In order to troubleshoot an unresponsive
application it is often helpful to create a
dump, i.e. a "snapshot" of the Windows
process(es) associated to the application.
To create a dump file:
- Start Task Manager by pressing
Ctrl+Shift+Esc or by right-clicking an
empty area of the task bar and selecting
Task Manager
- If no Details tab is visible, click
"More details" at the bottom of the
dialog
- In the Details tab, right-click
the desired process and select
Create dump file
- In File Explorer, open the location
displayed after the dump file has been
created
- Repeat the above if multiple processes
are involved
- Compress the file(s) to reduce the
size of the transfer, e.g. right-click
and select Send to/Compressed (zipped)
folder
This procedure is suitable for creating a
user-mode dump file. If creation of the dump
file fails with an "Access denied" error, it
may indicate that the process is busy
running in kernel mode (e.g. code by a
driver). If an application is unresponsive
in this condition, a driver update may solve
the issue.
Please note that the process dump
may contain private information, if such
data was in use by the process. It is
support policy to delete any such dump files
after use.
