An exasperated cry for help

[Katla]

Okay, *sigh*, I have a SY-K7VTA-B running a 950 AMD, and 512 RAM. While piddling around in PSP5 one day, I get
a the dreded blues screen telling me "cannot write to
C:", uh-oh. I press "any key", blue screen goes away,
pointer moves, so I continue to play. I get the blue
screen once again "Okay this ain't good"...press "any key"
get back to Windows(98) and shut down.

Next morning go to boot up and it runs Scandisk, then
Surface scan and find "bad cluster" after "bad cluster".
After 3 days of "fixing", I shut down and call Western
Digital. "Send it in, we will send you a new one"...
YIPPIE!! Box HD and get it ready for shipping.

I grabbed my old 2G HD (still had Windows 95 on it and
a bunch of files) and stick that in there. Hey I gotta
have something!). But when I went to boot that it said
something to the effect that my memory wrong and reconfig.

One person told me "it could be the ribbon cable, it could
be the IDE controller". Anyone have a suggestion?

Right now I am on a loaner comp, a Compaq Presario with a
266...HELP!!

 

[spoondigity]

Well the hard drive sounds like a totally different problem than what you are currently dealing with to me. The hard drive actually has a physical problem on the platter where clusters are becoming unusable. This new problem sounds like your actual ram maybe. Have you tried just going into your bios and saving settings? I am sure the problem is beyond this step but it is worth a try. Otherwise, if you have multiple memory sticks and not all are needed to run the machine, you could try a stick of memory at a time to find out if one in particular has a problem. Let us know how it goes.

 

[toss5000]

I am not exactly sure of their policy on this, but a friend of mine sent his hardrive back to WD and the one they sent him back was refurbished and it crapped out after about 6 months. So be sure (if possible) to get a hardrive thats not refurbished.

Kill a man and you're a murderer;
Kill many and you're a conquerer;
Kill 'em all and you're a god.

 

[Katla]

RAM was suggested to me and I switched the 512 for the
original stick that came with the set up. It still
wouldn't run the 2G HD. This Friday I am going to
Radio Shack and getting a new ribbon cable. Hey it
is cheaper then going for a whole new MB, IF it is
the IDE controller like someone suggested. BUT if it
is the MB I am eyeing a SY-KT400. ;D

Kat

A beautiful and sparkling, but superficial woman
rules a wide circle; a woman of real culture a
small one... Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 

[Katla]

How can I tell if it is a refurbished HD?

A beautiful and sparkling, but superficial woman
rules a wide circle; a woman of real culture a
small one... Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 

[tilepusher]

Hey K,

First off, was this 2 gb HDD used in this system orginally? if not you have to FDISK & Reformat it & reinstall windows & all of your hardware drivers.
Secondly, how old & how many watts is your PSU(power supply unit)? If it is more than 2 years old or less than 300 watts, consider getting a new Antec or Enermax PSU of at least 300 watts or more. Your HDD needs "Clean" power & if your PSU goes bad, you will have this Bad cluster problem, even after you get this new HDD.

Reseat your Ram, check/replace your IDE cables & post the exact wording of your error message. Good Luck

Peace Out.............tile

god knows your entire system setup & he would answer your questions if he could just stop laughing