HD Problems

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 1:10 pm

ok well first off here are my computer Spec's.

Mobo: Gigabyte K8NF-9 retail
CPU: AMD Athlon-64 3500+ retail
RAM: Buffalo PC3200 512 (2x) 1GB Dual Channel retail
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce 6600 256mb pci express retail
Power Supply: AGI 400w oem
HD: Sony Playstation2 40GB 5400rpm

ok i know its not that great of a comp especially the HD but it ran well and fine on my computer up until a couple days ago's and it just bluescreens me wont let me re format windows on it at all ive went into my bios and messed with the boot order and still nothing aswell as cleared the cmos and still nothing...so i went to use my HD from my other computer WD 80GB 7200rpm HD and that one boots up slower as heck...and takes forever then it tells me video memory test failure...so i went to my local computer shop and explained to the one guy that was there at the time he said it was my ram but i dont think it has anything to do with my ram at all...but then again im not sure...i can explain more if it is needed...thank you all for your time and concern.

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Tue May 23, 2006 3:20 pm

download the ultimate boot cd, boot from it, run DFT, choose advanced scan on the drive..if the end screen is red, the drive is bad..if it's green the issue lies someplace else.

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 3:39 pm

konFused wrote:ok well first off here are my computer Spec's.

Mobo: Gigabyte K8NF-9 retail
CPU: AMD Athlon-64 3500+ retail
RAM: Buffalo PC3200 512 (2x) 1GB Dual Channel
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce 6600 256mb pci express
Power Supply: AGI 400w
HD: Sony Playstation2 40GB 5400rpm

ok i know its not that great of a comp especially the HD but it ran well and fine on my computer up until a couple days ago's and it just bluescreens me wont let me re format windows on it at all ive went into my bios and messed with the boot order and still nothing aswell as cleared the cmos and still nothing...so i went to use my HD from my other computer WD 80GB 7200rpm HD and that one boots up slower as heck...and takes forever then it tells me video memory test failure...so i went to my local computer shop and explained to the one guy that was there at the time he said it was my ram but i dont think it has anything to do with my ram at all...but then again im not sure...i can explain more if it is needed...thank you all for your time and concern.

This ocurred after you reset the BIOS? (The WD slow and mem error)

Make sure you cleared the old hdd info in the BIOS and redetect that WD.

Do you have a setting for agp aperature size in the BIOS, and if so, what's it set at- I've seen incorrect aperature size cause errors, but you do have plenty of RAM. Or if there's an agp steering setting in the BIOS, default may cause problem. You're using PCI Express x16 technology...

Also if there's options for initial display device... is it set agp or onboard (I don't see onboard video on that mobo on Gigbyte's site, but that doesn't mean there isn't a bogus setting in the BIOS by default)

What UDMA (ATA) mode are those hdd's?

Can you connect that Sony hdd to another box and check out the drive? Run some diagnostics on it, usually freely downloadable but I dunno w/ that Sony.

Is the BIOS reporting the Sony hdd at all?

Pull every card out. Reseat the video card. Pull the RAM and reseat each stick. Try it one stick at a time if you have to, and move each stick to each slot. If you have a PCI vid card try that instead for diagnosing if it's still dogging.

Sometimes a good cleaning and reseat everything does wonders.

I had an older Gigabyte mobo a few years ago, I loved it.

I also had one of their WLAN cards last year, I loved that too. Sold it a couple months ago.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 4:26 pm

ive already reseated everything and this was happening before i cleared the cmos aswell just thought clearing it might help which didnt...i also tried re detecting the WD HD aswell...nothing happened there either...as far as the ATA transfer rates are...

Western Digital:
(NOTE: Drives manufactured prior to December 1, 2005 have a 150 MB/s buffer to host transfer rate.)
Buffer To Host (Serial ATA) 300 MB/s (Max)
Buffer To Disk 748 Mbits/s (Max)
and this drive was Sept. 11, 2005..so im taking it serial ata150 my guess....

