Aces High Bulletin Board
Help and Support Forums => Technical Support => Topic started by: Greebo on September 29, 2011, 04:27:34 PM
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My current hard disk is on the verge of expiring, lots of error messages and chkdsk runs on boot up etc. As I'm going to have to go through all the hassle of reinstalling everything anyway I've decided to upgrade my PC with an SSD and Windows 7 Professional. I have backed everything up and read a few installation and tweak guides including the hints and tips in this forum.
Before I start I have a question. I can install either the 32 or 64 bit version of Windows 7 but I see there's this USB bug with the 64 bit version causing crashes on AH with some PCs. I like the idea of being able to use all my memory with the 64 bit version though. I have got all my USB stuff running off self-powered hubs already, so how likely am I to get this issue if I do go 64 bit?
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Should be ok. Get all the updates for WIndows 7 as well. It looks like one of the updates fixes a kernel crash issue with sounds as well.
We have a 64 bit system running and it seems to be stable, but we tend to sweat the details more than most.
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I'd say go ahead with x64, the known advantages greatly overcome the slim potential for mishaps.
Win7 x64 pro here and no problems thus far. I really mean none, nothing, zip, zero, nada, squat... Just be sure to have your MOBO installation discs on hand. Win 7 will not always install chipset, onboard lan adapter, usb 3.0 drivers automatically. At least didn't for me. It's been pretty stable thus far.
Hope that helped :salute
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I'm currently running Win7 64 with an i5 dual core. The only issue I had with it is the built in GFX chip. Chip didn't support the graphics on AH. Installed an additional video card and have had no issues whatsoever. The only settings I use in-game are detailed terrain and water (no shadows for me) and I hold 50-60 fps.
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Should be ok. Get all the updates for WIndows 7 as well. It looks like one of the updates fixes a kernel crash issue with sounds as well.
We have a 64 bit system running and it seems to be stable, but we tend to sweat the details more than most.
any idea which update? if you have the KB number thing, I'll download it right away.
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Hey,
I use W7 64 bit, with SSD. No issues. No usb issues at all. Game crashes occassionally, very little actually, but its happens on log in. Just try again and fly. You will like the SSD, all tho it does not really affect game performance except for loading game. Put it in your port 0 sata port, install OS with only the SSD in. Add other drives only after you have put system in and its running. If you do a lot of editing on computer, add a spin drive to store all constant changing files. SSD's have a much shorter life span than spin drives, you'll want to limit writes to drive as much as possible. Do not do excessive benchmarks.
I would suggest the 64 bit OS, so you can use more than 3 GB's of ram.
I had a lot of problems with the SP1 update and IE9, currently not using them. Your copy might have that already in it. If not, Google it up before you try it. If the install develops issues, you do not just format and start again. SSD tech is way different than spin drives, maintenance is different. No defragging, no superfetch and some other things. Look into over provisioning and partition size before install of OS. W7 disk will handle the alignment of OS all on its own. Do some research to familarize yourself before install. Altho you may not be installing an OCZ SSD, they have a good forum with some quality info on SSD OS installs and maintenance. Also check for forum with your SSD manufacturer.
luck
ps: if you use an nForce chipset, leave SSD in IDE mode in bios. n Force had issues with SSD's. If Intel chipset, your gold, set bios for AHCI before OS install. Use latest bios version for mobo as well.
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any idea which update? if you have the KB number thing, I'll download it right away.
Unfortunately, I have no idea which one fixed it. I did a fresh install last week and did all (100+) the updates at one time.
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Thanks for the help guys. The old HDD finally gave up the ghost last night just after Skuzzy's first reply to this thread.
This morning I installed the SSD and Windows 7 64 bit. Initially all went well, Win 7 installed and updated itself OK. It came with SP1 and updated to IE9. I rarely use IE though anyway. I'm going to use the SSD for OS and programs and an HDD for data (skins etc.)
However there is some sort of DNS issue which stops me connecting to websites. The hardware connection's OK since Windows Update connects to the MS site. I've Googled the problem and it seems to be a common Win 7 issue with a number of possible cures. So I've got a few things to try when I get home tonight.
