Every now and then my computer will show a blue screen with the message that a fatal error has occured or hardware failure and to restart Press Control, ALT and Delete.
What could this be and what does one do to repair it?
Unfortunately it could be a whole number of things. What programs are you using at the time of the error? Does it happen when you try do anything in particular?
Mattk is correct that it could be any of a number of things and that to start to diagnose the problem you have to figure out when it occurs. Does it seem to occur randomly or does it occur when you use a particular piece of software or a particular piece of hardware?
In my experience, if it seems to occur randomly it will probably turn out to be a hardware problem. I spent a week once trying to figure out why I was getting seemingly random blue screen errors before I finally took my PC in for service (it was still under warranty). It turned out to be a bad Pentium chip. (The service guy told me that after having the machine in the shop for about a month.) Another computer gave me seemingly random blue screen errors that I blamed on Windows but after about five reinstallations of Windows I replaced the mother board and that solved the problem. Another computer would start to boot but when it got to Win98 it would give me blue screens and tell me Windows Explorer wouldn’t run. After several reinstallations of Win98 I was about to Easter Egg the CPU (i.e., replace it with a new one to see if that would identify the defective part) when I noticed that a jumper had fallen off the mother board and that my CPU was running on 2.0V instead of the 2.2V it was designed for. Apparently it ran just fine on the low voltage until confronted with WIN98 and Windows Explorer when it pooped out.
You can also try a hardware diagnostic utility (e.g, Norton Diagnostics).
Good luck.
I think lindsay wrote another post saying she was going to put in 64megs ram but we never heard back from her about that. & now this.
Dear Lindsay…while the SD folks want to try to help with your questions you are taking brevity in the description of your problem(s) a little too far. You (I think) posted a message a few days ago re your pending upgrade of your system via added RAM. Is this the same system? Has the problem been occurring since the upgrade or prior to it? Is is completely random or does it happen in certain programs?
Vague problem descriptions get well meaning but often useless answers (as this one may well be) with respect to being responsive to your specific problem.
Blue fatal error screens are generally indicative of lower level driver/hardware IO conflicts. IF it is the same system and all other aspects of the system are the same with the exception of the RAM upgrade and it has only been occuring since the upgrade it is quite possibly related to a RAM / motherboard / RAM BIOS settings conflict. I have upgraded lots of MB’s and some MB’s and some RAM modules simply won’t cooperate for a variety of highly technical and sometimes completely mysterious reasons. Make sure the RAM upgrade your got for your MB is specified to the speed and requirements of your motherboard. Your manual should have a fairly specific descripion of allowable memory parameters. Also, there are lots of cheapo, poorly spec’d modules on the market. Try to make sure you are buying name brand memory.
http://www.thechipmerchant.com is a good place to look
Have you tried using Viagra? 
astro, I suspect the ram too, but she never comes back here anyway to look for our answers, or so it seems.