GA-K8NS Pro boot problem

[Gmala]

First of all, let me tell you I'm fairly inexperienced when it comes to building my own machine, but I thought I'd give it a go, based on what I know and advice from friends who've also built their own machines.

Specs:

Gigabyte GA-K8NS pro
Athlon64 3400
350W Power supply
Corsair Matched DDR400, 512M each (x2)
IBM 160G Hard Drive ATA/IDE
Plextor 708A DVD RW
Placeholder Geforce 3 (until the new x800 is available)
Windows XP Home

Now, here's the problem, when I start the computer, bios recognizes the hard drive, and the DVD player. Changing the boot order to install off the CD, the computer is able to install it on the hard drive. I have moved the HD over to another computer, and can confirm that the installation of windows has taken place.

However, when I switch the bios to boot from the hard drive first, it always hangs in the boot up sequence when it gets DMI pool data section. The processor is recognized correctly. The memory is recognized. I have tried pulling one stick out and booting, as well as switching slots.

In my book, it talks about video cards that are only AGP x2 can hang the system, and I thought that might be it. However the AGPx2 light on the motherboard wasn't on, and the invidia website says the geforce3 can run at either 2x or 4x AGP, so I'm rapidly running out of options.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated, and I apoligize in advance if I don't understand your advice right away.

Thanks,

Ryan

 

[Cybercraig]

If you're trying to stuff a 3.3vdc Video card in there it will never work. Also, you don't need the hard drive set up as first boot. I set mine, floppy, optical drive, hardrive in that order. You may have to wait and extra couple of seconds, but if you need to boot off of a disc later you won't have to go back into BIOS and change everything.

"I am become death, the destroyer of worlds. Now, let's eat!

 

[Gmala]

Thanks for your quick response, I'll try trading out the video card with something more recent. and I'll take your bios advice as well...How do I find out about the voltage of the video card?

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Gmala on 06/23/04 05:27 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Crashman]

no problem with the video card, don't bother. All GeForce3's were 1.5v compliant. Every single one.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[Crashman]

Don't throw him offtrack with that kind of info, all GeForce3's were 1.5v compliant. Every one. As in, ALL. So that can't be the problem. Ever. On any AGP system. Not even a brand new A64 platform.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[Cybercraig]

Sorry about that, I was thinking Geforce 2. I've never heard of that card. I should have looked it up! Duh!

"I am become death, the destroyer of worlds. Now, let's eat!

 

[Crashman]

98% of GeForce2's were 1.5v compliant as well. And the ones that weren't, were improperly documented anyway, leading normal people to think they all were.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[xeenrecoil]

heya Gmala;

I can think of two things that could be causing the OS to hang on bootup, the first thing is the Chipset drivers, if you didnt install the chipset drivers upon installation of the OS, some chipsets have a really hard time dealing with default windows drivers, and it will cause the system to hang for very long periods of time, however after 5-10 min they will boot to the desktop.

The other possible problem is the hard drive wether it be the jumpers incorrectly set on the hardware itself or the drivers for the drives, check out both just to make sure.

Drivers are pretty important, if they arent right they can cause all kinds of problems like freezing, crashing, etc

<Archer> Cant this ship go any faster, I thought this was a Warp 5 Engine?
<Tucker> Yeah, on Paper...

Xeen

 

[Gmala]

OK, booting up the machine now then, we'll see what happens. I'm familiar with updating the drivers inside windows, is there a way to do it via CD without windows installed?

The jumpers on the back of the hard drive are set to device 0 master, are there any other jumpers I need to be concerned with?


UPDATE: let it sit there a bit to see if it would get past that section of the boot, no dice. However I have discovered that it knocks my other computer offline, dang it.

A bit of a catch 22, the windows CD has copied all the files on to the HD(as per original post), but it has yet to boot up properly, so nothing has been setup yet. Is it even possible to install drivers (assuming I'm able to do it)from CD with the HD in that condition?
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Gmala on 06/24/04 12:07 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[xeenrecoil]

Heya Gmala;

I see what your getting at, hmm well really at this point of the game the only real possibility is the bios settings, apparently something in the bios is preventing bootup, so go through your boot sequence and make sure that your INT-18 boot device is disabled, also make sure your CD-Rom boots before your hard drive, go ahead and disable your floppy for now untill it gets up and running, that is if your not using it for anything, the windows CD is bootable.

This should allow for an uniterupted finish of the installation, if not it is possible that the installation got corrupted and you will have to format and restart the entire OS installation process, as it doesnt seem to be recovering, however try the other steps i mentioned first before you format the drive.
Also i had heard that IBM were having some problems with some of their drives, perhaps this is one of them? its worth checking into possibly.

I Cant think of a reason why you would need your hard drive to boot first, if thats whats causing the problem then simply have your CD-Rom boot first, and dont worry about it, as long as ive owned a computer i have always had the CD-Rom drive boot before the Hard Drive anyway...Good Luck with this.

<Archer> Cant this ship go any faster, I thought this was a Warp 5 Engine?
<Tucker> Yeah, on Paper...

Xeen