.sys file is corrupted. Nothing will load. This happened while I was at work… I just loved coming home to that. I’m waiting on the arrival of my new hard drive now. Does anyone know if it is too late to save anything on my hard drive?

Marshall 09.11.06 / 6am

There’s a good chance your data’s still fine. The best thing to do is take the hard drive out of the computer and put it into a 2.5″ USB external hard drive enclosure, then plug it into another working computer. You should be able to copy all of your data off the drive that way.

For those using a desktop instead of a laptop, a 3.5″ enclosure (IDE or SATA, depending on the type of drive) will do the trick.

Dave 09.12.06 / 1pm

Me again. As Marshall suggested, the USB drive enclosure is the way to go. Someone on the Dell forum suggested the same thing. I’ve tried that to save the data on my problem drive, and I’m getting close but I’m not there yet. If I boot the Dell with a Knoppix CD, I can see the data on the old drive — this is true both when it’s in the USB drive enclosure, and when the drive was still installed in the Dell. Unfortunately, the only drives I can copy the data when using Knoppix are formatted as NTFS, which my version of Knoppix doesn’t support (for writing).

I also tried using the USB drive enclosure with two Windows systems: The Dell (WinXP) and a laptop (Win2000). In both cases, as soon as I plug in the drive, the computer sees it, but I can’t access anything on it. Any operation that attempts to access the drive either hangs completely or slows down to a crawl. I don’t know why Windows has a problem with the drive when Knoppix doesn’t.

My next experiment will be to use Knoppix to copy the data over the network to the Dell. I think that’s the only thing I haven’t tried yet.

Chrissie 09.13.06 / 2pm

How can you tell if this might be an uncoming issue with your PC? Is there something I can search for on my PC?

Thank you.

Marshall 09.13.06 / 3pm

Chrissie - Go to Start -> Control Panel -> System -> Device Manager and look for IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers. Double click it, then double click on one of the entries below it. Go to the Driver tab, then the Driver Details button. Is one of the files called “IASTOR.SYS”?

And by the way, how’d you find the site if you’re not having the problem?

Chrissie 09.13.06 / 6pm

Thank you. I do not have that driver on my computer. I found the website cause I did a search on Dimension E510 noise, and it pulled up this one.
My stupid Dimension makes a noise when it’s thinking. It sounds like a vibration now. I don’t know what’s wrong with it, and Dell told me that I needed to take off the cover, disconnect and reconnect the cords to the fan. So I wanted to see if anyone else was having that problem, before I attempted to do that, and what they found.

Joy 09.15.06 / 11am

This has been very interesting to read. I just purchased an Inspiron E1405, received it just yesterday. I too got a Blue screen error reading fresh out of the box, although the message I was getting was file ialmrnt5. Bums me out that I’m having problems from the get go. I am hoping this problem isn’t as severe as some of you are experiencing?! Anyone have some suggestions?

Aaron 09.18.06 / 9am

I had/have the listed problem with my XPS200. The blue screen event became increasingly prevalent. Most DELL techs insist that I do a PC Restore which clobbers all data. Then I would have to reload everything. This is unacceptable since it is time and labor extensive. Luckily I have everything backed up with Norton Ghost 10. Yesterday, another DELL tech seemed familiar with the problem and had me delete all three iastor.sys files. He indicated that since I only have one internal hard drive it is not needed. So far it looks as if this may work, but only time will tell.

Marshall 09.18.06 / 9am

Ah - now that’s interesting. I wonder if the problem’s been that they’re shipping with RAID drivers bundled or enabled even on systems without multiple drives… and they finally figured it out?

Do you remember what the filenames were?

