BlaqC

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8 years ago

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BlaqC

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4178

December 29th, 2018 18:00

Studio XPS 9100, debug or replace? crashing (CPU fault)

My 2011 7-year old Studio XPS 9100 has started crashing.

  • Cleaned/reseated RAM; blew dust out
  • All PSU pin voltages are correct. PSU is 2-3 years old.
  • WinDbg crash minidump analysis shows "WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR (124)
    A fatal hardware error has occurred" pinpointing the CPU. (FAILURE_BUCKET_ID: 0x124_GenuineIntel_PROCESSOR_MAE_PRV)

Looking online shows that debugging this error may be quite time-consuming and I'd like to get your advice regarding trying to debug this issue or just buying a new PC.

  • My modus operandi has always been "buy a powerful, expensive PC and run it for 10 years."
  • My PC had run fine until now (except for needing a PSU replacement one time).Would I face increasing problems in the near future with aging, unsupported components?
  • One small flaw: I seem to recall reading years ago that this PC could only handle a maximum of 6GB RAM (crippled Windows), although the motherboard supports twice as much. (I have updated to Windows 10 since then.) While I've managed with 6GB, it's certainly proven a hassle with dozens of open browser tabs. (and yes, I use The Great Suspender.)
    • So one advantage of getting a new PC would be getting rid of this maddening 6GB limit.

So, would you try debugging this issue or buy a new PC? And why? Thanks.