Can't boot, black screen, "Safe mode" stuck at agp440.sys driver

Hi, I’m using Dell Inspiron 8600 Laptop running on Win XP Professional with SP2. It has all recent Windows updates. I’m facing a problem since past 6 months which my webcam software also clashes with one of video games installed and hence I always need to re-install them to make them work for next two weeks. Now, since past 2 days my laptop is stuck on black screen. It wont just boot.

When I try to enter Safe mode, it gets stuck at agp440.sys driver. I tried booting with ‘last good configuration’ from the boot menu but that dint worked, neither the instructions provided at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324764. Can anybody please tell me what is the problem?

Without doubt this is a hardware problem, and you know what, it's that most forgotten piece of hardware - the memory! I had excatly this problem, and only after I NOTICED THAT THE bios WAS POSTING AN INCORRECT memory size did I remove two 512mb chips (I already had 2 other 1 gb chips) and hey presto, not only did everything work, but is has never run so fast!

I think what must be happening is that AGP440.sys must be loaded into a part of the memory which has failed, so there it hangs.

Another point, my sister had a Dell with the same problem, and it was down to the extremely cheap (sorry Dell, but it is true) memory chips Dell uses in their home computers!

Replace your video driver and then problem will be gone. You are facing issue due to that only. I had seen some Microsoft kb articles which says that you will need to re-install the motherboard video drivers. Or else you wont be able to get in the safe mode. You can try running system restore also. This might revert old settings back to give you a more stable output. It works most of the time and give you fast performance also. The second thing you can do is go ahead with a driver updater tool. This will automatically add fresh drivers in your system.

For method that I am posting you have to use windows xp installation disc. Or else this method will not work. You have to boot your system from Windows XP CD. Just insert the disc and boot your system with that. From the boot menu hit R. This will launch Recovery Console. In that you will need to choose the correspondent key to launch a installation process. Hit the key and press Enter. The process might also ask you about password. Add the same. Now launch CMD and then type listsvc and hit enter. In this you have to find Agp440 service. Configure the startup to Boot. Press Esc and once again type agp440 and hit enter. Then type service_disabled and hit enter. Reboot your system.