White Screen of Death?

Randonly this morning while browsing the internet I got a white screen crash. No errors in event viewer, no overheating, checked cpu,gpu,system temps which were all fine. How can I troubleshoot this one?

Anyone else ever had this?

Find more posts tagged with

SAVE $250 on Your Boot Camp — Use Code "EXAM26"

Exclusively for TechExams members for Infosec Boot Camps starting before April 30, 2026

View Boot Camps

Comments

Lee H

Hi

Does it only happen in IE, update your AV and do a full scan, possible

Lee H

Pash

Lee H wrote:

Hi

Does it only happen in IE, update your AV and do a full scan, possible

Lee H

Well i use Firefox on that PC. I will do a virus scan to be safe. Gonna check all vital driver updates as well. Very random tbh.

sprkymrk

Vista or XP?

I've also seen java "white screen" before.

hypnotoad

Is it a real white screen or some kind of pop-up? Can you Ctrl-Alt-Del for task mgr or alt-tab? Is it a 'hard' lock-up -- does your cursor disappear. Can you hit the num-lock key and get it to turn on and off?

Ricka182

I've had a white screen lockup before, both while running IE or Outlook. I usually just kill the process in task manager. If that doesn't work, I wait a short while and try again. Last resort, reboot...

Pash

Hi fellas,

Sorry I should be more specific:-

XP Pro OS. I couldnt access the task manager at all, no cursor and no key combos would pull me out. Rebooted and it hasnt come back since, there were no errors in event viewer and according to my motherboards temp monitor everything is very cool 20c for CPU 33c for system temp, nvida cp software says 50c for the gpu which is fairly good.

Because I have no errors to work with + there being very little information on this crash type available ill have to let it go. It's a self built machine so getting direct support is impossible.

Cheers for the replies as always.

Pash,

Ricka182

This clearly isn't the best response you'll get, but it may close the issue...at least until it happens again....you mentioned the OS as XP, that's the problem. It's a mystical Windows thing, one of many.....

undomiel

Something else you may wish to check out assuming the machine is virus/spyware free is to reinstall the video drivers and also check if maybe something is going on with the video cable or the monitor itself. You could also try disabling all video acceleration. Also try seeing if when the machine whites out whether you can shut it down with key strokes or not even though it doesn't display anything. (ctrl-alt-del, s, u, enter)

Talic

I wouldn't worry about it unless it happens repeatedly. Just do a AV scan and if you have some extra time on your hands you could try to duplicate it.