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From what I've seen the two biggest issues with Win7 x64 (probably Win7 in general) is driver issues. Windows will want to install its own drivers which may seem to work at first but will be problematic. Also later on windows will try to push updated drivers on you which might do the same thing. As a result you want to find the specific drivers for all of your stuff (go to you motherboard's website, your video card's website, your SSD's website, etc) and download/install their specific drivers even if windows says everything is OK.
Set your windows updates to "notify but let me decide when to install" or whatever and make sure that you do not check the boxes for any drivers. There is even the option to tell windows update to ignore that specific update. If Windows says there is an updated driver check the websites for your devices and see if they show it too. If so then download it manually from the websites and NOT from Windows updates.
You can also point your "my documents" shortcut to a folder that you can create on the HDD to help keep that stuff off the SSD.
Good luck!
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Greebo,
Could you clarify your DNS issues a little more. ie can only update windows.
Trigger might be right about drivers. I would be surprised if it is a w7 issue. W7 has many stock drivers included.
Are you using a lan on the mobo or a pci lan card? If onboard lan, make sure that the lan is enabled in the mobo bios. I myself have disabled Green lan and such.
Go to mobo manufacturers site to get 64 bit lan drivers. There might be a lan diagnostic available as well.
Look at your anti virus, disable for now.
Disable UAC for now.
Disable Windows firewall for now.
If you use a router, check your router settings. Is anything a wireless component? Is your modem in bridge mode? No router check setting for modem, firewall and such.
Look at component services and make sure things are turned on and those that need auto start are. Wireless services are one of these, WLAN.........
Try an SFC /scannow?
Look at the updates that were installed, you might consider uninstalling them all and seeing if that gets you connection. I had major issues with IE9?????
If you find nothing thats obvious, you might consider something called a "Repair Install". You will use your install disk to accomplish this. It will roll back OS to a 1st install state, removing all drivers and updates and such. Many hardware drivers on hardware install disks are not ready for W7 64bit. Go to manufacturers website for latest 64 bit drivers!
If all else fails you will need to get the SSD back to factory fresh state and try installing the OS again. The SSD manufacturer will have something like "Sanitary Erase" or something similar, for thier drive to accomplish this. You must return drive to factory state before any OS install for best performance and life.
My best guess at this point is that you have incorrect or corrupted lan driver.
I would advise a repair install before starting over, if that gets you internet connect, then it was a bad driver or problem w7 update, of which I have had many issues with. If "repair install" works, use no w7 updates untill all 64 bit hardware drivers, from websites, have been added.
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Actually there are some issues with W7 incorrectly intiating the Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter which you can disable and it will fix the problem. You can also adjust the network adaptors IPv4 settings to point to a specific DNS server. OpenDNS primary is 208.67.222.222 and secondary 208.67.220.220 (not the 208.67.202.202 that is incorrectly posted elsewhere).
EDIT: What Tigger said plus move any Libraries you create over also. This is actually the largest growth area with W7 due to the size of music and video files.
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Thanks for the suggestions guys but I figured it out once I got home and had some time to play with it. Actually it wasn't DNS at all, as I couldn't ping numerical addresses. Nothing was working online except Windows Update. Turns out I had made the mistake of setting up an internet connection with my ISP's password etc. However Windows 7 does this automatically anyway. Once I deleted my extra unneeded connection it started working. DNS was a bit erratic on auto settings though so I reset the DNS servers to the OpenDNS ones suggested above. Actually I was using these before with XP. Now it works fine.
I also managed to get AH working, no problems with it so far.
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Its always something simple LOL
S
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I've got another couple of problems in Win 7 64 bit now. When AH is running I'm seeing some video corruption, bunches of small bright green squares very briefly flashing across the screen once every 10-20 seconds. The same video card in Windows XP didn't do this so I'm assuming video drivers are the culprit. The card is a GTX 260 and the drivers are 275.33. Is there a known safe driver for this card? The game has also dropped to the desktop once without warning which may be related to this.
I also found the desktop performance to be very slow at times, but disabling indexing seems to have fixed this.
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That sounds like a heat issue has already begun to work down the memory.
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Could also be the power supply but first try reseating the video card and make sure all the power connections are secure. Maybe you knocked something loose in the process of replacing the hard drive?
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I used the GTX 260 with the last of the 19x.xxx and the 215.75 beta drivers with no issues. There was something bad about the 197.45???? drivers.
