Strange Problem after Windows Update

My system configuration can be seen in my signature but to make it clear, I'm running Windows Vista. Anyway, last night I shut down my laptop (I normally hibernate) to allow Vista to update. The OS processed and installed 8 updates, presumably the 8 most recent. This morning I turn my laptop on, go and make myself a coffee only to come back and see what looks like a poor excuse for a BSOD. I wish I had taken a picture but with my course work only on my laptop at the moment, it wasn't in the forefront of my mind. From what I could make out, something known as GDM had encountered a problem and I was advised to contact the system admin, resolve the problem and restart. So I did the latter. Windows has now booted fine and I'm hoping the update has applied. However, now when I start up I get a warning mentioning that I am running a "selective start up". Could somone tell me what this is, why its likely to have occured and if I should go back to a "normal" start up? Also, some light on this "GDM" would be useful. I guessing its a graphical display manager or something, simply because the background for the warning message was loads of strange characters.

Any advice on this situation would be great seeing as I can't afford to lose my only work horse at University!

Thanks for your time

 

Selective startup just means that msconfig is configured to something other than the default. There's nothing wrong with doing that if everything works; a lot of people intentionally disable startup items to get a faster boot. There should be an option to tell Windows not to warn you about selective startup.

I can't shed any light on this GDM thing, though, but if you don't want to lose your data, just make sure you backup often.

 

Thanks for the advice! I've made a backup of the files that are important now, I just seemed to forget recently with so much happening. Do you think I should return the System Configuration to Normal Start Up or won't it make a difference?

 

Well, if you want to just be absolutely sure everything works, then it probably is in your best interest to switch it back to normal. If you're one of those nitpicky tweakers you might want to look into selective startup settings, though.

 

I'm not that nit-picky! I'll hit it back to normal and see how it likes that.

Update: Everything seems to be running ok but if I get the weird crash again I'll be sure to take a picture of it. Thanks for all your help!

 

For the time being you should turn off the autostart after BSOD. That way you will have time to read it and record what it says.

Click Start then right click "computer". Select properties, the advance system settings. Under "Startup and Recovery" click "Settings". In the section labeled "System failure" uncheck the box "Automatically restart".

Voilà, any BSOD will now stay visible until YOU decide to restart the machine.

Gary