Bad Pool Caller driving me insane

[TW]Fox

[TW]Fox

[TW]Fox

Man of Honour
Joined
17 Oct 2002
Posts
160,150
I'm still having loads of problem with a Bad Pool Caller BSOD, but now its getting weird.

Most of the time, I get advance warning of this BSOD by my PC acting strangely. I'll describe what just happened, it's typical of what usually happens.

Eve Online disconnected. Went to reconnect, the client crashed. Then I began to lose internet connectivty. Then I went to 'Repair' my wireless connection to fix that. Couldnt do it. Checked device manager, the wireless card was marked as 'Could not be started'. This is when you know its going to break. Hit restart, Windows closes down, plays the shutdown sound...

Bang. BAD_POOL_CALLER.

Thats usually how it happens. Sometimes it'll happen differently - earlier nothing would load anymore, IE refused to run due to no system resources then bang. BAD_POOL_CALLER again.

Earlier on I got IRQL_LESS_OR_NOT_EQUAL refering to my Realtek onboard audio. So I totally disabled it, but I'm still BAD_POOL_CALLER.

It's getting quite frequent and quite annoying and has been an issue ever since I built my PC from virtually all brand new components.

Any ideas?

Spec:

XP Pro Sp2
Gigabyte DS3 Rev 3.3
Core2Duo E4300
2Gb OCZ Platinum PC6400
GeForce 8800GTS
SB Audigy
Linksys Wifi card

I've tried running with the Audigy disabled, makes no odds.

Help! Tried with everything at stock as well.
 
First thing I always check when I have strange errors is the memory. Download Memtest86 and burn it to a CD/put it on a floppy, boot from it, and let us know if it finds any errors.
 
next time it happens write down the stop string as this contains the critical numbers.
This should make it easier to find the cause of the issue.

Also worth checking the memory dump as this may contain valid info...
 
Just happened again. Everything started going to pot.. internet stuff disconnecting, then no connectivity. Opened device manager, saw the wireless card was showing as fine. Hit repair to repair connection... trouble starting this devi....

bang.

BSOD. No actual error message this time, but I got the stop code:

0x0000008E (0xC0000005, 0x000000000, 0xB5DB30B0, 0x00000000)

Interestingly, I had to hard power off the machine as the reset button wouldnt work.

Windows started back up. Net connected. Suddenly no connectivity then bang.

BAD_POOL_CALLER

0x000000C2 (0x00000007, 0x00000CD4, 0x024C004C, 0x8995F5B0)

Reset button worked this time.

Any ideas?
 
Would update the wireless card drivers myself, also run Memtest86 as suggested above, but it definately sounds like a driver conflict somewhere.

Disconnect everything you don't need - printer etc, see if it still does it. If it doesn't then add each one back in bit by bit and see how it goes.
 
Bad_Pool_Caller is where the kernel or process (driver) is trying to perform invalid memory operations.

Those error codes do appear to be unusual. A list of common violations can be found here.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/ms796120.aspx

99% of the time it is down to drivers. Although it can be a BIOS issue. You have not recently updated your BIOS have you? These type of BSOD's can appear because of a damaged or an incorrect BIOS update.
 
I'd definetly memtest the RAM, but I'd also download and checkout the debugging tools. Recommended this to someone else in another thread and it came in very handy for me when I was getting some BSOD's.

You can get the debugging tools for windows here.

What'll you want to do is download those and install.
Then run the program and click on File->Symbols Path
In the window that pops up type: SRV*c:\tmp_symbols*http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols
Then file->Open Crash Dump
The dumps are normally located in C:\windows\minidump, so browse there and find it
When you've opened it, it'll take a few seconds to open, at the bottom it shoudl say "Debugee not connected" that'll eventually turn to "kb>" and you have a box to type in.
In there type: !analyze -v
That should give you full information on the crash, including the faulting program or/and driver.

When you type and hit enter with !analyze -v command, it'll give you lots of information about the crash and inparticular a program or driver that caused the fault, so we can see which thing in particular is causing it and maybe uninstall that or go from there.
 
Brilliant, thanks!