Aaron 09.19.06 / 2pm

All 3 files had the same name, iastor.sys. I do not recall the folders where they were located.

bk2life 09.19.06 / 9pm

ive got a e510, purchased jan 06. what are the production dates of these “infected” computers. i havent had any probs with mine. and i hope since i have read this blog, i didnt infect my computer with BSOD… lol

ifitsgotwheels.com

Marshall 09.19.06 / 9pm

It’s not a matter of infection. Certain models produced in 2006 may have issues with the hard drive controller driver IASTOR.SYS. To check:

Go to Start -> Control Panel -> System -> Device Manager and look for IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers. Double click it, then double click on one of the entries below it. Go to the Driver tab, then the Driver Details button. Is one of the files called “IASTOR.SYS”?

Rezz of Oz 09.20.06 / 3pm

So I have a system that isn’t booting because of this error. I’ve taken the drive out and put it into another identical system and Windows Explorer cannot read the drive UNTIL I run the rescan Plug and Play devices within the Intel Manager. Then the drive shows up.

Any idea how I can update the driver WITHOUT being able to boot to the machine since I get that damn BSOD everytime I boot this thing.

eric 09.20.06 / 5pm

i have an E310 that i purchased back in june. it started doing the BSOD in july. it eventually got so bad that windows wouldn’t load and said a system file was missing. with dell’s help today, i managed to get the system file repaired and windows loading. however, i still get the screen. i set acceleration to none hoping it would help, but it left a black bar on my desktop. so i set it to minimal. before doing this, my limewire program wouldn’t load, it would instantly go to the blue screen. now limewire will run, but it still pops the screen up when i try to run my antivirus program.

i’m sick of this. i’ve always thought dell was a good company, but this has got to go. this is my 3rd desktop and my wife has a laptop, all from dell. they’re about to lose my business for good if a fix doesn’t pop up soon

kathy 09.23.06 / 9am

This is my 2nd Dimension E510, couldn’t get 1st one to boot at all. A hour with tech support and they send me another that gives me the BSOD, and then goes into a reboot loop. This is sickning, I buy new so I don’t have to spend my time fixing and upgrading, a grand later and your worst off.

Ashik 09.24.06 / 4pm

My 1 year old Dell 3000 suddenly gave a BSOD 0000008 error code. I realised it happened only when it began to install newly d/l Windows Updates. I had just done an XP Repair due to viral infection and had observed during installation a warning that unsigned USB drivers were being installed (though this was using original Dell XP cd I had used before). I figured that the Windows Updates that were trying to be installed were somehow conflicting with the original XP drivers.

I upgraded the DELL BIOS and while reading the above posts, I decided to check Intel web site for an upgrade to its Chipset. I just installed that (make sure you get the right one using Device Manager) and no Blue Screen while installing Windows Updates.

I am therefore recommending to all of you suffering from 0×0000008E to check for software updates to their motherboard Chipsets.

john mccarthy 09.26.06 / 4pm

Hello

I have spent the last week trying to clean up my computer. I am not a technical expert and only really know the basics. my approach has been to clean my hard drive but still i felt it was time to clean all the cobwebs and reinstall. apparently this is an easy process i simply insert my recovery disk and away i go. But alas i am now one and a bit weeks into a vigil to try and find out why i keep getting a blue screen of death saying iaStor.sys not found. I am using a fijitsusiemens computer with chipset 915 express family (found by the intel chipset id tool i downloaded). i have an I/O controller 82801FB and memory 82915GP (i have no idea what this all means ?) i tried to download and install the latest intel storage manger (which was supposed to work with my chipset and XP home ed, but alas another error message appeared saying my system was not compatable ? so to answer your question it is not just DELL that are having problems.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Some sleep and my wife talking to me again since i have been locked in our home office would be nice too.

regards

John

Alex Hates Dell's oversea support 09.28.06 / 9am

Hi,
I would like to thank Steve for writing that guide and everyone’s contribution which saved me from returning the new Dell 9200 machine after a long period of search.

My situation is little different, but in general, it is because the Intel Matrix Raid. I followed Steve’s guide and fresh-installed xp pro sp2 on a RAID 0 of 500 GB. Before seeing this site, I was stupid enough to think that Dell would be able to help me. Although it is not Dell’s fault entirely, but they should’ve known this kind of problem by now. A warning about RAID before purchase(”only preconfigured RAID by dell will be supported or you might have to have a “Dell experience”") or more educated over-sea tech support would saved all of us so much time and hassle.

