‘Haunts every PC gamer’s dreams’: Microsoft kills off blue screen of death

One of the most legendarily hated sights in the history of the computer is about to be changed forever — but maybe not for the better.

It may well be one of the most anger inducing sights in all of technology but the blue screen of death’s reign of terror is almost over.

For anyone who’s ever used a PC, Microsoft’s error message has been a source of frustration, despair or pure unadulterated rage for as long as the tech giant has been around.

The company recently dropped a bombshell, announcing it was getting rid of the iconic blue screen of death — or BSOD.

But PC users shouldn’t rush out into the street for a wild bacchanalian party just yet because the company has already announced its replacement — and it could be just as ominous.

In a post last Friday on the Windows Insider blog, Microsoft announced it was redesigning the BSOD, which the company says is “a new, more streamlined UI for unexpected restarts which better aligns with Windows 11 design principles and supports our goal of getting users back into productivity as fast as possible”.

For those part of the Windows Insider program (mainly software testers who get early access to new features) this will be green.

However, for the rest, it's reportedly going to be black when it rolls out to the public.

The company announced Microsoft Insiders will get the black screen. Photo: Microsoft

The public are reportedly set to get the black screen. Photo: Microsoft

The design will also be pared back with the frowny face, which has been a feature of the screen since Windows 8, removed as well as the troubleshooting QR code which had been placed on the page in recent years.

It will now simply say: “Your device ran into a problem, and needs to restart”, followed by the current progress of the restart.

At the bottom of the page will also be a stop code and what failed to force the restart.

The change is reportedly to make the error screen “less ominous”.

While it’s not the first time that the blue screen of death has been changed, it is a big departure from the colour which has become so iconically linked to the issue.

Although Microsoft could always decide to return to the blue in the future, Microsoft users are starting to come to terms with the new-look error screen.

Farewell blue screen of death - we hardly knew ye.

There has been some criticism of the new look with some users claiming it looks too similar to the update screen, which is also a black background with a progress counter.

Plenty more are already calling for the blue screen to return.

In a story on the move on PC Gamer, Andy Edser described the new black design as “Just an ominous void, a stop code, and the message that haunts every PC gamer’s dreams at night.”

Others have questioned that the move might be in response to the CrowdStrike outage last year that saw many met with the blue screen around the world as computers repeatedly rebooted and crashed.

To avoid that issue repeating, Microsoft announced a new Quick Machine Recovery mode in November to allow computers to be rebooted even if it’s unable to boot.

Originally published as ‘Haunts every PC gamer’s dreams’: Microsoft kills off blue screen of death