BetaWiki:Featured article/2022-05
A blue screen of death is a common name for the screen that occurs during a system crash in Microsoft Windows operating systems. It is shown when the operating system can no longer function safely due to a fatal system error. On Windows NT, blue screens are also commonly known as STOP errors, referring to the *** STOP label that introduced the error code up to Windows 7.
A user interface for displaying important system messages was first introduced in Windows 3.0, which took the form of a full screen prompt that suspended Windows until being dismissed by the user. The first known build to implement the Windows NT blue screen is the October 1991 build.