can't open any picture files, gets an error

[luckydude]

hey all,
my dad has a Dell Dimension 8200 computer and he runs Windows XP pro. he's had it for almost a year and up until recently it was working just fine. Almost a month ago, he tried opening his picture file and he got this error message: "The instruction at 0x77f8353b referenced memory at 0x0013c608. the memory could not be red. Click on OK to terminate the program" He doesn't have any virus or spywares for sure. I reinstalled Windows XP, but he still gets the same error everytime he tries to open a picture file.

I am not sure whether the error has anything to do with the big picture file or not. He has tons of pictures on his computer's hard drive. He also has two hard drives and 1GB of RAM. If anyone can help me that would be great. If you want to know more about the computer,I would be happy to tell you more. I thank you all in advance

[Redshift]

What software are you using to view the picture file? is is just one specific file or directory or filetype or can he not open any pictures at all?

[luckydude]

What software are you using to view the picture file? is is just one specific file or directory or filetype or can he not open any pictures at all?

He uses the windows default, Windows Picture and Fax Viewer. It's not just one specific file, it happens if he tries to open any picture file. He uses "Adobe Photoshop Elements" to organize his pictures and has a file named, Adobe, under "My Pictures" folder. There are several folders inside the "Adobe" folder and are organized by the date when the pictures were taken. Most of the time, he gets another error that reads "Windows have encountered problems and needs to be closed. We are sorry for the inconvinience" or something like that and all of a sudden it closes the folder.

Everything else (all the software and so on) is fine except the picture file. I have set up a wireless Loca Area Network so that he can access his pictures from his laptop, but he started getting the error before I set up the LAN. He can open pictures from his laptop easily, so i was thinking may be the problem has to do something with the computer's memory. As I mentioned before, he added another 512 MB RAM to make it 1 GB of RAM. Do you think that is causing problem? I need somebody's help. I thank you in advance.

Luckydude (not feeling so lucky now)

[Monte]

Format + Reinstall Windows = Problem Fixed.

[luckydude]

I already reinstalled the operating system (Windows XP Pro) two days ago, but I keep getting the same error. Would you explain more about "format"? Should I re-format the hard-drive? I don't understand it completely. Your help is greatly appreciated.


Luckydude

[Redshift]

If the problem happened as soon as you added the extra memory then try removing it first and seeing what happens, seems unlikely but it could possibly be a memory allocation error.

To format your hard drive means to completly erase all info from your disk and start again it's a bit extreme though and you should leave that untill it's your last option.

[luckydude]

Actually, my dad added extra memory (he already had 512 and added another 512) after he got that error. He thought the reason it took him so long to open picture files was because of low memory but what he didn't know was most of the computer users in the world don't even have 512. So, he added 512 more and made it 1 GB, but still got the same error and couldn't open any picture files.

It seems like the only option I have is to format the hard drive. I remember doing it once for my laptop (after getting a nasty virus though I had McaFee Virus Protection in 2001) but my friend helped me on that. I forget how to do it, but I will google it and am sure I will find instructions. Anyhow, thanks a lot for your suggestions. I appreciate it.


Luckydude

[viperman224]

send it back. You said it's almost a year old. let DELL handle it thats what they get paid for. lol. you need to boot the laptop into DOS to format and you need a boot disk (IE. windows 98 boot disk). You may also have bad RAM (random access memory) or memory. my best suggestion is to send it back to dell but if you do get ALL your data off of it don't format it but just wipe all of your data off of it (IE. pictures, word docs., etc.) because they might just send you a whole knew unit.

[luckydude]

Thanks viperman224, it seems like that's the last option I have. Thanks all, I appreciate your help.

Luckydude

[Monte]

You still can format and check if you don't want to send it back, to format, boot your windows xp cd, then go to install windows, hit f to format and install. This option whipes out everything on your hardrive, which gets rid of the errors and such. But as viperman said, call dell.

[luckydude]

thanks Monte,
I will do as you said. Thanks again for your help.

Luckydude