Working on a Windows XP machine means that you will inevitably end up working with Dr. Watson.

Dr. Watson is a windows utility that runs in the background checking for errors and generating reports about its findings. Like the assistant to Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson doesn’t actually solve the problems but he does offer valuable clues so that you can go from there.

When Dr. Watson finds a problem, he pops up in the form of a gray dialogue box that informs you of a program error and tells you the program will be shut down. When you see this box, you can click a button to view the details of the report or you can opt to send the report to Microsoft for further review.

While you’ll likely be annoyed that your program got pulled out from under you, keep in mind that this is a vast improvement over a complete system crash. Occasionally Dr. Watson errors aren’t necessarily ominous; a simple re-boot often works things out. But if you are consistently receiving Dr. Watson errors you will want to dig deeper and find out what’s going on.

Dr. Watson records all program errors in his log. In Windows XP this log is located in the Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\DrWatson folder and is named, “drwtsn32.log”. By double-clicking the log file, NotePad or WordPad will open and you can view the reports. Each report is listed chronologically so you will need to scroll to the bottom to see the latest program errors.

Instead of scrolling, you can also do a search by date by hitting control + F and entering the desired date. Likewise, you can go error by error by using control + F and searching for the word “when”. This is because each date has the word “when” in front of it.

The data listed in the report is technical data. For those with limited computer tech savvy, this will be meaningless. But you will see the programs that are consistently causing program errors along with error codes called “exception numbers”. First you’ll see the application path that caused the problem followed by the exception number. From here, you can search the internet for information about the exception number.

If you send the report to Microsoft, you will likely be directed to possible solutions such as to websites with updated drivers that will solve your problems. Microsoft uses the data sent to determine real world bugs with their software and ultimately creates patches and hot-fixes. If these exist for your problem, you’ll likely be directed to their website where you can download them. The information sent by Dr. Watson is the information you’ll see by clicking the debug button.

Dr. Watson runs automatically in the background but you can load Dr. Watson at anytime by going to the Start button, choosing run and typing in: drwatson. A small button appears on the taskbar that you can click to check for errors. If Dr. Watson finds errors, you’ll see the dialogue box, otherwise you will get a “no faults found” message.

Now that you know what Dr. Watson is all about, next time he appears on your screen, you’ll know he’s hard at work, gathering clues about your computer program errors.
 

We recommend trying the Free Regcure scanner to see of your errors originate in the Windows Registry, as they most often do!

Related: How to Fix Dr Watson Errors