Help - boot up problem - followup
in [Home Built PC]
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From: John on 26 May 2010 17:36 John wrote: > Problem: about two days ago, during boot up my pc started giving me > the error message "no 80 conductor cable installed" followed by "disk > boot failure insert system disk and press enter". >-edited-< > > My pc: Biostar P4M80 mobo w/ P2.4 Ghz P4 cpu and 2Gb RAM > WD 40Gb HD (system/boot disk) > Seagate 500Gb SATA HD (data disk) > floppy > DVD > CD/R > I've had this set up trouble free for three or four years > Replaced cable with an UDMA cable. No warning message about the "no 80 conductor" but am still getting the "disk boot failure" message after system starts "building DMI Pool". Other stuff I've read suggests one or more problems could cause this - BIOS, mismatch between info in BIOS vs what system says, hd John
From: Paul on 27 May 2010 01:23 John wrote: > John wrote: > >> Problem: about two days ago, during boot up my pc started giving me >> the error message "no 80 conductor cable installed" followed by "disk >> boot failure insert system disk and press enter". >> -edited-< >> >> My pc: Biostar P4M80 mobo w/ P2.4 Ghz P4 cpu and 2Gb RAM >> WD 40Gb HD (system/boot disk) >> Seagate 500Gb SATA HD (data disk) >> floppy >> DVD >> CD/R >> I've had this set up trouble free for three or four years >> > Replaced cable with an UDMA cable. No warning message about the "no 80 > conductor" but am still getting the "disk boot failure" message after > system starts "building DMI Pool". Other stuff I've read suggests one > or more problems could cause this - BIOS, mismatch between info in BIOS > vs what system says, hd > > John Have you checked the drive on another computer ? You can check the partition table in the MBR with PTEDIT32. The first picture is a screen shot, of the tool being used to display the four potential primary partitions. The second partition in the example, has the 0x80 boot flag, so that is the partition that boots. Much the same info can be had in Disk Management, if it'll look at the drive. http://www.vistax64.com/attachments/vista-installation-setup/7308d1224108918-hidden-partiton-recovery-dell-xps-420-dell-tbl.gif ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tools/pq/utilities/PTEDIT32.zip You can grab the MBR with a tool like "dd". Then read the data with a hex editor. There isn't a lot to see there, except if the 446 bytes of code happen to have been wiped out. In the command line example here, I'm copying a single 512 byte sector from the very beginning of Harddisk0. And the data is being copied into the file "my_mbr.dd" in the current working directory. Using a hex editor, I can look at the 512 bytes contained in the my_mbr.dd file. http://www.chrysocome.net/dd dd if=\\?\Device\Harddisk0\Partition0 of=my_mbr.dd bs=512 count=1 There is a second bit of boot code, in the boot sector of the C: partition. That can be viewed with TestDisk. You can't really repair the boot sector in TestDisk, but you can at least look at it. TestDisk is a tool, that can reconstruct an MBR, based on scanning the disk for partitions. Its ability to "repair" the partition boot sectors, is limited to copying the duplicate boot sectors at the end of the partition, and they're not always loaded with anything. http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Step_By_Step So it is possible, with free tools, to have a quick look around. You can also run a read-only disk test utility. You'd check the WD site and see if they have a test utility. For example, I can see various versions of "Data Lifeguard" here. http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=502&sid=2&lang=en In terms of repair, the "fixmbr" and "fixboot" commands, in the Windows Recovery Console, can be used to fix simple problems. "Fixmbr" puts back the 446 bytes of code, without changing the 64 bytes occupied by the primary partition table entries. "Fixboot" reloads the partition boot sector on the C: partition. (I used that, when I copied my WinXP C: partition with Robocopy, which doesn't copy the partition boot sector, and then I used "Fixboot" to put the necessary stuff to make a real C: partition of it.) Recovery Console is an option of a WinXP installer CD, such as a retail or OEM one you might buy at your local computer store. You can use CHKDSK, to check the partition while the drive is connected to another computer, but doing so isn't guaranteed to fix things for you. I haven't been blown away by the merits of CHKDSK. So perhaps a little investigation, using another computer, will tell you whether your drive is fried or not. Paul
