Decipher the blue screen Deciphering the blue screen can seem like a difficult and intimidating task, but really, it is organized in a particular structure and can provide important clues to what is wrong with the server. It is important to understand the structure and content in the blue screen (a brief description of the blue screen has been provided below). Usually, the blue screen occurs when you attempt to start the machine in the safe mode and it does not start. The blue screen has four parts, organized in the same order: Actual error message: There are a number of error messages that could appear on the screen based on the type of error. For example, the image below shows the error message BAD_POOL_HEADER. server down Other examples of error messages are given below: KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED indicates an incorrectly configured device driver. REGISTRY_ERROR indicates a serious problem in the registry. INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE indicates that the OS is unable to read from the hard disk. UNEXPECTED_KERNEL_MODE_TRAP indicates a problem with the memory. BAD_POOL_HEADER is hard to decipher but this indicates that the issue has something to do with a recent change in the system. NTFS_FILE_SYSTEM indicates a corrupted hard disk. KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR indicates the OS was unable to read a page of kernel data from the page file. NMI_HARDWARE_FAILURE indicates the inability of the hardware’s abstraction layer to identify the cause of the error.