Sony PS2 Drive:
Ultra ATA/100

as far as cleaning ive done that a numerous amount of times..and what not wehn i re seated everything..idk why it is doing this..

but i was told to just send the HD to the WD Manufacturer....and wait 3-5wks for a new one..but i dont really have the patience to wait it out lol...umm...ive tried a back up 10gb HD aswell and that bluescreened on my computer..my dad had gotten it from a compaq i believe its a 10gb back up hd...from a computer from his work he said it did work in the computer it was previously in im thinking it might be my IDE cable im going to go check that out as i believe that can slow the boot time but my PS2 HD boots fast...its the HD that boots...slow..aswell as my PS2 HD when it bluescreened the first time gave me some insuffient memory crap or something..but the second time it bluescreened told me to run CHKDSK /F but i cant cuz it wont let me so idk how they expect me to run a CHKDSK so im guessing it might be my mobo

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 5:57 pm

well now i got the Western Digital HD to say

Windows could not restart because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<Windows Root>\system32\hal.dll
Please Re-Install a copy of the above file..

well ive tried using the diagnotics disc for the WD HD that it came with and it just skips right by boot from cd: and goes striaght into the error again...ive changed the boot order around aswell and hit a key when it came up to boot from cd..still nothing it just goes to the error so im guessing my damn cd rom went to hell..lol just what i need...: ( so i guess im going to have to wait on my tax return and hopefully it comes soon so i can go buy a new cd rom and whatever else i will need aswell...

...but htne again i dont think it is the cd rom because it still detects it in the bios and it also still opens and closes..yet it is an old one and probably cant read the cd for some wierd reason...its a lite-on 52x drive...it lighrs up though stating its reading the cd and it did play cd's and what not before this all happened to me so i know it cant be the cd rom its just weird that it doesnt want to boot from cd though like it should..who knows....ive tried to re install windows on it wont even let me boot off of that either still goes straight into that error...

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 6:39 pm

konFused wrote:well now i got the Western Digital HD to say

Windows could not restart because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<Windows Root>\system32\hal.dll
Please Re-Install a copy of the above file..

well ive tried using the diagnotics disc for the WD HD that it came with and it just skips right by boot from cd: and goes striaght into the error again...ive changed the boot order around aswell and hit a key when it came up to boot from cd..still nothing it just goes to the error so im guessing my damn cd rom went to hell..lol just what i need...: ( so i guess im going to have to wait on my tax return and hopefully it comes soon so i can go buy a new cd rom and whatever else i will need aswell... ...but htne again i dont think it is the cd rom because it still detects it in the bios and it also still opens and closes..yet it is an old one and probably cant read the cd for some wierd reason...its a lite-on 52x drive...it lighrs up though stating its reading the cd and it did play cd's and what not before this all happened to me so i know it cant be the cd rom its just weird that it doesnt want to boot from cd though like it should..who knows....ive tried to re install windows on it wont even let me boot off of that either still goes straight into that error...

I've seen that hal.dll prob posted on recently here in SG. I'll try to find you a link.

Download a WD hdd checking utilityfor your model (example: Power Max v. 4.22) and hook that hdd up to another box and test it.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 6:42 pm

ehh trhing is i only have my old man's lap top lol...so i dunno...but i have a friend 7thkevin who lives nearby..so ill see if i can dl this and what not.

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 6:44 pm

http://forums.speedguide.net/showthread.php?t=199730

follow the HAL links on this page: link

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 6:48 pm

^ehh alrighty...so i guess the HL is Hal not hl...anyways thank you soo very much for the help..now i just have to find a floppy drive laying around somewhere...but thanks much for the help i appreciate it a lot..

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 6:48 pm

konFused wrote:ehh trhing is i only have my old man's lap top lol...so i dunno...but i have a friend 7thkevin who lives nearby..so ill see if i can dl this and what not.

bro! Are you in IL too?

Are you north or south of 7thKevin?

You might have another friend living nearby... me

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 6:52 pm

konFused wrote:^ehh alrighty...so i guess the HL is Hal not hl...anyways thank you soo very much for the help..now i just have to find a floppy drive laying around somewhere...but thanks much for the help i appreciate it a lot..

link

HAL.DLL is Missing - Updated by MVP Alex Nichol

Option 1:

Boot from your CD and follow the directions to start Recovery Console. Then:

Attrib -H -R -S C:\Boot.ini
DEL C:\Boot.ini
BootCfg /Rebuild
Fixboot

Option 2:

Boot from your CD and follow the directions below to start Recovery Console.

Insert the Setup compact disc (CD) and restart the computer. If prompted, select any options required to boot from the CD.
When the text-based part of Setup begins, follow the prompts]

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:01 pm

lol i live like 2mins drive distance from kevin...right on mt prospect rd... by the sam's club

and for some reason it wont let me boot off of my damn computer it says boot from cd: then it just freezes there forever...and when it doesnt then it will skip that if i dont hit anything and go straight to the error and yes it read hal.dll lol i just mis read it.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:15 pm

well..ok i switched my drive from CS to Master then it runs slows as crap when it boots...and i am able to get the NVIDIA Boot Agent im taking its the WD HD CD that it came with..well it goes through there and gives me the Memort video test failure again...but when its on CS it wont let me boot from cd itll just freeze up and sit there and if i dont boot from cd itll just give me the HAL.dll error again..

