Star Critical Bug Could Derail Windows 7 Launch
Linked by snydeq on Wed 5th Aug 2009 19:11 UTC
Windows Windows 7 RTM Build 7600.16385 includes a potentially fatal bug that, once triggered, could bring down the entire OS in a matter of seconds: "The bug in question - a massive memory leak involving the chkdsk.exe utility - appears when you attempt to run the program against a secondary (i.e. not the boot partition) hard disk using the "/r" (read and verify all file data) parameter. The problem affects both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 7 and is classified as a 'showstopper' in that it can cause the OS to crash (Blue Screen of Death) as it runs out of physical memory," reports InfoWorld's Randall Kennedy. Microsoft is claiming the bug is a chipset driver issue, but Kennedy's testing of the latest Intel INF Update Utility driver set and VMware virtualized chipset drivers suggests otherwise. "This is clearly a Microsoft bug - and the fact that it manifests itself via the chkdsk.exe utility makes me wonder if it isn't something intrinsic to the Windows 7 version of the New Technology File System (NTFS) driver stack." Worse still, user comments suggest that Windows Server 2008 R2 suffers from the same flaw.
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RE[3]: Show stopper yes...
by Delgarde on Wed 5th Aug 2009 21:49 UTC in reply to "RE[2]: Show stopper yes..."
Delgarde
Member since:
2008-08-19

There is that... sometimes.


Only "sometimes"? In my experience, a quick fix made under time pressure will almost inevitably introduce at least one new bug...

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 2

RE[4]: Show stopper yes...
by Tuishimi on Wed 5th Aug 2009 22:23 in reply to "RE[3]: Show stopper yes..."
Tuishimi Member since:
2005-07-06

In my experience sometimes the problem was so simple that it is obvious, and requires only a quick and small code change.

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RE[4]: Show stopper yes...
by Tuishimi on Wed 5th Aug 2009 22:26 in reply to "RE[3]: Show stopper yes..."
Tuishimi Member since:
2005-07-06

Allow me to elaborate... two "showstopper" bugs I have fixed that caused OS crashes where simple initialization issues. Shared memory variables were initialized, then cleared (accidentally) but another section of code, then referenced.

In these two cases it literally came down to moving two lines of code and documenting that certain things need to happen in a certain order.

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RE[5]: Show stopper yes...
by Tuishimi on Wed 5th Aug 2009 22:26 in reply to "RE[4]: Show stopper yes..."
Tuishimi Member since:
2005-07-06

...admittedly it was because of a rarely taken path in the code... but you get the point.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 2