Here is the details from the last BSOD I had last night. I'll dig out another in a sec to compare. I've stripped stuff I don't think helps us found whats wrong:

BAD_POOL_CALLER (c2)
The current thread is making a bad pool request. Typically this is at a bad IRQL level or double freeing the same allocation, etc.
Arguments:
Arg1: 00000007, Attempt to free pool which was already freed
Arg2: 00000cd4, (reserved)
Arg3: 024c004c, Memory contents of the pool block
Arg4: 8995f5b0, Address of the block of pool being deallocated

POOL_ADDRESS: 8995f5b0

FREED_POOL_TAG: PcNw

BUGCHECK_STR: 0xc2_7_PcNw

CUSTOMER_CRASH_COUNT: 6

DEFAULT_BUCKET_ID: COMMON_SYSTEM_FAULT

PROCESS_NAME: winlogon.exe

LAST_CONTROL_TRANSFER: from 8054a583 to 804f9f13

STACK_COMMAND: kb

FOLLOWUP_IP:
e10kx2k+dd46
b9d2cd46 ?? ???

SYMBOL_STACK_INDEX: 3

FOLLOWUP_NAME: MachineOwner

MODULE_NAME: e10kx2k

IMAGE_NAME: e10kx2k.sys

DEBUG_FLR_IMAGE_TIMESTAMP: 3bb96776

SYMBOL_NAME: e10kx2k+dd46

FAILURE_BUCKET_ID: 0xc2_7_PcNw_e10kx2k+dd46

BUCKET_ID: 0xc2_7_PcNw_e10kx2k+dd46

Followup: MachineOwner
 
Lots of them are very similar, all referencing e10kx2k.sys which I beleive is something to do with the SB Audigy.

This is the first BSOD I got last night. At the time, the Audigy was disabled in device manager and I was using the onboard Audio:

DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL (d1)
An attempt was made to access a pageable (or completely invalid) address at an
interrupt request level (IRQL) that is too high. This is usually
caused by drivers using improper addresses.
If kernel debugger is available get stack backtrace.
Arguments:
Arg1: 00000104, memory referenced
Arg2: 00000002, IRQL
Arg3: 00000000, value 0 = read operation, 1 = write operation
Arg4: b67b9695, address which referenced memory

Debugging Details:
------------------


READ_ADDRESS: 00000104

CURRENT_IRQL: 2

FAULTING_IP:
RtkHDAud+7b695
b67b9695 d860fc fsub dword ptr [eax-4]

CUSTOMER_CRASH_COUNT: 1

DEFAULT_BUCKET_ID: DRIVER_FAULT

BUGCHECK_STR: 0xD1

PROCESS_NAME: Idle

LAST_CONTROL_TRANSFER: from b67a1002 to b67b9695
TACK_COMMAND: kb

FOLLOWUP_IP:
RtkHDAud+7b695
b67b9695 d860fc fsub dword ptr [eax-4]

SYMBOL_STACK_INDEX: 0

SYMBOL_NAME: RtkHDAud+7b695

FOLLOWUP_NAME: MachineOwner

MODULE_NAME: RtkHDAud

IMAGE_NAME: RtkHDAud.sys

DEBUG_FLR_IMAGE_TIMESTAMP: 460a1d1b

FAILURE_BUCKET_ID: 0xD1_RtkHDAud+7b695

BUCKET_ID: 0xD1_RtkHDAud+7b695

Followup: MachineOwner


Following this BSOD, I disbaled the Realtek Audio in the BIOS and re-enabled the Audigy. The next time the system BSOD'd, it was again referenceing e10xk2k.sys. I've searched most of the plethora of crash dumps and it appears always to be audio related.

Any ideas?
 
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Hey :)

Well it's looking at least like a driver conflict definetly in regards to the sound, although bit iffy on the winlogon.exe system fault, but it is possible that it could be due to the sound issue.

1. First I'd disable both the onboard audio and the audigy from Device Manager (not BIOS yet), so you have no sound.
2. Then download Guru3D Driver Sweeper
3. Go into control panel and remove the drivers for Realtek AND Creative, then reboot.
4. When you're back from the reboot, run the Guru3D Driver Sweeper and clean Creative and Realtek drivers completely, then reboot and enter the BIOS.
5. When you're in the BIOS, now disable onboard Realtek audio, then save+exit and boot into Windows.
6. Now you should be back in Windows and Realtek shouldn't show up at all due to being disabled and any driver referencing that it was there, has been removed by the driver uninstall and the driver sweeper.

