This thread will teach you how to find and use event viewer for troubleshooting purposes or just for fun.. Locating Event Viewer: Windows 7: Type in "event viewer" without the quotation marks in the search bar in the start menu then hit enter. Or type it in the run command in windows xp. Conventional: Go to Start, then to Control Panel, then to Administrative Tools, then to Event Viewer. 1. When the Event Viewer window opens, you'll see 2 panes. The pane on the left will contain the 3 categories of events (they are Application, Security, and System). The pane on the right will reflect the messages for the category that is selected on the left. They will be listed as Information, Warnings, or Errors. Errors are what will concern us here. 2. Left click once on the Application category in the left hand pane - then check the right hand pane for errors. Locate an error that occurred around the time of the problem (there may or may not be one here depending on the type of error). Then, right click on it and select "Properties". The information in the resulting window may be able to be used by board members to help troubleshoot your problem. 3. Next, we'll do the same thing for the Security category. You'll left click on the Security category in the left hand pane, then will check for errors in the right hand pane. Locate an error that occurred around the time of the problem (there may or may not be one here depending on the type of error). Then, right click on it and select "Properties". The information in the resulting window may be able to be used by board members to help troubleshoot your problem. 4. Now, we'll do the same thing for the System category. You'll left click on the System category in the left hand pane, then will check for errors in the right hand pane. 5. Locate an error that occurred around the time of the problem (there may or may not be one here depending on the type of error). Then, right click on it and select "Properties". The information in the window may be used by board members to help troubleshoot your problem. 6. Sometimes there will just be too many errors for you to pick just one out. In this case, generate a report using the "Action" menu item. Select "Export list" from the dropdown menu, and save it as a text file (that's the default). Then, open the text file by double clicking on it. Select the lines around the time that the error occurred by highlighting it with your cursor. Then, right click on the blue highlighting and select "Copy". Now, when you reply to your post, you can right click on the post and select "Paste" to insert the lines into your post. With this information, someone will be able to suggest which errors should be checked in detail. 7. Lastly, a quick word about error messages. Often they will come in a format similar to this: STOP: 0x0000007B (0xEB82784C, 0xC0000034, 0x00000000, 0x00000000) These numbers are very important when diagnosing a problem with your system. They're written in hexadecimal notation, so they don't make much sense to most of us - but they do point to the errors and where they occur. Also, often a filename will be mentioned along with all these numbers. It's important so that we can tell where the error occurred (this isn't the same thing as what caused the error BTW) With this information, there's a good chance that someone can identify your problem and can use the error messages to track down a solution. *Will post pictures, been busy lately..*