From: Jan Alter on 27 May 2010 07:24 "Paul" <nospam(a)needed.com> wrote in message news:htkvk5$pmc$1(a)news.eternal-september.org... > John wrote: >> John wrote: >> >>> Problem: about two days ago, during boot up my pc started giving me >>> the error message "no 80 conductor cable installed" followed by "disk >>> boot failure insert system disk and press enter". >>> -edited-< >>> >>> My pc: Biostar P4M80 mobo w/ P2.4 Ghz P4 cpu and 2Gb RAM >>> WD 40Gb HD (system/boot disk) >>> Seagate 500Gb SATA HD (data disk) >>> floppy >>> DVD >>> CD/R >>> I've had this set up trouble free for three or four years >>> >> Replaced cable with an UDMA cable. No warning message about the "no 80 >> conductor" but am still getting the "disk boot failure" message after >> system starts "building DMI Pool". Other stuff I've read suggests one >> or more problems could cause this - BIOS, mismatch between info in BIOS >> vs what system says, hd >> >> John > > Have you checked the drive on another computer ? > > You can check the partition table in the MBR with PTEDIT32. The first > picture is a screen shot, of the tool being used to display the four > potential > primary partitions. The second partition in the example, has the 0x80 > boot flag, so that is the partition that boots. Much the same info > can be had in Disk Management, if it'll look at the drive. > > http://www.vistax64.com/attachments/vista-installation-setup/7308d1224108918-hidden-partiton-recovery-dell-xps-420-dell-tbl.gif > > ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tools/pq/utilities/PTEDIT32.zip > > You can grab the MBR with a tool like "dd". Then read the data with > a hex editor. There isn't a lot to see there, except if the 446 bytes > of code happen to have been wiped out. In the command line example > here, I'm copying a single 512 byte sector from the very beginning of > Harddisk0. And the data is being copied into the file "my_mbr.dd" in > the current working directory. Using a hex editor, I can look at the > 512 bytes contained in the my_mbr.dd file. > > http://www.chrysocome.net/dd > > dd if=\\?\Device\Harddisk0\Partition0 of=my_mbr.dd bs=512 count=1 > > There is a second bit of boot code, in the boot sector of the > C: partition. That can be viewed with TestDisk. You can't really > repair the boot sector in TestDisk, but you can at least look > at it. TestDisk is a tool, that can reconstruct an MBR, based > on scanning the disk for partitions. Its ability to "repair" > the partition boot sectors, is limited to copying the > duplicate boot sectors at the end of the partition, and they're > not always loaded with anything. > > http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Step_By_Step > > So it is possible, with free tools, to have a quick look around. > > You can also run a read-only disk test utility. You'd check the > WD site and see if they have a test utility. > > For example, I can see various versions of "Data Lifeguard" here. > > http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=502&sid=2&lang=en > > In terms of repair, the "fixmbr" and "fixboot" commands, in the > Windows Recovery Console, can be used to fix simple problems. > "Fixmbr" puts back the 446 bytes of code, without changing > the 64 bytes occupied by the primary partition table entries. > "Fixboot" reloads the partition boot sector on the C: partition. > (I used that, when I copied my WinXP C: partition with Robocopy, > which doesn't copy the partition boot sector, and then I used > "Fixboot" to put the necessary stuff to make a real C: partition > of it.) Recovery Console is an option of a WinXP installer > CD, such as a retail or OEM one you might buy at your local > computer store. > > You can use CHKDSK, to check the partition while the drive > is connected to another computer, but doing so isn't guaranteed > to fix things for you. I haven't been blown away by the > merits of CHKDSK. > > So perhaps a little investigation, using another computer, > will tell you whether your drive is fried or not. > > Paul From WD download their Data lifeguard diagnostic tools. You can