Software
Windows 7 chkdsk Bug Hysteria Probably Not Worth the Hype
Some folks are saying that a bug in Windows 7 RTM (scheduled to roll out tomorrow to MSDN and TechNet subscribers) is serious enough to derail the launch. I think they are probably reaching a bit far. I don’t know, but would imagine that this is something that can be fixed with a patch.
In any event, the bug supposedly consumes enormous amounts of memory if you run chkdsk and has been reported to crash systems. It has also been reported that this occurs both in Windows Explorer and in at an elevated CMD prompt. Neowin is linking to a post with a comment supposedly from Steven Sinofsky about the problem.
So there appears to be a bug, but I don’t think anyone is surprised to see any OS released these days that doesn’t still have a few kinks to be flattened out. Again, I wouldn’t sweat the shrieks of doom too much on this one.
UPDATE: And as usual, Ed Bott cuts through the clutter and provides some answers.
GoodThings2Life
08/05/2009 at 3:20 pm
Ed’s pretty dependable about his testing thoroughness and also in general about being right (whether you like/agree with his opinions or not, lol), and I’ve experienced this behavior in the RC as well in a similar situation scanning a 500GB USB hard drive… shock of shocks, both my system AND my drive are in perfect working order.
Mark (K0LO)
08/05/2009 at 7:47 pm
As Ed Bott’s article points out, this is NOT a bug. The chkdsk /r code was designed to execute quickly and it uses as much RAM as it can get its little hands on to do that. From what I’ve read, it does what it was designed to do and DOES NOT crash the PC.
Much hype and ado about nothing…