1. Home
  2. Notes

Notes

A collection of troubleshooting walkthroughs, how-tos, and notes. These write-ups are from real diagnostic issues as well as my personal notes collected from a lifetime in software and tech.

Troubleshooting

PC Freezing or Crashing? Programs & Games Lagging?

Jun 25, 2026 · Peter McKechnie

A client's Overwatch dropped from 240 FPS to a stuttering mess, and everything pointed at the GPU. It was a nearly-full SSD. A real case — plus an interactive diagnostic to triage your own machine.

Read the case →
Troubleshooting

When WSL Lies: the CreateVm/HCS/ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND Crash

Jun 25, 2026 · Peter McKechnie

WSL2 wouldn't boot after a Windows update, throwing ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND. The error was lying — the real cause was a displaced service, and the fix was a repair, not a reinstall.

Read the breakdown →
How-To

Reinstalling Your Graphics Driver — A Step-by-Step Walkthrough for Non-Technical Users

Jun 17, 2026 · Peter McKechnie

Glitching, black screens, or games crashing? A full driver reinstall often fixes it. Here's the calm, no-jargon, nothing-skipped way to do it with DDU — including the one BitLocker check you must not skip.

Read the guide →
Troubleshooting

nvlddmkm.sys Crash? Using DaVinci Resolve? It Might Be Related...

Jun 16, 2026 · Peter McKechnie

An RTX 40-series card kept blue-screening in nvlddmkm.sys, and every forum said the same thing: RMA it. But the crashes only happened at idle — the tell that it's software, not silicon. Here's the three-setting fix in DaVinci Resolve.

Read the breakdown →
Troubleshooting

SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION BSOD: Avast Was Leaking Kernel Memory

Jun 14, 2026 · Peter McKechnie

My Windows 11 workstation crashed with SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION every ~36 hours. The dumps blamed graphics — the real culprit was Avast leaking kernel memory, over a million un-freed allocations. Here's the full diagnostic trail, with the evidence.

Read the breakdown →
Work with me

When the obvious fixes don't stick

If you've tried the usual fixes and the problem keeps coming back, that's where I come in — methodical, first-hand diagnosis instead of guesswork.

$100/hour in-home or remote across NYC and Long Island