I'm having a tough time with my Lenovo Legion Y520 laptop, as it keeps crashing and showing the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD). The pattern typically looks like this: I power on the laptop, reach my desktop, and then when I try to open my browser, the laptop freezes and throws a BSOD with a message saying it's trying to recover, usually mentioning issues like 'CRITICAL SERVICE FAILED' or 'MACHINE CHECK EXCEPTION.' This leads to a cycle of crashes and reboots, occasionally showing 'Your PC didn't start correctly' or 'DEFAULT BOOT DEVICE MISSING OR BOOT FAILED.' I've tried scanning for malware and checked for minidumps, but the folder is empty. I haven't dabbled with Command Prompt or anything technical yet, as I don't feel confident about it. What steps can I take to troubleshoot this?
3 Answers
To get a clearer understanding of what's causing the BSOD, it’s important to check for dump files, which are crash logs saved when your system encounters the BSOD. Try accessing Windows normally or via Safe Mode, then check C:WindowsMinidump for any files. If you find any, zip the folder and upload it to a file sharing site like MediaFire or Catbox.moe. This info will help us analyze the problem better! You can follow a guide to change the dump settings if you haven't set them up yet.
The 'Machine_Check_Exception' error can be frustrating because it often points to hardware issues, especially with the CPU. It's worth considering storage problems too, especially if you're getting boot errors. If you're using NVMe storage, those types can lead to this problem, but if it's SATA, it might involve the motherboard too. Without dump files, it’s tougher to pin down the exact issue, but focusing on storage could be the way to go.
First off, I’d recommend running a memory test using Memtest. If that comes back clean, it might be a good idea to back up your important files and then do a fresh installation of Windows. Sometimes a clean install can save you a lot of time compared to tracking down the specific issue. If you still face problems after reinstalling, it could point to a hardware malfunction, which would require further investigation.
You can find some great Memtest tutorials on YouTube that walk you through the process. And yes, if it’s hardware, you might need to physically remove the faulty part and replace it.
Thanks for the quick suggestion! Is there a tutorial video on how to run Memtest? And if it turns out to be hardware, do I just physically replace the component myself?