Stuck at Verifying DMI Pool Data

[Gahagan1]

I've been having this problem since I moved in a few days ago. Hoping someone here can help.

My Rig:

Core i7 processor, 2.66 ghz
EVGA x58 motherboard
nVidia GTX 260 video card
1TB Western Digital hard drive
250GB Western Digital hard drive
750W Corsair power supply
6GB DDR2 RAM
Windows 7

My Problem:

The problem initially started with my stock heatsink breaking its motherboart anchors and tilting off the processor, causing the computer to shut down and become unresponsive. At the time I didn't realize what the problem was and turned the computer on and off a few times using the power supply switch in the back, as the power button on the front wasn't working.

After fixing the heatsink temporarily (by running the computer on its side) I then ran into the problem of hanging at "verifying DMI pool data" on startup. I did some research and tried the following (after making sure there was no disc in the drive), to no effect:

* Reset CMOS
* Checked all plugs and connections
* Confirmed correct settings in BIOS (250GB drive is the boot - set as primary boot device and plugged into SATA0. 1TB drive plugged into SATA2)
* Reordered cables both on the motherboard and back of the hard drive (after removing the TB drive to make things easier).

When none of these remedied the problem I figured I had cooked the drive, and hooked it up to another computer to confirm. Same as on my own rig, the hard drive would not boot when it was set as the boot drive, and produced the same "verifying DMI pool data" error.

After this I took the hard drive to the campus help desk, to see if there was any way to salvage the data off of it. The gent at the desk successfully mounted the drive, and verified that all the information was still present on it. He recommended I buy an enclosure for it to at least use it as an external drive, which works great. Everything's on the hard drive.

This would be all well and good if I didn't have a ton of data on the TB drive I'd rather not wipe by converting it to a boot drive and reinstalling Win7 over the top of it, so I'd really like to get the 250GB drive working again if possible. It doesn't make any sense that it would hang at DMI, but still work fine as an external drive.

I'm totally stumped, here's to hoping that someone here can help me out with this puzzle.
- Stefan

Edit: forgot to mention, while using the 250GB as an external drive I had the opportunity to run Error Checker on it and defrag it, which I did. Both completed, and threw odd error messages. The drive appears to be totally functional, except for hanging on DMI pool data. It leads me to believe I plugged something in wrong, or have something set incorrectly in the BIOS, but I can't figure out what.

 

[Ubrales]

Here is some information: http://www.duxcw.com/faq/computer/dmi.html

Hope this helps!

 

[dndhatcher]

Do you have $55 to make this problem go away?

Buy a new, fast Samsung F3 500GB and use it as the boot drive. Dispose of that old, slow 250GB HDD in an environmentally responsible fashion. Im sure your campus has that set up.

 

[Gahagan1]

Thanks for the link.

1.) No hardware's been changed.

2.) No HDD's been installed. I encountered the DMI error before I started pulling out drives to figure out what was going on.

3.) Have not tried this. I will do so once I'm around my rig again.

4.) Already cleared the CMOS.

5.) Tried this already, to no avail.

6.) Don't have a floppy drive on the rig.

7.) Have not tried this either, will try as well when I get home.

8.) Have not tried this either, though removing the video card and two sticks of RAM is all the extras I have required to boot the board. Will save this for last.

Other ideas that I can try to get this board back up and running?

 

[dndhatcher]

You get the same error booting another PC with that same drive. That basically guarantees that the problem is physical or logical damage to the HDD boot sector.
Completely reformatting it to get a new boot sector format might work if the damage is logical in the boot sector. If the damage is physical, it wont be able to boot ever again.

 

[Gahagan1]

Thanks for the quick replies.

Question though - if the hard drive is indeed damaged, either physically or logically, would that prevent it from booting when in an enclosure? Or do enclosures work by some sort of black magic that lets me see my data, even when the drive is non-functional in a tower?

Didn't mean for that to sound sarcastic. I'm just perplexed that it works fine when in an enclosure, and refuses to boot when its used as a boot drive.

Would it be possible to re-install Windows on the drive while it's being used in an enclosure? Maybe some Windows-specific boot files were damaged, and that's what's causing the DMI hangup.

 

[Ubrales]

Your logic is correct! However, get a new HDD; they are inexpensive these days. Go with either Seagate or WD after reading the reviews for the particular model you are interested in.

Please keep in mind that external enclosures are more prone to physical damage. Considering this, it's better to install the OS on an internal drive dedicated to OS and other programs.

 

[dndhatcher]

It doesnt access the boot sectors in the enclosure, its just a data drive. A PC never touches the boot sectors except on the HDD its booting from. Its not that its in an enclosure, its that its not being used as a boot drive.

You could see if the windows boot disk recognizes it as a partition that it can install into. My guess is if the boot sector is damaged, it wont let you unless a low level reformat cleans up the damage.

 

[Piqua17]

It doesnt access the boot sectors in the enclosure, its just a data drive. A PC never touches the boot sectors except on the HDD its booting from. Its not that its in an enclosure, its that its not being used as a boot drive.

You could see if the windows boot disk recognizes it as a partition that it can install into. My guess is if the boot sector is damaged, it wont let you unless a low level reformat cleans up the damage.

Cut to the chase. use the repair consul and do a MBR nothing is wrong with the drive. also clear cmos and replace battery before you MBR

 

[fearlessraccoon]

I found this old thread when I was getting the same error message today on my daughter's computer. I figured out the issue right away - she had left in a USB thumb drive, and the BIOS was trying to boot off of that rather than the C: drive (don't know why - I didn't set it up that way...). I just removed the USB drive and it booted normally.

The folks who frequent this forum would probably know to check the BIOS settings, but I thought I'd leave this here for others who don't know about such things, who may find this helpful. Sure was a heck of a lot better problem than a bad HD or MB!

 

[markxs]

I found this old thread when I was getting the same error message today on my daughter's computer. I figured out the issue right away - she had left in a USB thumb drive, and the BIOS was trying to boot off of that rather than the C: drive (don't know why - I didn't set it up that way...). I just removed the USB drive and it booted normally.

The folks who frequent this forum would probably know to check the BIOS settings, but I thought I'd leave this here for others who don't know about such things, who may find this helpful. Sure was a heck of a lot better problem than a bad HD or MB!

Solved! A usb device that had been left plugged in when the computer was shut down was my problem too. The pc would not boot past the verifying dmi pool. Once I removed the USB device the pc booted up fine. Kudos to you for posting your solution here fearlessraccoon!

 

[abetterfuture]

This thread helped me as well. I pulled out a quirky USB Bluetooth donagle and problem solved.

 

[aditya00seven]

Here is the solution ..

http://tiptotrick.net/fix-windows-7-stuck-at-verifying-dmi-pool-data/

 

[aditya00seven]

Thanks for the quick replies.

Question though - if the hard drive is indeed damaged, either physically or logically, would that prevent it from booting when in an enclosure? Or do enclosures work by some sort of black magic that lets me see my data, even when the drive is non-functional in a tower?

Didn't mean for that to sound sarcastic. I'm just perplexed that it works fine when in an enclosure, and refuses to boot when its used as a boot drive.

Would it be possible to re-install Windows on the drive while it's being used in an enclosure? Maybe some Windows-specific boot files were damaged, and that's what's causing the DMI hangup.

I already posted .... Solution is this like:

http://tiptotrick.net/fix-windows-7-stuck-at-verifying-dmi-pool-data/


[SOLVED]