0x000000FC Error

Danger Phoenix · 25 Sep 2008 at 19:38

A friend of mine (who is pretty much computer illiterate) installed updates automatically on her Windows XP Home and now keeps getting this error whenever she tries to boot Windows in either normal or Safe Mode:

Code:

0x000000FC (ATTEMPTED_EXECUTE_OF_NOEXECUTE_MEMORY)

All fixes I have seen require going into Windows... can anyone provide any suggestions for a fix please?

jonislost · 25 Sep 2008 at 19:42

As the cause seems to be the DVD drive maybe you should try unplugging it from the system and then try getting into windows. Once in then try the fix:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/878474

Danger Phoenix · 25 Sep 2008 at 19:44

jonislost said:
As the cause seems to be the DVD drive maybe you should try unplugging it from the system and then try getting into windows. Once in then try the fix:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/878474

She won't be able to do that and I am over 200 miles away so I can't help her

Tute · 25 Sep 2008 at 19:48

As it seems to be trying to access memory that DEP won't allow, you could try disabling DEP?

jonislost · 25 Sep 2008 at 19:57

Danger Phoenix said:
She won't be able to do that and I am over 200 miles away so I can't help her

Use the force.

Danger Phoenix · 25 Sep 2008 at 19:58

Tute said:
As it seems to be trying to access memory that DEP won't allow, you could try disabling DEP?

Without going into Windows?

Tute · 25 Sep 2008 at 21:14

Danger Phoenix said:
Without going into Windows?

Ah my fault, didn't read that.

Would she be able to simply disable the offending device from the BIOS?

Danger Phoenix · 25 Sep 2008 at 21:30

Tute said:
Ah my fault, didn't read that.

Would she be able to simply disable the offending device from the BIOS?

I've just guided her into disabling DEP in the BIOS - didn't help

Tute · 25 Sep 2008 at 22:00

Danger Phoenix said:
I've just guided her into disabling DEP in the BIOS - didn't help

Try disabling the optical drive from there. That way you don't have to disconnect it.

Mr_Orange · 26 Sep 2008 at 09:16

http://aumha.org/a/stop.htm is a good site for looking up error codes. It unfortunately doesn't expand on what was found before though.

Danger Phoenix · 26 Sep 2008 at 09:21

Managed to sort it out last night after about 2 hours on the phone! Found a guide on the internet that instructed to boot into the recovery console and remove SP3 - it did the trick. It would have taken us around 20 mins to do... took her 2 hours :rolleyes:

bledd · 26 Sep 2008 at 09:33

didn't know recovery console could do that

Burnsy2023 · 26 Sep 2008 at 10:51

bledd. said:
didn't know recovery console could do that

Me neither funnily enough, how did you do this?

Danger Phoenix · 26 Sep 2008 at 13:18

I followed Method 4 outlined here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/950249

Once I got her to type the commands in (which took forever because she kept typing them wrong) it was a 5 minute job

bledd · 26 Sep 2008 at 13:22

sweet

9 times out of 10 in that situation (if you had access to the machine) you'd just format it anyway, but thanks

Danger Phoenix · 26 Sep 2008 at 13:28

bledd. said:
9 times out of 10 in that situation (if you had access to the machine) you'd just format it anyway, but thanks

Really depends on whose machine it is and what mood I am in. If its my machine and I have nothing better to do, I would fix the problem so I can arrange my backups in a Windows environment before doing the format.

I would usually try and fix it for anyone, because if they can't fix it themselves, then I know they would expect me to install everything from Office to Firefox for them afterwards! Would take ages!

bledd · 26 Sep 2008 at 13:40

in that case, depends if you're charging them!

Danger Phoenix · 26 Sep 2008 at 13:53

bledd. said:
in that case, depends if you're charging them!

Nah, most the "Tech Support" I do is for friends and family and I do not charge them for that. If I was charging people then obviously I would want to do a "good" job which in this case means take a while