so looks like im just going to have to find a floppy drive somewhere in this place and dl what i need to fix it..thank you all for the help i really appreciate it a lot...much respect

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:29 pm

konFused wrote:well..ok i switched my drive from CS to Master then it runs slows as crap when it boots...and i am able to get the NVIDIA Boot Agent im taking its the WD HD CD that it came with..well it goes through there and gives me the Memort video test failure again...but when its on CS it wont let me boot from cd itll just freeze up and sit there and if i dont boot from cd itll just give me the HAL.dll error again.. so looks like im just going to have to find a floppy drive somewhere in this place and dl what i need to fix it..thank you all for the help i really appreciate it a lot...much respect

hey bro, if that WD is on the primary alone- (strongly recommended) try it wioth no jumper setting- make the setting blank. I've even found that non-standard jumper setting sometimes is required.

btw, I have 2 testing boxes, old but good enough. P3 700 Mhz...and a K62 500 Mhz.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:37 pm

yea well i only have one HD and one CD rom so it shouldnt matter where that jumper is ill take it off though and test it thanks much.

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:52 pm

konFused wrote:yea well i only have one HD and one CD rom so it shouldnt matter where that jumper is ill take it off though and test it thanks much.

yeah but those WD's ... they can be fussy about the jumper setting- no kidding.

And they like to be alone on the channel.

I just posted something today on a problem I had a couple of years ago... a POST error. Not as consequential as yours.

http://forums.speedguide.net/showthread.php?p=1860702#post1860702

ghettoside wrote:I had a few glitches w/ the box. The box would fail to identify a CD Burner as the secondary master infrequently and hand at POST with a "non ATAPI device error", and sometimes it would happen to the primary hdd, a new 40 Gb WD ATA 100. But all too frequently. Whether O/C'd or not. The primary slave was a Maxtor ( ) 8 Gb ATA 33.
Eventually I found that after removing the Maxtor and installed a 30 Gb WD ATA 100... the POST problems vanished. LMAO. That problem dogged me for months I no longer mix UDMA modes on the same channel.

It would hang...and would not boot, had to pull the AC cord...wait a couple secs... then try it again. sometimes it was one try- sometimes 10!

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:53 pm

konFused wrote:lol i live like 2mins drive distance from kevin...right on mt prospect rd... by the sam's club

and for some reason it wont let me boot off of my damn computer it says boot from cd: then it just freezes there forever...and when it doesnt then it will skip that if i dont hit anything and go straight to the error and yes it read hal.dll lol i just mis read it.

If you can't hook up w/ 7thKev maybe I can help ya out if ya don't mind a slight cruise.

I have plenty of cd drives...

I'm west of Waukegan... near Fox Lake. Not really a bad cruise from you guys, say 1 hr more or less... depending on the highway.

feel free to pm me too anytime bro.

maybe we can get a SG Midwest Team or Club going

... I think Stonecat has one on the East Coast...

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 8:06 pm

hmm sounds kewl...yea Fox Lake my bestfriends uncle lives there about 40min drive...not bad at all..over by that auto museum..well around there..lol

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 8:17 pm

konFused wrote:hmm sounds kewl...yea Fox Lake my bestfriends uncle lives there about 40min drive...not bad at all..over by that auto museum..well around there..lol

Yups... the museum in Volo

I'm not far at all from there!

lemme know.

maybe I should post a gen discussions thread "calling all Northern IL SG members..." Would be cool to have local group.

my testing boxes aren't the newest, but fine for diagnostics, and ample hardware on hand- except for hdd's right now.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Tue May 23, 2006 8:18 pm

ahha..well check your pm

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Tue May 23, 2006 8:27 pm

konFused wrote:ahha..well check your pm

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:18 am

Well, did you run DFT on the drive so you could tell for sure if it was good or not (either of the original two)? If not, you should. Start by checking out the hardware instead of swapping parts and trying to install Windows 900 times. Second of all, if you can't even format the drive or get through the installation, it's a good sign that either the hard disk or the memory in your computer is defective. The guy you spoke to could be right. The UBCD I mentioned also has memtest on it, so you can easily check your memory (with reasonably high probability). If the WD is alone on the cable, take the jumper off to put it in "Single" mode. If it isn't, put the jumper on the appropriate pins for Cable Select (all the way to the right I think, don't have one in front of me so double check it). You have to narrow away the hardware junk, then move to the software. Thanks for the "I disapprove" comment too, I'll refrain from helping out from now on.

