Hi! When booting VMs running Windows Server 2008 R2, sometime they end up in the Recovery Console. This seems to happen most often after installing Windows updates (but then again, this is probably the dominant reason for reboots). Simply aborting the first requester in the Recovery Console leads to a successful reboot of the VM. A Minidump is created, which points to a fault in the Windows kernel (see below). Does anybody have similar problems? Does anybody have an explanation and maybe even a fix for this? I asked VMware Support about this, but they weren't aware of other people seeing this happen. I am using a rather out-of-the-box installation, with VMware Tools installed and VMXNET3 driver, nothing fancy. Environment is ESX4.1 (U3, but this problem started earlier). This is the analysis of the minidump. The german error message roughly translates to "The instruction in 0x%08lx points to memory 0x%08lx. Unable to execute task %s in memory". Whatever that actually means... EXCEPTION_CODE: (NTSTATUS) 0xc0000005 - Die Anweisung in 0x%08lx verweist auf Speicher 0x%08lx. Der Vorgang %s konnte nicht im Speicher durchgef hrt werden. FAULTING_IP: +16 00004449`485f2e43 ?? ??? EXCEPTION_RECORD: fffff88001f57a38 -- (.exr 0xfffff88001f57a38) ExceptionAddress: 00004449485f2e43 ExceptionCode: c0000005 (Access violation) ExceptionFlags: 00000000 NumberParameters: 2 Parameter[0]: 0000000000000008 Parameter[1]: 00004449485f2e43 Attempt to execute non-executable address 00004449485f2e43 CONTEXT: fffff88001f57290 -- (.cxr 0xfffff88001f57290) rax=fffffa8001cb72b0 rbx=fffffa8001cd7830 rcx=0000000000000000 rdx=fffffa8001cb72b0 rsi=fffffa800189e660 rdi=fffffa8001cd5720 rip=00004449485f2e43 rsp=fffff88001f57c78 rbp=fffff8000186c280 r8=fffffa800188d0c8 r9=0000000000000000 r10=fffffffffffffffe r11=fffff80001841e80 r12=fffffa8001cd5720 r13=0000000000000000 r14=0000000000000000 r15=0000000000000001 iopl=0 nv up ei pl zr na po nc cs=0010 ss=0018 ds=002b es=002b fs=0053 gs=002b efl=00010246 00004449`485f2e43 ?? ??? Resetting default scope DEFAULT_BUCKET_ID: DRIVER_FAULT_SERVER_MINIDUMP PROCESS_NAME: System CURRENT_IRQL: 0 ERROR_CODE: (NTSTATUS) 0xc0000005 - Die Anweisung in 0x%08lx verweist auf Speicher 0x%08lx. Der Vorgang %s konnte nicht im Speicher durchgef hrt werden. EXCEPTION_PARAMETER1: 0000000000000008 EXCEPTION_PARAMETER2: 00004449485f2e43 WRITE_ADDRESS: GetPointerFromAddress: unable to read from fffff800018fe100 00004449485f2e43 FOLLOWUP_IP: nt!IopProcessWorkItem+23 fffff800`019c1633 488bcb mov rcx,rbx FAILED_INSTRUCTION_ADDRESS: +23 00004449`485f2e43 ?? ??? BUGCHECK_STR: 0x7E LAST_CONTROL_TRANSFER: from fffff800019c1633 to 00004449485f2e43 STACK_TEXT: fffff880`01f57c78 fffff800`019c1633 : 00000000`00000001 00000000`00000000 fffffa80`01896830 fffffa80`0189e660 : 0x4449`485f2e43 fffff880`01f57c80 fffff800`016d8841 : fffffa80`01896800 fffff800`019c1600 fffff800`018cd800 00000000`00000000 : nt!IopProcessWorkItem+0x23 fffff880`01f57cb0 fffff800`01965e6a : 00000000`00000000 fffffa80`0189e660 00000000`00000080 fffffa80`0188d040 : nt!ExpWorkerThread+0x111 fffff880`01f57d40 fffff800`016bfec6 : fffff800`01841e80 fffffa80`0189e660 fffffa80`0189eb50 00000000`00000000 : nt!PspSystemThreadStartup+0x5a fffff880`01f57d80 00000000`00000000 : fffff880`01f58000 fffff880`01f52000 fffff880`01f579e0 00000000`00000000 : nt!KxStartSystemThread+0x16 SYMBOL_STACK_INDEX: 1 SYMBOL_NAME: nt!IopProcessWorkItem+23 FOLLOWUP_NAME: MachineOwner MODULE_NAME: nt IMAGE_NAME: ntkrnlmp.exe DEBUG_FLR_IMAGE_TIMESTAMP: 4fa390f3 STACK_COMMAND: .cxr 0xfffff88001f57290 ; kb FAILURE_BUCKET_ID: X64_0x7E_BAD_IP_nt!IopProcessWorkItem+23 BUCKET_ID: X64_0x7E_BAD_IP_nt!IopProcessWorkItem+23 Followup: MachineOwner
