Despite decades of research in extensible operating system technology, extensions such as device drivers remain a significant cause of system failures. In Windows XP, for example, drivers account for 85% of recently reported failures. In this talk, Henry Levy describes Nooks, a reliability subsystem that seeks to greatly enhance OS reliability by isolating the OS from driver failures. The Nooks approach is practical: rather than guaranteeing complete fault tolerance through a new (and incompatible) OS or driver architecture, the goal is to prevent the vast majority of driver-caused crashes with little or no change to existing driver and system code. From the Series:CSE Colloquia - 2006