Works: General Protection Fault When You Run Works

When you run Microsoft Works, you may experience one of the following symptoms:

• You may receive the following error message:
  Wksdb caused a general protection fault in module Nv4disp.drv.
• You may receive the following error message:
  An error occurred in your program. To keep working anyway, click Ignore and save your work in a new file. To quit this program, click Close. You will lose information entered since your last save.
  followed by the one of the following error messages:
  Wksdb caused a general protection fault in module Nv4disp.drv.
  Wksss caused a general protection fault in module Vprdrvx.drv.
• You may receive the following error message:
  ...caused a general protection fault in module Gbtntw9x.drv.
• You may receive the following error message:
  Wksdb caused a general protection fault in module 3dbt2w9x.drv.

This issue may occur if the video adapter installed in your computer is based on the NVidia Riva TNT chip set.

To resolve this issue, download and install the latest video driver for your video adapter from the following NVidia Web site: Microsoft provides third-party contact information to help you find technical support. This contact information may change without notice. Microsoft does not guarantee the accuracy of this third-party contact information.
To work around this issue, reduce the graphics hardware acceleration. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
2. Double-click System.
3. On the Performance tab, click Graphics.
4. Move the Hardware acceleration slider until it is one notch to the right of None (the Basic acceleration setting).
5. Click OK, and then click Close.
6. When you are prompted to restart your computer, do so.
   
   If you are cannot restart your computer successfully, follow these steps:
   1. Press and hold down the CTRL key when you see the Starting Windows 98 message (in Microsoft Windows 98) or press F8 when you see the Starting Windows 95 message (in Microsoft Windows 95) on the screen.
   2. Click Safe Mode.
   3. Repeat steps 1 through 6 to restore your original graphics hardware acceleration setting.

If 16 Megabytes (MB) or more of memory is installed in your computer, you should not experience any loss of performance when you decrease the graphics hardware acceleration. If you do notice a loss in performance, restore your original graphics hardware acceleration setting.

The third-party products that are discussed in this article are manufactured by companies that are independent of Microsoft. Microsoft makes no warranty, implied or otherwise, regarding the performance or reliability of these products.