Windows XP SP3 allergic to AMD chips

Some owners of PCs based on AMD chips have had the bad surprise to see their machine restart without interruption after installing Windows XP SP3, according to several testimonies posted on the forums of Microsoft.

The editor of Redmond is aware. “The cause of the problem is complex, it comes from the fact that some OEM [PC manufacturers, Ed] have used inappropriately images of Windows XP machines to Intel chips on a PC with other types of processors” , He says.

On his blog, Jesper Johansson, one of MVP (*) U.S. Microsoft, said that similar problems had affected the XP SP2 and could be the same concern with the SP3. It confirms that some OEMs, including HP, have used the same ISO image of Windows XP on Intel or AMD PC. However, this image contains a specific driver for the Intel platform, called intelppm.sys “, which normally remain dormant on machines equipped with AMD chips. It is used in connection with the management of energy (power management).

Start Windows in safe mode

But after installing Service Pack, problems have been encountered with this driver on AMD machines. Users could not start the computer or saw displayed an error message “STOP error code of 0×0000007e.”

The solution proposed by Jesper Johansson is to start Windows in safe mode and turn off the pilot “intelppm.sys” it provides the full procedure to disable it by going to the registry.

Problem: other sources of conflict were also observed with platforms AMD after installing Service Pack, including at the Bios motherboards. It is not totally guaranteed that the deactivation of the pilot solve the problem.