Best regards,

Alex

Paul 09.29.06 / 12am

I have nowhere in my BIOS to switch to AHCI mode, only ATA. Rev. A04 and A05 both wont let me go to AHCI. why?

New Dell User 09.29.06 / 4pm

Wow, had no idea so many people were experiencing this problem, and i’m having the EXACT same problems (blue screen, stop errors, device drive conflicts) … hopefully one of the posted solutions works!

Mary 09.30.06 / 12am

Just got off a 2 hour phone call with Dell. Bought an XPS400 a month ago. I got the BSOD after I installed my son’s Disney game (well, a week after I installed it).

STOP: 0X000000D1 (0X00000018, 0X00000002, oX00000000, 0XF73AF25F)
*** iastor.sys-Address F73AF25F base at F73A0000, DateStamp 42b2df42.

I rebooted and the machine worked fine - for a few days. This morning, I got the BSOD and when I rebooted, the BSOD was still there - stuck. I turned off the computer several times, turned it on in safe mode and uninstalled the program, and did a system restore. Left for several hours, came back, turned on the computer and BSOD was still there.

I called Dell’s XPS tech support. Restarted in safe mode, downloaded all of the Matrix stuff at Intel - no luck. When the computer came on again, I finally got to my desktop, but it was stuck. Had to reboot and got the BSOD again. This time it wasn’t the iastor.sys message, but another one with no specific callout.

We then did some hard drive diagnostic checks which all failed. They’re suppose to replace the hard drive next week. Oh joy! Something tells me that won’t be the end of my problems.

Joy 09.30.06 / 11am

Mary be warned,
I sent off my pc to get the “hard drive replaced” over a week ago, due to BSOD and errors, just got it back today and inside was a repair action sheet. They didn’t do anything to it, they marked a choice that the problem is limited to software and to contact Dell Support for assistance. This is a brand new computer and I haven’t been able to use it since it came out of the box. I too had called Dell’s tech support and tried several diagnostics. This totally blows. Good Luck!

Joseph 10.02.06 / 9am

I’m still having issues, but not as often. My get the BSOD or my XPS 200 reverts t 4bit color mode when I am watching video or visiting a mypage space. it seems like the video card can’t handle the audio and video like its suppose to. I don’t know if it’s too late to take the machine back. I plan to upgrade the video adapter. This has worked for others.

Mary 10.03.06 / 2pm

Joy, they sent the tech guy out to my house. Showed up a couple of hours ago. My computer still doesn’t work as the memory and motherboard now need to be replaced. I’m sititng on hold with Dell Warrant support right now because I AM pissed! The hard drive they brought out was refurbished. My computer is less than a month old. If I wanted a refurbished computer, I would have bought a refurbished computer and saved several hundred dollars.

Damo 10.06.06 / 8am

I’ve been getting similar problems. BSOD with IASTOR being the culprit. I’ve only had the Dell 5150 for about 3 weeks and now the PC boots into the Symantec recovery mode but BSOD before it reaches the menu. Pressing CTRL + F11 ro get to the recovery just comes up with an error “CANNOT RESTORE”. DELL have sent out restore CD’s but when I try to rebuild XP Media it just hangs on “Examing 228418MB Disk 0 at ID0 on Bus on IASTOR” So will contact DELL again for what good that will do!

Graham Mackay 10.06.06 / 1pm

I bought a Dell 5150 three weeks ago.

This very day, I have just seen my first ever Blue Screen of Death. I am not a techie and I am disgruntled at the though of having to get this solved personally.

The error message I receive is DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL. The techie stuff at the bottom gives further details - STOP: 0×00000D1.

This is absolute kak. I had a Toshiba lap-top for 6 years and no hassle.