The 275 series drivers are really for later cards. I use 275.33 for GTX 550 TI's. The 260 cards are around 5 years old now. Maybe its going bad.
I used 2 260's in SLI, great cards. I upgraded to the 550 TI's, a pair of them, were same cost as one 260, prices are down. 550's use only 1 onboard plug, smaller in physical size bt a lot and more onboard ram.
Him the W7 install should have disabled indexing on the SSD, as well as a scheduled defrag. You do not defrag an SSD. Make sure its not scheduled in the defragment scheduler. I say disable it but you planned on adding spin drives to build, they can use defragging.TRIM is for SSD maintenance or some use log off time for SSD maintenance.
Go into device manager for drive and enable write cacheing under the policies tab.
It will get better with usage.
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The video card is more likely than the PSU (700W Seasonic) I think. A few years back I had a video memory issue where this card would freeze briefly then swap all the textures around in AH. You'd be flying around with dashboard instruments etc. draped all over the landscape. Lowering the clock settings on the video card fixed this. I thought the current issue was the drivers because the problem exactly coincided with me changing the OS. However now I come to think of it, the new installation may well have increased the video card's clock settings back to default. I'll install a utility and try dropping them again.
I've made sure trim, defrag, write cacheing etc. is all set up, and other stuff I read in SSD/Win 7 set up guides. There was a tick box on the C: SSD drive's properties: "Allow files on this drive to have contents indexed....." that I disabled. I thought it had fixed the slow desktop problem at first, but it hasn't gone away after all. Occasionally you click on a button or an icon and nothing happens for ages. While you are waiting you can move the mouse and click on buttons but none of them works until the window or program you originally clicked on opens.
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Whats the event viewer saying, any errors, associated with known issue?
Consider disabling superfetch and prefetch.????????????
You let W7 handle install? ie alignment of drive.
You left a pagefile on SSD boot?
Some would disable system restore.??????????????? I have done this because a repair install is just to easy. I was forced to this becuase of bad MS updates.
You should not be waiting on the SSD. Its plug in the SATA port 0? Mobo in AHCI mode?
As time progresses the TRIM and/or GC(Garbage Collection) in SSD firmware will help with performance. Also an SSD is only as good as the system cpu. I have a 30GB SSD boot with several spinners, all IDE. Its not a speed demon, but only the OS, XP Pro/32 is on the SSD with a Core2 DUO 6400.
Most apps are on a spin drive. Slow down write there. Overall tho its a good combo, no issues. This is what you had been considering.
Not a 24/7 machine. Use it for low level editing and storage, in my case.
I just remember this, 275.33 drivers come with 3D drivers for 3D TV. Only install the drivers and physX, not any 3D, Nvidia sound, or auto update stuff.
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Lowering the clock speed of the memory on the video card seems to have fixed the graphics glitches in AH, at least it did not do it in two flights last night.
The slow desktop performance persists though. I have disabled pre and superfetch, left a small pagefile on the SSD and I enabled AHCI on the BIOS and OS. The SSD is in port 0. I haven't disabled system restore yet, I wanted to get everything loaded and stable first. I'm not sure about what features the video drivers installed though.
One symptom of this is a long pause between the desktop loading and being able to open any program or menu. It takes over a minute between clicking on the start menu and the menu opening. After that things generally work fine, but occasionally there is another, usually shorter pause when clicking on something.
Event viewer listed three persistent errors:
There is an item (event 6) regarding Windows turning off power management features that occurs on every start up, but before the initial password pause and the desktop loads. This is down to my old MB not supporting the latest power saving features of in 7 and there's nothing I can do about it as there is no up to date bios for it.
There was another item (event 10) that turned out to be an MS bug related to SP1. This coincided with the start menu finally opening after the desktop first loaded. However fixing the problem with an MS fix stopped the messages but didn't fix the lag.
Finally there was a persistent message about the wireless driver saying it had shut down successfully. As i don't use wireless I just disabled the service to stop the messages. No help with the lag though.
I've spent most of the week experimentally disabling services, eye candy and security stuff, running scans and trawling through Windows forums to no avail.
I may have to live with it for now I think. I need to get on with actually using the computer for a while rather than trying to fix it. Thank you for all the suggestions though guys.