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Wed May 24, 2006 12:48 pm

Amro wrote:Well, did you run DFT on the drive so you could tell for sure if it was good or not (either of the original two)? If not, you should. Start by checking out the hardware instead of swapping parts and trying to install Windows 900 times. Second of all, if you can't even format the drive or get through the installation, it's a good sign that either the hard disk or the memory in your computer is defective. The guy you spoke to could be right. The UBCD I mentioned also has memtest on it, so you can easily check your memory (with reasonably high probability). If the WD is alone on the cable, take the jumper off to put it in "Single" mode. If it isn't, put the jumper on the appropriate pins for Cable Select (all the way to the right I think, don't have one in front of me so double check it). You have to narrow away the hardware junk, then move to the software. Thanks for the "I disapprove" comment too, I'll refrain from helping out from now on.

bro, I had the idea konFused was unable to boot up period....that it wasn't passing POST. If it can POST then yeah I'd run the DOS utilities in the UBCD that you linked to.

konFused, for sure bro that jumper setting is known issue. I'd have that WD by itself on it's channel, and make sure the jumper is off. Unless I had another of the same series and the same UDMA mode (info).

I've seen some hdd detect as incorrect size... or hang on boot up, just by changing that MS/CS/SL jumper setting. And cause POST problems. And sometimes errors when adding a slave requiring moving the jumper.

If that doesn't fix it, then I'd pull cards. And for sure I'd try one RAM stick at a time.... and so on

I agree w/ Amro on gotta find the hardware error first, not install xp 10 times.

Re formatting: make sure the mobo virus protection is off- if on it will pretty much prevent you from writing to the mbr of the hdd, and subsequently formatting, although most BIOS should pop up a dialog box asking what to do...."allow write?"

I have a file I got from Norm years ago that's a series of machine debug commands to wipe the mbr...110% effective

hdwipe... It runs silently, just enter it at the command line and viola... no more mbr.

Your anti virus won't like this file one bit either.

You may have to adjust your av to move the file.

I'll hook you up w/ that one, I have it on a boot CD. You can make your own mbr wiper too, I'd have to look for the MS KB links though on the commands.

I guarantee you run that one time, and xp setup will tell you the hdd is new!

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Wed May 24, 2006 9:35 pm

alrighty well im downloading this program on my laptop atm and then ill just burn it to this cd and hopefully itll boot up from it...usually it gives me the "Media Test Failure" when i try to boot a cd...for some reason it just goes into the Nvidia Boot Agent when it boots from any bootable cd ive put in my cd rom drive thus far...but ill try this and hopefully it can work ive taken out the jumper from the WD HD aswell as tried to move around the sticks of ram by trying each one itself in each slot nothing happened aswell as i even tried to run the ram at just 1GB non dual channel by disabling shadow in my bios and putting them in their seperate slots that make it non dual channel...hopefully this UBCD works i really appreciate the help amro and ghettoside...much respect to the both of u..

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Wed May 24, 2006 10:28 pm

ok so i downloaded the full version of the UBCD program then unzipped it then burned the folder with the ISO program inside it on the cd...and it just skips through the process of booting from the cd..and just goes straight to the error screen saying im missing the Hal.dll...i dont get any of this my computer ran fine at my friends i shut it down bring it back to my house goto boot it up and then i get all these problems...

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Wed May 24, 2006 10:31 pm

ok, in the bios, is your computer set to boot from the cdrom before the hard disk? if not, set it to so you can boot from the cd. what do you mean you burned the folder? do you mean you used some burning software to burn the ISO to the cd?

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Wed May 24, 2006 10:44 pm

yea....i downloaded the program onto my laptop here...and then unziped it..then burned it to a cd...and ive had my cd rom to boot before my hard disk set up in bios already

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:39 pm

ok cool. so when you "burned it to a cd," did you burn the iso as a file onto the cd or did you use burning software to burn the cd image onto the cd (in windows, do you see blahblah.iso on the cd or do you see a bunch of files and folders)? sorry to ask, trying to make sure the cd is bootable

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:40 pm

konFused wrote:alrighty well im downloading this program on my laptop atm and then ill just burn it to this cd and hopefully itll boot up from it...usually it gives me the "Media Test Failure" when i try to boot a cd...for some reason it just goes into the Nvidia Boot Agent when it boots from any bootable cd ive put in my cd rom drive thus far...but ill try this and hopefully it can work ive taken out the jumper from the WD HD aswell as tried to move around the sticks of ram by trying each one itself in each slot nothing happened aswell as i even tried to run the ram at just 1GB non dual channel by disabling shadow in my bios and putting them in their seperate slots that make it non dual channel...hopefully this UBCD works i really appreciate the help amro and ghettoside...much respect to the both of u..

see next post

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:45 pm

Amro beat me to it.