Wade 10.08.06 / 8pm

E510 BSOD, Dell sucks

Gordon 10.09.06 / 11am

Hi All. My Dell Dimension 5150C was shipped 28 Dec 2005. It went wrong in June 2006 and after at least two weeks Dell took it back and replaced something. The process wiped the memory clean and reinstalled all the cruddy software that Dell adds in these days. I deleted these and put my preferred virus scan, firewall and spyware back and the thing seemed to work fine for three months. Now (Oct 2006) I am getting the dreaded BSOD and the reference to iastor.sys. After a couple of hours on the phone Dell tell me that my hardware is fine and for a mere £24 they will fix the software! I want my money back. Thank God for my HP laptop.

marc 10.09.06 / 6pm

HI ,i wonder if someone can help ,i bought my dell dimension 5150c on 9 aug and its never worked proper from day one .I was gettin BSOD message IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL up on screen after a few days.i contacted dell they recommended re installing software and it worked but after a few days back to the same problem .now i cant get the windows xp to copy to hard drive as it just re boots to dell logo screen or get a BSOD message up.Now im left with a useless computer and dell have charged me an extra £34 since just to speak to someone who cudnt solve the issue , anyone help please ? ,marc

Alex Hates Dell's oversea support 10.10.06 / 1pm

Guys, why not try to replace the hard drive that shipped with the system. If it does not work, you can return the hard drive.

Edd 10.11.06 / 12pm

Hi.
I had this same problem on a Dell XPS 400 and I tried the 3 safe modes and also last known good but didnt work. the Blue Screen i got was STOP: 0×000000D1 DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL due to a “IASTOR.SYS” which is regarding a Intel Matrix Storage Manager file for RAID configurations . WHat i did is i went to the BIOS by pressing F2 at startup and went to drives then to SATA operation since my computer does not have RAID i just changed it to COMBO and it worked beautifuly… =) Try it out!

by the way… a Dell technician helped me out so its not entirely Dell’s Support that sucks… actually he was very polite and worked my issue in less than 15 minutes.

Scott 10.11.06 / 11pm

I’m truly grateful that I found this site, and Edd, your post came at the perfect time for me. I just started searching for help today, and the BIOS thing worked. I’m also using an XPS 400, and for the past few days up until today, it would just lock up completely (no BSOD) whenever there was moderate-heavy hard drive access.

patrickg 10.12.06 / 1am

Sad to hear that so many people have been having the same problem that I’m experiencing. This is the second time that my computer has crashed with a serious disk failure, and this one was much more severe. I began incrementally troubleshooting as follows:

System: Dell E510 with 2 SATA drives in a RAID-1 Config, WinXP-Pro

1. installed floppy drive and booted Win-XP Recovery CD, hit F6 to install iastor.sys drivers. Result = BSOD at chkdsk recovery.

2. updated driver disk to newest drivers (from link on this site), booted XP CD with new iastor.sys, and the drive was not recognized.

3. tried previous version, drive not recognized.

4. Removed firewire card, unplugged all USB, disabled integrated sound and NIC. booted to WinXP CD with old iastor.sys drivers. Result = BSOD during chkdsk recovery.

= same BSOD.

*** Finally, as a last ditch effort (and I don’t recommend this, but it worked for me) ***

I broke my RAID-1 configuration by unplugging the power to my 2nd drive, and started up my computer with my RAID array in a degraded state. I booted to WinXP with the old iastor.sys drivers, and after about 1.5 hours, the chkdsk successfully completed, and my computer boot successfully.

Right now I’m backing my data before I decide what to do next. Has anyone achieved a stable configuration with this Intel controller using WinXP? With RAID? With no RAID?

I’ll probably see if I can get the newer drivers to install now that my computer boots, and perhaps upgrade the firmware… Then see where to go from there.

Good luck to everyone else with this issue!

Dave P 10.12.06 / 6am

This web site has been a massive resource for me in resolving my BSOD on a Feb 2006 5150c. Out of the box, I’ve had issues with the thing. It’s had new memory as one of the DIMMS failed in two days, and even after a rebuild - completely removing all dell diagnostics and hidden partitions - the thing would still fail. The problem of a rebuild with no floppy is getting the machine to work with the SATA drive using SATA drivers.

