Author Topic: A turn for the bizzare. help please (Read 1449 times)

DREDIOCK · « **on:** July 22, 2007, 08:10:22 PM »

As some of you are aware I have been having issues with my machine suddenly shutting down during gameplay.

Long story short.
I decided to replace my power supply. No big deal right...No.

Hooking everything up went without incident.
Upon booting I was getting a warning beep. Looked it up and info I got stated MB PS or keyboard probs.
So I shut down and recheck everything.

Next come a long nonstop beep unlike the typical warning beeps.
But. windows loaded.
I shut down and rechecked a couple more times. and each time windows started normally except for the beep
Eventually I figured out that it was because I didnt have my system case fan hooked up. This is the fan that is attached to the panel that comes off when I need to do something to the innards. Replace graphic card etc.
So I disable the warning buzzer in BIOS and the sound goes away. BUT

Now windows wont load.
I get a
"DISK BOOT FAILOUR insert system disk etc" message.

Went back into BIOS. it doesnt recognise my hard drive.
Tried inserting the windows disk. that doesnt see it either.

Tried everything I can think of including turning the bios back to where it was.

Thoughts? Solutions?

Also. could it be it was my hard drive on its way out all along that was the cause of my system shutdowns?

If I get a new hard drive. will I somehow be able to retrieve the data on the old one?

Roscoroo · « **Reply #1 on:** July 22, 2007, 08:23:34 PM »

reseat your ram . you may have bumpitied it or poped one of the locks on it.

(just some stupid thing ive done befor )

Spikes · « **Reply #2 on:** July 22, 2007, 08:25:08 PM »

I've gotten this on my old computer, your motherboard may be going bad. This is one problem.

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #3 on:** July 22, 2007, 08:41:04 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by SpikesX
I've gotten this on my old computer, your motherboard may be going bad. This is one problem.

oh dont tell me that. its less then a year old

Avaro · « **Reply #4 on:** July 22, 2007, 08:52:47 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by DREDIOCK
oh dont tell me that. its less then a year old

The long beep is ram as roo said...

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #5 on:** July 22, 2007, 09:16:18 PM »

Ram checks out as fine in the Bios
Tried reseating it anyway to no avail.

Tried hooking up a different hard drive but that doesnt work either.
BUT. the HD was from my old P500 and wasnt working right when I still had that machine up and running.

Next question.

Would I be able to tell if its the motherboard by switching IDE slots? Meaning hooking up the CDROM where the HD is normally plugged into the board?

0thehero · « **Reply #6 on:** July 22, 2007, 09:52:44 PM »

Your RAM can't be tested from the BIOS; Make a MemTestx86 boot CD to correctly test memory. However, this is not your problem.

Quote

"DISK BOOT FAILOUR insert system disk etc" message.

If you can get Windows to load the Recovery Console from the CD, run CHKDSK /R and if it can see your disk, it will run a check and attempt to repair data damage on the drive.

Quote

Would I be able to tell if its the motherboard by switching IDE slots? Meaning hooking up the CDROM where the HD is normally plugged into the board?

This is an excellent way to determine if you have a bad IDE channel on the motherboard; if the BIOS doesn't see it or you can't see the drive in Windows (i.e., if your boot hard drive is attached to the secondary channel and set to boot in the BIOS, for example) then you'd know that the primary channel was dead. It happens.

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #7 on:** July 23, 2007, 12:36:40 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by 0thehero

If you can get Windows to load the Recovery Console from the CD, run CHKDSK /R and if it can see your disk, it will run a check and attempt to repair data damage on the drive.

Volume has one or more unrecoverable problems

But it seems it may let me do a fresh install of windows. which I am assuming will also end up wiping my HD clean?
Which is something I'd prefer to avoid if possible

OOZ662 · « **Reply #8 on:** July 23, 2007, 03:45:15 AM »

Assuming that only the hard drive is the issue.

If you buy a second hard drive, install windows, and boot from said drive, you can then look at the "dead" drive and retrieve any information that hasn't been destroyed.

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #9 on:** July 23, 2007, 10:36:41 AM »

trying to install windows (on same drive) I get this message

*** stop: 0x0000008e(0cx0000005,0xf77c0cad,0xf732a7e4,0x00000000)

0thehero · « **Reply #10 on:** July 23, 2007, 12:01:43 PM »

You might just have a motherboard problem.

That's a RAM-based STOP error, but if your drive is having corruption issues, your motherboard could be on the way out.

Test your RAM using the MemTestX86 boot CD, to rule it out.

Good luck.

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #11 on:** July 23, 2007, 06:02:44 PM »

Im lleaning towerd the motherboard as suggested.
Unfortunately its a socket 939 with an AGP slot which is next to impossible to find anymore.

I got the 939 a year or so ago when it looked like that was going to be the way AMD was going to go. unfortunately a couple months later that changed.

Problem now is this may mean building an entire new system as my Video card, and memory will be next to useless which is something I definately wanted to avoid doing just yet.
It also means a less then $100 purchise will balloon up to a $400 purchice
Which right after buying my new plasma. paying property,sales and income taxes I just dont have this very moment and wont have extra funds for a couple weeks till I get paid from my next job

So for now Im stuck using my wifes machine
AMD Anthon 2400 (socket A) with 512 ram

Which for her purposes is just fine.

Sucks for my gameplay though

Only other thought I have is in grasping at straws and throwing the old PSU back in and seeing if maybe the new unit is bad.
But as I have said. Thats grasping at straws

I may do it though as I have nothing better to do

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #12 on:** July 23, 2007, 09:28:16 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by 0thehero

This is an excellent way to determine if you have a bad IDE channel on the motherboard; if the BIOS doesn't see it or you can't see the drive in Windows (i.e., if your boot hard drive is attached to the secondary channel and set to boot in the BIOS, for example) then you'd know that the primary channel was dead. It happens.

Ok just farting around and noticed I overlooked this.

Switched IDE slots. system still wont boot but the in the bios it clearly and correctly sees both the master and slave CD drives reguardless of which IDE I hook them up to.

And doesnt see thr HD in either

Is there any meaning to this?
Or is it still the mainboard is bad?

Auger · « **Reply #13 on:** July 23, 2007, 11:26:27 PM »

That proves that the motherboard IDE ports are both working. Either your HD has gone to the angels or the cable to it went bad. Try swapping drive cables and see what happens. You may also want to try a different power cable to the HD too.

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #14 on:** July 24, 2007, 12:42:38 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Auger
That proves that the motherboard IDE ports are both working. Either your HD has gone to the angels or the cable to it went bad. Try swapping drive cables and see what happens. You may also want to try a different power cable to the HD too.

Had tried different cables previously including a brand new set I never used when getting the motherboard option to go with the higher quality ASUS cables I already had instead.
Also tried just about every power connector that the PSU has attached to it.

Back to an old question.
Could a dieing hard drive have been causing the sudden occasional shutdowns I was experiencing as well?

BTW Thank you to everyone for the help