Question

I am fighting a bug which does not reproduce on my machine, but repeats every time on my client’s machine. I’ve tried everything, and now I am looking for any debug data (or whatever) that IE8 leaves after a crash. Google and Microsoft searches gave me nothing. Where does Internet Explorer 8 store its crash dumps? It definetely sends something to Microsoft after a crash, how can I see it?

Answer 1

There is a post here that will show you how to generate a mini dump

http://www.vistax64.com/windows-updates/227276-mshtml-dll-internet-explorer-8-crash-3.html

To generate a minidump:

1. Download and install the “Debugging Tools” package
2. From the folder where you installed it, run WinDBG.exe as admin (right-click, “run as admin…”).
3. Press F6, sort “by executable”, find IEXPLORE.EXE, select, OK. (It’s easier if you have only one instance of IEXPLORE running at this time.)
4. It’ll spew out a whole bunch of numbers and eventually dump you on a prompt at the bottom of the page. Just type G and press enter. This attaches the debugger to the IEXPLORE process but then lets it “Go” and continue to do its thang.
5. Do whatever you need to do to repro the crash.
6. This time, a crash condition will cause the debugger to “break into” the IEXPLORE process and suspend all its actions. In other words, instead of seeing the same crash message you’ll see the debugger take over and IEXPLORE will look like it’s frozen.

7. Ignore all the spew again and wait for the prompt at the bottom of the WinDBG window, then type this:

   .dump /m IE1.dmp

If you don’t give it a full path, the IE1.dmp file will be created in the same folder where you installed the debugger package. If you zip up that minidump and upload it here, I or someone else may be able to dig more info out of it.