BSOD Registry Error

M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
Hi,

This morning I booted up my Octane laptop, Windows 10 started as normal. I noticed I had been logged out of some applications (Google Chrome and Steam), some other applications seemed to be acting slow so my first thought was to just reboot. When I rebooted I was met with the BSOD with "Your device ran into a problem and needs a restart" (Stop code: REGISTRY_ERROR), it then restarts but goes back to the BSOD and loops endlessly until I force it to turn off.

On my other machine I created a USB boot drive, and booted from there in the BIOS. Through that I have run Startup Repair but it says unable to repair (it creates a log file but there is no way to access the file currently).

Does anyone have any advice for next steps? Full specs below.

If really necessary I can try a clean reinstall of windows but would like exhaust other options first.

Thank you greatly for any help!

Chassis & Display
Octane Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD 144Hz 72% NTSC LED Widescreen (1920x1080) + G-Sync
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Eight Core Processor i7-9700K (3.6GHz) 12MB Cache
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair 2666MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX 2080 - 8.0GB GDDR6 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB WD Black™ M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 3400MB/s R | 2800MB/s W)
1st Storage Drive
1TB SEAGATE 7mm SERIAL ATA III 2.5" HARD DRIVE WITH 128MB CACHE (
Operating System
Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00001]
 
ubuysa

ubuysa

The BSOD Doctor
Can you please download the SysnativeBSODCollectionApp and save it to the Desktop. Then run it and upload the resulting zip file to a cloud service with a link to it here. The SysnativeBSODCollectionApp collects all the troubleshooting data we're likely to need. It DOES NOT collect any personally identifying data. It's used by several highly respected Windows help forums (including this one). I'm a senior BSOD analyst on the Sysnative forum where this tool came from, so I know it to be safe.

You can of course look at what's in the zip file before you upload it, most of the files are txt files. Please don't change or delete anything though. If you want a description of what each file contains you'll find that here.

Also, the most likely cause, based on what you've said so far, is the system drive. Download the Western Digital Dashboard and use that to test the drive and look for driver and/or firmware updates. Also post the SMART data from that drive.
 
M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
Hi, thanks for the quick response. I'm unable to get to the desktop to download anything, it's just an endless loop of the computer rebooting to the BSOD.
 
ubuysa

ubuysa

The BSOD Doctor
Can you boot the Windows installation media? If you can, select Repair My Computer, navigate to Startup Repair and see whether that can get you booting again.

If that doesn't work then navigate to the Command Prompt (in the installation media system) and locate your system drive letter. The WindowsRE system that the installation media uses, doesn't enumerate drives in the same way as your normal Windows system, so you'll have to keep changing driver letters (first C, then D, then E, etc.) listing the directory of each drive letter, until you locate your system drive (the one with a Windows folder on it). Then, on the system drive, enter the command chkdsk /f to check and repair the filesystem on that drive. Then try Startup Repair again.

If none of that works then your best option is a fully clean reinstall of Windows. Once you've done that download the WD Dashboard and test that system drive.
 
M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
Thank you for providing more details. It wouldn't let me run chkdsk /f as it said the disk was read-on;y. When running just chkdsk it came back with this, I've no idea if it provides any clues to what may be wrong with the ssd!
IMG_4596.jpg
 
ubuysa

ubuysa

The BSOD Doctor
There are a couple of things you can try from within the installation WinRE system, but I rather think the drive may be faulty...

Try issuing a chkdsk /f /x command. The /x switch forces all open handles to close, that may allow chkdsk to run.

If that doesn't help then try this next step. This step is risky so check carefully that you follow my exact instructions:
  1. In the WinRE installation system, at the command prompt, enter the command diskpart
    The prompt will change to Diskpart> indicating that you're in the diskpart system
  2. Enter the command list disk
    The list of installed drives will be shown
    This is the risky part: You must identify which disk number is your system drive based only on the size. That's going to be tricky since both drives are 1TB. It may be wise to physically disconnect the SATA drive whilst you do this so that only the system drive is listed.
    Note the number of your system drive, I'll call it n
  3. Enter the command select disk n to select the system drive. A message confirming which disk is selected will be issued. BE CERTAIN that it's your NVMe system drive and not the SATA drive (if it's still connected)
  4. Enter the command list partition
    The list of partitions will be shown. The Windows partition will be the largest partition
    Note the number of the Windows partition, I'll call it p
  5. Enter the command select partition p to select the Windows partition. A message confirming which partition is selected will be issued.
  6. Enter the command attributes disk clear readonly to clear the read only attribute from the Windows partition
  7. Enter the command exit to leave diskpart
  8. Now try running chkdsk /f /x again
If you still can't get chkdsk to run, or if it reports errors, contact PCS and arrange to RMA that system drive. You will need to clean install Windows on the new system drive. You can buy a cheap M.2 caddy and plug that old NVMe drive in as a USB drive to see whether you can recover any data of it, but you may be disappointed. When SSDs fail they generally fail catastrophically.
 
Last edited:
M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
Can't thank you enough for going through all these detailed instructions. I ran through it all and certainly seems the drive has failed, so I've replaced with with a new one and getting Windows all backup and running. I've got a m.2 caddy on the way so will see what I can recover but there wasn't anything essential really.

Thanks again!
 
ubuysa

ubuysa

The BSOD Doctor
SSDs really require backing up on a regular basis much more than HDDs do. I don't think anyone has ever made that point, but they do.

Happy you got it resolved.
 
M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
For some reason I was under the impression the SSDs had a very low failure rate, good to know!. Could I ask what you find to be the best back up option? Is it Windows File History or a third party?
 
T

TonyCarter

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
Reliability is down to the specific drive...some are better than others, and 'endurance' or 'enterprise' models will normally cost more, but have longer warranties.

But, SSDs tend to give no warning, so you won't see a few errors that you can ignore for months and then recover what you can from the failing HDD. It will work one day and not the next, and there will be no way of getting access to the data.

But there's no excuse for not having a good backup solution (usually multiple if your data is important).

BackBlaze are a cloud storage outfit, so have LOTS of drives, and so have LOTS of info on LOTS of different drives.

Here are BackBlaze's stats for HDDs and SSDs:
www.backblaze.com

The SSD Edition: 2023 Drive Stats Mid-Year Review

Explore the 2023 Mid-Year SSD Drive Stats, reviewing failure rates, average age of failure, and key insights from our data analysis.
www.backblaze.com www.backblaze.com
www.backblaze.com

Backblaze Drive Stats for Q3 2024

Read the latest annualized failure rates for the Backblaze drive fleet.
www.backblaze.com www.backblaze.com

Are Solid State Drives / SSDs More Reliable Than HDDs?

It's good to know the difference between HDDs and SSDs and understand how the different SSD technologies affect reliability.
www.backblaze.com www.backblaze.com
 
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