220-1102 Software Troubleshooting Practice Question

Answer analysis

Option-by-option breakdown

For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.

• ✓

  Corrupted program files for the application

  Why this is correct

  This specific crash signature — an access violation (0xC0000005) occurring immediately at launch — is classically caused by a corrupted executable or one of its supporting DLLs. The Windows loader attempts to map the program's code and import tables into memory; if the PE header or a required import is damaged, the process receives an invalid memory access before the main code ever runs. Reinstalling the application or performing a repair installation replaces the damaged files and restores proper structure, which is why this is the correct answer.

• ✗

  A faulty RAM module

  Why it's wrong here

  A faulty RAM module can indeed trigger access violations, but it would not selectively affect only this one application at launch with no prior issues. Memory bit flips from hardware failure are sporadic and location-dependent, so they tend to cause random crashes, data corruption, or blue screens across many programs and system processes, not a deterministic failure of a single freshly launched application. If RAM were the root cause, you would typically observe broader instability and reproduce the error inconsistently, not a reliable crash every time this specific app opens.

• ✗

  Insufficient hard disk space

  Why it's wrong here

  Insufficient hard disk space primarily affects operations that require writing data, such as creating page files, temporary files, or saving user documents. At the moment of launch, the application's executable is already on disk and is memory-mapped by the OS; not having enough free space will not inherently cause an access violation unless the Windows page file cannot expand to commit the process's virtual memory, which would normally yield an out-of-memory or insufficient-resources error rather than 0xC0000005 at the entry point.

• ✗

  Antivirus software falsely flagging the application

  Why it's wrong here

  Antivirus false positives usually result in the malicious-looking file being quarantined, deleted, or blocked by a security notification, not directly throwing an access violation inside the running process. If AV software had flagged the executable, launching it would typically produce an 'Access denied' or 'This program has been blocked' dialog, and the file would be absent or renamed in quarantine. While AV could theoretically interfere with memory scanning, the classic mechanism is binary removal or blocking, making this explanation far less likely than corrupted program files.

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