At that point, I'd play around and see if the BSOD's happen, maybe for a day or so, if it does BSOD the memtest your RAM, but if it doesn't then at that point I'd reinstall the Audigy drivers and re-enable it from the Device Manager and if you start BSOD'ing you could probably put it down to something dodgy happening with the Audigy in relation to the driver, but if it doesn't start rebooting then you're golden :)
 
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It's just gone again this time referencing something completely new:

DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL (d1)
An attempt was made to access a pageable (or completely invalid) address at an
interrupt request level (IRQL) that is too high. This is usually
caused by drivers using improper addresses.
If kernel debugger is available get stack backtrace.
Arguments:
Arg1: 00000000, memory referenced
Arg2: 00000002, IRQL
Arg3: 00000000, value 0 = read operation, 1 = write operation
Arg4: e2027c0d, address which referenced memory

Debugging Details:
------------------


READ_ADDRESS: 00000000

CURRENT_IRQL: 2

FAULTING_IP:
+ffffffffe2027c0d
e2027c0d 8b2b mov ebp,dword ptr [ebx]

CUSTOMER_CRASH_COUNT: 1

DEFAULT_BUCKET_ID: DRIVER_FAULT

BUGCHECK_STR: 0xD1

PROCESS_NAME: System

LAST_CONTROL_TRANSFER: from e20130f2 to e2027c0d

STACK_TEXT:
WARNING: Frame IP not in any known module. Following frames may be wrong.
bacc7f78 e20130f2 00000000 8863f198 88889cf0 0xe2027c0d
bacc7fc4 b9cebf7e 88889cf0 805451ff 88989268 0xe20130f2
bacc7fcc 805451ff 88989268 00000000 88989268 ctoss2k+0x6f7e
bacc7ff4 80544d6b baceb768 00000000 00000000 nt!KiRetireDpcList+0x61
bacc7ff8 baceb768 00000000 00000000 00000000 nt!KiDispatchInterrupt+0x2b
80544d6b 00000000 00000009 0081850f bb830000 0xbaceb768


STACK_COMMAND: kb

FOLLOWUP_IP:
ctoss2k+6f7e
b9cebf7e ?? ???

SYMBOL_STACK_INDEX: 2

FOLLOWUP_NAME: MachineOwner

MODULE_NAME: ctoss2k

IMAGE_NAME: ctoss2k.sys

DEBUG_FLR_IMAGE_TIMESTAMP: 3b9d8ea6

SYMBOL_NAME: ctoss2k+6f7e

FAILURE_BUCKET_ID: 0xD1_ctoss2k+6f7e

BUCKET_ID: 0xD1_ctoss2k+6f7e

Followup: MachineOwner
 
I think its odd how this is affecting both my Creative and Realtek sound cards.

This, along with the fact that immediatly before it happens my Wifi card stops responding makes me think something is wrong relating to the PCI Bus. What do you reckon?
 
Possible, might be worth removing the Audigy and Wifi card from the machine completely and also remove all of their drivers and seeing if you get any further BSOD's with the onboard audio / no wifi, that if you can live without the WiFi and using onboard audio for a little :) Although because it's only showing problems with the sound drivers, I'm thinking it's more a driver conflict between the Audigy and the onboard audio.
 
Fox, same thing happened to me about 2 weeks ago now. All of a sudden after months and months and months of happy PC usage, my PC started acting weird and gave me similar errors to yours. It would freeze in safe-mode after awhile, and in normal Windows stuff would crash, etc, and I'd get the Bad Pool Caller BSOD.

Eventually, I couldn't be bothered to mess on and on. Did a format, started again and 2 days later I'm back up and running fully and the PC is fine again.

So god only knows what happened or caused the error to happen, but the format worked a treat. :)
 
Gets weirder.

Audigy totally gone now - removed it and its sat on the desk. No BSOD's but...

My internet connection is incredibly unstable. The Wifi disconnects and reconnects frequently and when it is connected, it's so painfully slow its unusable. My laptop however, sat on the same desk, connected via wireless to the same router, is working perfectly.

Just connected via a wire now.. and internet access is perfect.

Getting bored, might just format. Although a format hasn't fixed the BSOD's before..
 
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