An error was detected ... paging operation.

edited December 2010 in Hardware
My file/media server (running Windows XP Pro) shut down abruptly with the power outage two days ago. I have restarted after power was restored but the server was not able run more than a short amount of time before freezing. I tried to reboot two times and ran memtest and prime95 afterward; CPU and RAM were okay. Just when I was almost deciding that hard disk was faulty although SMART status was normal, I checked the system messages in Event Viewer. There were many repeating warning messages of the same kind ( Event ID: 51) as follows
An error was detected on device \Device\Harddisk0\D during a paging operation.
At first, I thought that this was the confirmation of a faulty hard disk and I was upset with my luck that I had to waste time with RMA/backup/restore. Then, I noticed that all of the errors were only about the page file and it could be just a corrupted page file during power outage. I went to
Control Panel / System / Advanced / Performance / Advanced / Virtual Memory (Change)
And, disabled virtual memory ("No paging file" radio buttion), clicked OK -> OK. Windows wanted to reboot and I clicked OK again. After reboot, scheduled an error checking
Right click on C: in Windows Explorer -> Properties / Tools / Error Checking (Check now), tick mark both options for automatically fixing file system errors and bad sectors, click OK -> OK. Windows wanted to reboot again and started checking the hard disk upon reboot; error checking lasted more than 2 hours.

After reboot was complete, I have enabled Virtual Memory again (System Managed Size) and rebooted again. My file server is now completely fine.

I just wanted to add a note here in case someone else has the same problem since this saved me from an unnecessary RMA process.

Comments

  • TushonTushon I'm scared, Coach Alexandria, VA Icrontian
    edited December 2010
    Nice post. I hope I don't need it but valuable info!
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