Laptop shutdown problem

gears

I have a Dell Inspiron 6000 which has shutdown twice by itself recently. A message does appear on the screen which I don't understand so I took a picture and hope the someone here might help me with it. Thanks

Patrick 1

Sadly that's a generic blue screen with no real information about what could have caused it. Have you recently installed any new hardware or has your computer been acting/making odd noises recently? Also have you installed any updates? Can you boot into the OS at all either via safe mode or as normal?

gears

Thanks for the reply, no there's been no new hardware or software updates other than the usual windows updates and no odd noises either. I can get it up and running ok and I'm typing this on it right now, I'm just worried that this blue screen is a sign of more problems ahead if I don't do something now.

Patrick 1

Hmm, could be an update issue, try opening a command prompt and running "sfc /scannow" This checks the integrity of the windows install and can repair it if an update caused a problem. You need to run command prompt as administrator though, which requires right clicking on the command prompt icon and hitting "Run as administrator"

gears

Thanks again, I tried that but don't know the administrator password, I did try a few ones it might be and just leaving it blank but it didn't work. Would a clean install of Windows be the answer maybe or a bit of a drastic step?

Patrick 1

That'd be a bit drastic alright, just get onto the system admin and tell them what's up, kinda odd to not have the admin password for ones own laptop though, usually mine doesn't ask, and if it does it is the same as my logon password.

gears

This laptop is my own which I've had for a long time now so there is no system admin to talk to and I don't use a log in password as, when it's my own, I don't use a log in it just opens up when I turn it on. Is there a way to reset the administrator password?

Patrick 1

I believe there is, but having never done it myself I have no idea now, but the password should be the same one it was whenever you first installed. There is a chance there's no password and all you have to do is hit enter, but that'd suprise me. I'd google how to reset that password.

yoyo

You can use NTPasswd to reset the admin password

Nick

gears

Thanks Nick I'll give that a go.