What app did ya burn that boot disk with?

If you unzipped or extracted the files... and then burned in native win...or another app even... disk is most likely not bootable.

Did you boot up w/ it or just run it from within win - at your bud's crib?

.iso needs to be burned with an image burning sw app. Nero is one choice that I would recommend ... I use UltraISO... but then I do a lot of iso making and burning. I have Nero too, and Clone CD, and more.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:46 pm

ok when i open the cd its the folder which is label'd ubcd34-full then inside that folder is the ISO file...i just dragged the folder in there..after i unzipped it onto desktop there is only that one ISO file in the folder...and i just opened the cd then dragged the ubcd34-full folder into the blank cd and wrote it on the cd that way...probably not the correct way not sure though

im on my laptop atm that is where im downloading and burning everything from...

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:51 pm

I had another thought/question.

Is that WD clean- no OS from the other box you took it out of?

trying to boot into an existing OS from a hdd pulled from a different box=bad idea. Easy BSOD.

Maybe I'm gettin lost here.

Also, if it ain't runnin' by next Monday... bro we'll have to hook up during the week, I'll come down to DesPlaines w/ some tools and hw if ya help me out w/ some of the train fare. Hopefully it'll be fixed before that

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:52 pm

konFused wrote:ok when i open the cd its the folder which is label'd ubcd34-full then inside that folder is the ISO file...i just dragged the folder in there..after i unzipped it onto desktop there is only that one ISO file in the folder...and i just opened the cd then dragged the ubcd34-full folder into the blank cd and wrote it on the cd that way...probably not the correct way not sure though

im on my laptop atm that is where im downloading and burning everything from...

I suspect that's it...

Can't unpack the iso and burn in native win. need to burn an iso

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Wed May 24, 2006 11:54 pm

^yea i wouldnt mind helpin you out with any train fair and what not...but im sure itll be fixed by then hopefully if not then i wouldnt mind you comin on down...ummm the HD use to run on this computer it just stoped working so i just put it to side thats when i got the ps2 HD and used that instead of the WD because i didnt want to deal with all the trouble...then the ps2 HD blue screened on me....for like no reason...worked perfect the day before i brought it home from a friends...but yea the WD HD was only used in this computer...no other one....aswell as the ps2 HD

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Thu May 25, 2006 12:03 am

konFused wrote:^yea i wouldnt mind helpin you out with any train fair and what not...but im sure itll be fixed by then hopefully if not then i wouldnt mind you comin on down...ummm the HD use to run on this computer it just stoped working so i just put it to side thats when i got the ps2 HD and used that instead of the WD because i didnt want to deal with all the trouble...then the ps2 HD blue screened on me....for like no reason...worked perfect the day before i brought it home from a friends...but yea the WD HD was only used in this computer...no other one....aswell as the ps2 HD

cool, thanks for the prompt answer.

I was just downloading that boot CD... I assume it's inside the zip archive? The first link gave me an .exe. Both versions still downloading.

I'm gonna burn that myself, I haven't got this one.

Now if you're available over this weekend bro... I will be in the City, and I got no prob stopping over if I'm already out that way, (since I'd have already paid my own train fare lol!) but I beleive your box will be at home and not at your Dad's.... correct?

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Thu May 25, 2006 12:06 am

I'll get you a download for that hdwipe file later, you'll prolly have to download it from your own box anyway since you may be needing to adjust av to move it. Or I'll hand ya some discs when we hook up.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Thu May 25, 2006 12:16 am

ehh..yea ill be here i live with my old man atm..ever since i moved back out here from cicero...but...idk i downloaded the ZIP copy not the EXE....

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Thu May 25, 2006 12:25 am

konFused wrote:ehh..yea ill be here i live with my old man atm..ever since i moved back out here from cicero...but...idk i downloaded the ZIP copy not the EXE....

ok, my download finished. the zip extracts an .iso.

You dragged the whole folder over to burn? if you burned the folder that has the iso inside... nopes will not be bootable. When I clicky on the iso it opens UltraISO... I have it associated w/ all iso, so I dunno what the win default is for iso...but if the iso was inside a folder and you dragged it inside a container folder- will not be bootable.

ghettoside · Post by **ghettoside** » Thu May 25, 2006 12:25 am

konFused wrote:ehh..yea ill be here i live with my old man atm..ever since i moved back out here from cicero...but...idk i downloaded the ZIP copy not the EXE....

that exe is still downloading lol.

konFused · Post by **konFused** » Thu May 25, 2006 12:32 am

lol ...well is ultraISO like Daemon Tools and what not....and yes i dragged the whole folder over to burn...