Whenever things bog down here at S2KI.com, I can pretty much expect to see the following message on my desktop:

The instruction at "0x0202494e" referred to memory at "0x000000489". The memory could not be "read". Click OK to terminate the program.

In short, (and according to Microsoft's cryptic email to me) IE gets crippled by an inability to handle URL references that are "inappropriately long" and goes to it's knees. One bit of evidence in support of this theory is that using Opera as my web browser eliminates the problem.

One workaround is to delete IE history files or to go into the registry and wreak havoc. The former worked for a couple of days and the latter did the same, albeit with much higher risk to the overall functioning of the operating system.

Microsoft has a "hotfix" that you have to beg out of them that is supposed to fix the problem, but it didn't help on my machine. It appears that the only option left is to reinstall XP. Oh wait, maybe I should follow through with my threat to relegate the PC box to the weather station updates and move on through life with the Mac at the ready.

Anybody else been seeing these memory flops lately?

...Bob

 

No. .....




I have a Mac.

 

To answer your question, no.

But I'll shotgun some stuff at you and you can confirm/deny:

Have you loaded any new application software prior to the problem?

What class machine are we talking about (chip type, motherboard manufacturer, BIOS revision, etc)?

Which flavor of XP - service pack 1 or 2?

How much RAM? It's possible you may have marginal memory. Or bad memory.

Have you updated your system at the Microsoft Update site?

What antivirus, antispyware, or other background processes are running on the machine?

That's all I have off the top of my head.

 

I haven't seen that either, but my browser is firefox.

 

I saw a similar message last week, but not in relation to IE. I was loading Quickbooks on a clients computer.

 

The only thing that stands out was McAfee Suite which brought nearly everything down to the stone age. It has all sorts of

Privacy and anti-spam features that took forever to load or run their routines so I bagged the suite and am now running AVG

Anti Virus with none of the other stuff. McAfee had a firewall that I had engaged, but since I have a wireless router, that

was unnecessary, so now, no firewall (except the router). As for AntiSpyware, I have been using Microsoft

ABIT IS7-V with Intel 82848P (MCH) + 82801EB (ICH5) - Pentium 4 2.8 GHz

BIOS - i848P-W83627H-6A79AA1HC-16 which is the latest available.

Service Pack 2

1 GB. I've checked out the memory with a couple of different mem tests. Turned out OK. My guess is that they were not all that demanding, though.

Yes, I have it tell me when udates are available and I manually run the update.

Only AVG anti virus and Microsoft AntiSypware (which has not picked up an offending Spy since about a month after I installed it).

Microsoft actually cops to this being a problem, but attributes it to websites that have addresses a mile long.

Ironically, the Microsoft guy told me I could probably fix the problem by reinstalling Windows. Trouble with that is that I updated XP Home with SP2 on the Microsoft site, so if I try to update Windows, I have to delete the current OS because SP2 won't recognize my original XP disc. That leaves me having to do a new install with the original disc and then going back to Microsoft's update site to do the SP2 update. I'd rather do just about anything else.

 

My favorite alternative would be to go outside and roll around on a hill of fire ants.

Firefox as an alternative to IE is quite solid, and its free. (You need to leave IE on the system to do those Microsoft updates and a few other things, though). I switched over to Firefox a couple of years back and have been glad I did ever since. HPH

 

^ I use Firefox as well. From time to time I have difficulty with certain websites and have to go to IE. Othertimes, while using Firefox,I get messages saying that my IE needs to be updated, yet that has been done. I have changed my "default browser" back to IE while using Firefox, and I still get that message.

Anyone know what I'm missing there?

 

From what I can gather, the problem is the result of a maximum string length parameter which is larger than the string buffer allocation. This in turn causes the string to be truncated. It's just another undocumented feature (formerly known as bug).

Do you only see the problem on s2ki.com? If so, you may want to use a different browser for this site. I know it's not optimized for IE.

If the underlying cause of the problem is a registry entry or mismatched .dll files, a reinstall might correct the problem. It doesn't seem logical that loading the same OS, service pack, and patches would fix the problem but this is MicroSoft after all.

 

I've never used Firefox so I have no idea. Sorry.