To work around this, I selected ATA mode for the SATA operation in the BIOS. This allows Windows XP to see the drive at install without the SATA drivers being present. This worked fine for the most part, but i’d still get BSOD. Now after months of investigation, I’ve got a stable system, running the latest SATA Drivers and no BSOD.

If you’re doing a rebuild, use the ATA mode (if available in the BIOS). Make sure you have the SATA drivers and latest Chipset installs available. Install Windows, then on first boot, install the chipset and reboot. Note that you’re still using the ATA mode here.

Here’s the tricky bit, the Intel Storage Matrix drivers (used for RAID and AHCI) will not install unless you’re running in AHCI mode in the BIOS. To work around this, first you need to update the driver within windows. You should be able to get the drivers from here

http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/Filter_Results.aspx?strOSs=All&strTypes=All&ProductID=2101&lang=eng&OSFullName=All%20Operating%20Systems#DRV

Anyway, with the drivers to hand - start device manager, open up the IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers - you should see an entry for your controller (Not the primary IDE controller, one from intel that should say AHCI). Right click and select update driver. Select Install from a specific location, and follow the wizard to locate the drivers downloaded from the link above. Once instaled you should be asked to reboot. Let the computer reboot, but enter the BIOS when it powers down. Switch the SATA operation back to AHCI, and the save and exit the BIOS. reboot, and windows should run normally - using the SATA drivers. Once it is running the SATA drivers, you can then re-run the Matrix Storage Drivers install, this will add the monitor tool so you can confirm it is running the correct drivers.

But… this didn’t actually solve my problem. !!WTF!! I use my dell to connect to my office using Mobile User VPN software from Watchguard. Now it took some time to figure out, as the problem wasn’t when the connection was activated, but actually when I put load on the network interface such as using Remote Desktop to connect to my office server - I did this, and bang, BSOD, DRIVE_IRQL_blah_de_blah - but no driver listed.

I upgraded the Network card drivers, and the problem stopped, for a little while (I’d recommend anyone using the network card to upgrade the drivers as the Dell ones are seriously out of date) - but in the end it came back. Now I’ve switched to using PPTP to connect to my office, and what do you know - STABLE, no BSOD.

My conclusion, there is more wrong here than orginally thought, yes the original dell SATA drivers are screwed, getting these updated will help. But, the network drivers are out of date, even with an upgrade, simple VPN causes BSOD - so is it a manufacturing fault with the Intel Chipset or with the people who actually make the motherboards, or is their a general conflict with resources?

For all my ramblings, I must point out that the machine is question doesn’t have RAID, but the IASTOR.sys driver IS used to connect the SATA drive in AHCI mode too.

On a lighter note - My D(h)ell support experiences have been comical. The first young woman I spoke to said it must be my Internet connection because dell didn’t supply it (ah bless) so I should contact my ISP, then she said t must be my modem - which i don’t use, as I have a router - so she asked if my usb modem was plugged into the router (I did explain the principles of my chosen router, but it fell on deaf ears) it got funnier, but I didn’t think so at the time. I think I’m still awaiting my call back - which was promised 8 weeks ago, but I’m not holding my breath.

On the back of this, there’s a five year IT rolling upgrade that won’t be going their way - unlucky.

To Marc (posted October 9th) - When do you get your BSOD? Is it all the time or running net programs? Is your 5150c the small form factor one, with the silver case? If so, try switching to the ATA mode in the BIOS to get your system to boot

Kelly 10.12.06 / 1pm

I have a 5150c that has a mfg. date of 09.06.06 and I got the blue stop error screen on 10.04.06. I talked with Dell tech support and they had me take out my video card, memory sticks, hard drive, and cd/dvd drive before determining that my mother board was the problem. After a tech replaced the mother board and the computer still booted up to the blue screen, the tech tried taking out one of the memory sticks. Amazingly, it worked just fine with one memory stick–but then I realized that my cd/dvd drive was not recognized. I installed the new memory stick that Dell sent me and the next day (10.10.06) I got the blue screen again.

