windows xp randomly reboots while transcoding videos with mencoder

Question

A WinXP box (SP3, 32-bit) reboots randomly after I initiate batch transcoding of some videos using console mencoder.

Event log has the following record:

The computer has rebooted from a bugcheck. The bugcheck was: 0x0000009c (0x00000005, 0x8054e5f0, 0xb2000010, 0x04000e0f). A dump was saved in: C:\WINDOWS\Minidump\Mini100310-04.dmp.

I understand that 9c points to some kind of hardware failure. CPU is an obvious suspect, but is it possible to scrape something from the rest of the hex codes or the dump?

Situation is kinda complicated due to the fact that I have only VNC access to the box at the moment, so there's no easy way to check BIOS or take a look at the hardware.

Answer 1

9C's can be caused by almost any hardware component, but there are some things you can do to troubleshoot from the OS.

http://hcidesign.com/memtest/ will let you test RAM from within the OS http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=103 prime95 will let you test both CPU and RAM from within OS

These things should help you confirm a problem with those two components but it still doesn't rule out motherboard as the cause of the problem and I'd recommend trying the hardware in an alternative machine to test and confirm.

Answer 2

I usually use the memtest boot CD to test the RAM: http://www.memtest.org/#downiso

Also, check what your temperatures. It's possible something is overheating. If you don't already have something, try speedfan: http://www.almico.com/sfdownload.php