Knowledge Base

Problem

After a blue screen of death (BSOD) occurring during video acquisition, EthoVision XT cannot launch. Errors such as 'missing MFCORE.DLL' and '0xc000007b' appear. SFC scans and manual DLL replacement do not resolve the issue.

Details

Occurs when a BSOD during active EthoVision acquisition causes chain DLL corruption at the Windows OS level. Affected versions include EthoVision XT 17. Standard repair tools (sfc /scannow, manual DLL copy) are insufficient because the corruption is widespread across system libraries. The USB hardware dongle (if present) is not affected by the OS reinstall and can be reused after reinstallation.

Solution

1. Attempt SFC repair first: open an elevated command prompt and run 'sfc /scannow'. If this does not resolve the DLL errors, proceed to step 2.
2. Perform a full Windows OS reinstall. Back up experiment files and the EthoVision experiment folder before reinstalling.
3. After reinstalling Windows, reinstall EthoVision XT (same version as before) using the original installation package or a link from MyNoldus.
4. If a USB hardware dongle was in use, it is unaffected by the OS reinstall — simply plug it back in and install the Sentinel/HASP driver.
5. Reactivate any software-based licenses as needed following the standard activation procedure.
6. Restore experiment files from backup and confirm EthoVision launches correctly before resuming acquisition.