I’m really glad I found this website. I felt like I was going crazy. Unfortunately, I’ve been unproductive now for a few days because of a broken computer…so frustrating.

Brandon P 10.12.06 / 9pm

I have the same problem on my gateway cx2610. iastore creates a stop error irql. I use the driver by intel 5.0.0.1032 It’s listed as Intel(R) 82801FBM SATA AHCI Controller. I get the error whenever I run virus scan (norton) or download multipul files at once.

marc 10.15.06 / 2pm

hi dave p, i got this programme all the time whatever i was doing , yes i have the slimline one you describe ,im pleased this website exists !.do you reccomend replace hard drive ?

Ian B 10.15.06 / 10pm

Hi, Great info - same problems on a Dell 8400 after fitting a new hard drive. I tore my hair out for hours until I read the message from Kelly (12/10/06) so I ran MemTest 86 - Straight away one faulty memory module. I suggest that anyone with the same type of problem run a memory diagnostic first

Edd 10.18.06 / 6pm

Guys once again just go to the BIOS and under DRIVEs change the SATA operation to COMBINATION. It has worked on many computer now so try it out!!1

troy 10.22.06 / 2am

I have a dell 8400. I have the same problem. I have reformatted and within one day am getting the error again. I had tried switching to combo mode but it won’t load. Do i need to reformat both my disks to switch to combo mode?

It says my slave drive is corrupt when i do

Marshall 10.22.06 / 9am

I haven’t had the opportunity to test this myself yet, but if Troy’s right, what this might mean is that if the drive has already been corrupted, the fix will be too late. For systems where there has yet to be corruption, using Combo mode might stave off the BSOD.

Troy: if you try removing the corrupt drive and booting in combo mode — for the time being, eliminating the RAID and using just one drive — does that work?

troy 10.22.06 / 10am

i haven’t tried that yet, but all the diognostic tests i’ve run on the slave drive say it has passed, no errors.

Marshall 10.22.06 / 11am

The diagnostics will probably pass in most of these cases, because there isn’t a physical problem with the drive. The problem here is that the driver is not properly written, or the BIOS is set for the drives to behave properly, so the data on the drives is being corrupted. Once you reformat the drive and rebuild the RAID, the drive should be fine. But the drivers and the BIOS have to be set properly…

Star 10.23.06 / 11am

The last solution worked for me. When I changed the operation mode from RAID to Combination I was able to reinstall and boot the OS. THANKS!

troy 10.23.06 / 4pm

i tried unplugging my f drive(slave drive) and disabling it in bios. I then tried to switch to combo mode and it said my F drive was corrupt again. Do i have to reformat both drives? Currently i have everything backed up on my slave drive. How do i get it to combo mode? Do i have to change it to combo mode in bios first and then run windows setup after that? How do i know which drivers i need from intel?

sjogro 10.23.06 / 6pm

Dell Dimension 9150
I don’t know what’s coincidental and what’s necessary but here’s how I *FINALLY* got to install Windows XP Professional on my new computer:

- take out all PCI cards except your videocard (especially take out your TV Tuner card)
- get a floppy drive connected
- get the SATA/RAID drivers from Dell support on a floppy and insert in the floppydrive
- reset BIOS settings to Default, save, exit, and get back to BIOS again
- set BIOS Floppy Drive to Internal (Default is USB)
- set BIOS Drive Configuration to Combination Mode (Default is RAID/AHCI)
- set Boot order so that CD Drive comes before Harddisk
- insert Windows XP setup CD
- save configuration and exit BIOS
- when the line pops up “press a key to boot from cd”, do so…
- setup starts loading (notice it will load drivers automatic

Things Worth Knowing

Dell Dimension E510, iastor.sys, Windows XP blue screen error, stop code 0×000000D1

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