I see a blue screen! What should I do?

If you happen across a blue screen, do not restart. Do the following steps before hitting the power button as most of the time blue screens indicate an internal problem with your computer or operating system. Blue screens are extremely useful for diagnosing and fixing a problem. Ignoring a blue screen generally leads to worse problems later down the road.

A typical blue screen looks like this:

To help speed up the process of fixing your computer, have a pen and paper in hand, and write down the following information from your blue screen:

1. Bugcheck information. All we need from this section is the final line, which in the example is "DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL"

2. Driver Information. We will need everything that is in this line of the blue screen. Typically, many blue screens will have a STOP 0x0... error line here. Make sure to write this down and double check the numbers and letters in your error message.

3. Debug port and dump status information. The only line of use here is usually the first line. Write down this line.

4. Also make sure to write down what you were doing when the computer went to the blue screen. Examples of typical functions might be a computer starting up, shutting down, or you using the computer as you normally do. Blue screens generally do not associate with specific software, so a blue screen while you were typing in Microsoft Word most likely has nothing to do with Word.

Now that you have written down all of the important blue screen information, call Pratt Helpdesk at 660-5400 or email us at support@pratt.duke.edu. We will have a technician down to your computer to take a look at the error screen and retrieve your notes. Blue screens are difficult to research and find a fix for so expect 2-4 business days before Pratt IT can post a response.