Rufus Windows installer USBs triggers a blue screen error.
Rufus Windows installer USBs triggers a blue screen error.
Radisys BG845G, Pentium 4 2.80, 1GB DDR crashes immediately after a few minutes of file loading on Supermicro X7SLA-H, Atom 330, and MSI AM3 boards. After rebooting, it restarts again. On the VIA Nano U3300 with Gigabyte M7V90PI, the system freezes during installation of a 2GB DDR3 drive and then crashes with IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL BSOD before restarting. I've used this exact USB stick and ISO on multiple similar hardware setups—including another NForce 430 AM2 board, older Atom laptops, AMD thin clients, and VIA Eden systems—without any problems. Recently, I installed Windows LTSC without issues on a different HDD on the same MSI AM3 and Atom boards. Still puzzled about what might be causing this now.
When installed during the operating system setup, the connection to the network might indicate a January 2026 update is being applied. To confirm, consider installing the OS without network access on these devices.
Why are no one paying attention to this? One CPU is 18 years old, the other 24. They probably won’t handle certain commands needed by Windows 10 or modern Linux. Try copying a recent OS to a CD—not a memory stick. Booting from USB works only occasionally for these old machines.
I'm not certain about this situation, but have you considered examining the dump generated after the BSOD? It often provides more details than what appears on the screen. I recall Windows generates a minidump file in the C:\Windows\Minidump directory when it crashes, but I’m unsure if it does so during installation or on the USB drive. Could it be related to the USB itself? I think I was using that device. When reading those dumps, I suspect they might help identify the root cause. I’d also try creating another installation media with a different USB drive. I have about eight drives at home, half of which behave similarly and struggle with live Linux images, while the others work fine with the same Rufus and ISOs. I marked them to prevent confusion next time I need an installation medium.
I’d consider performing a memtest and assessing storage health using SMART statistics for each drive. This hardware should undergo a verification process to eliminate any potential issues.