even download the program as an ISO and make a boot startup disk so as to check the drive on your original system. Check your original 40 Gb drive with the program to see if it passes. Of course change the boot order so as to start from a CD rather than a hdd. .. If it passes then I would disconnect all peripherals (including CD, DVD, floppy, SATA) and try booting again from the original HDD. If the problem persists I would try resetting the bios (usually a jumper on the mb or pulling the battery for 20 min). Things that hit me to do if the disk passes are to take the drive to another computer, (back up the partition and its data to an external hdd first) and see if it will allow XP to be installed on it. If it does then I would suspect bad RAM. Of course if you had another spare hdd you could try installing XP on your original system with that and see if you get errors during the install for verification that it's RAM. -- Jan Alter bearpuf(a)verizon.net
From: John on 28 May 2010 15:18 Thanks for the suggestions. I have used them where I could but am hampered because I only have the one floppy (installed on the pc giving me problems) and my other pc is a laptop with CD burner. So to recap what I have done: 1. disconnected all devices, reset CMOS (again) 2. inspected mobo for any sign of bad capacitor (puffed out dome) but didn't see anything there 3. d/l Western Digital LifeGuard Diagnostics and made bootable CD 4. booting pc with only video card, k/b and mouse behaved normally FWIW 5. each of the hard drives passed both the quick and extended disk tests 6. connected only the boot HD. pc boot process reaches screen that says "building DMI pool" and then I get disk failure message - insert system disk 7. connected the cable to the optical devices - Windows Setup disk is seen at boot up and Windows setup procedure starts. I stop there because no hds connected yet 8. set CMOS to boot from CD, added connector cable for the hd, and started Windows Setup. At setup screen, chose option to install new, then selected hd (only the one), delete existing partition and install new one and format. Windows Setup proceeds and eventually displays the screen saying to remove any floppies and that it will reboot the pc in 15 seconds. However, it does not reboot and AFAICT it's as if all the prior setup work is lost and am back at square one. I still haven't figured out if my problem(s) is a CMOS/BIOS problem, problem somewhere else on the mobo or conflict between BIOS and Windows config (because it hangs at point "building DMI pool"). I also would like to figure out why the pc does not perform the "soft" reboot at the end of the Windows Setup Install process. I read somewhere that that was probably a result of BIOS settings, but the stuff I've read is usually as clear as mud describing the settings. These were the two clearest articles: http://www.dewassoc.com/support/bios/awardfaq.htm http://www.buildeasypc.com/sw/bios_setup.htm John
From: Jan Alter on 28 May 2010 18:15
"John" <my_name_is_my_own(a)swbell.invalid.net> wrote in message news:htp4tl$hc4$1(a)news.eternal-september.org... > Thanks for the suggestions. I have used them where I could but am > hampered because I only have the one floppy (installed on the pc giving > me problems) and my other pc is a laptop with CD burner. > > So to recap what I have done: > 1. disconnected all devices, reset CMOS (again) > 2. inspected mobo for any sign of bad capacitor (puffed out dome) but > didn't see anything there > 3. d/l Western Digital LifeGuard Diagnostics and made bootable CD > 4. booting pc with only video card, k/b and mouse behaved normally FWIW > 5. each of the hard drives passed both the quick and extended disk tests > 6. connected only the boot HD. pc boot process reaches screen that says > "building DMI pool" and then I get disk failure message - insert system > disk > 7. connected the cable to the optical devices - Windows Setup disk is > seen at boot up and Windows setup procedure starts. I stop there > because no hds connected yet > 8. set CMOS to boot from CD, added connector cable for the hd, and > started Windows Setup. At setup screen, chose option to install new, > then selected hd (only the one), delete existing partition and install > new one and format. Windows Setup proceeds and eventually displays the > screen saying to remove any floppies and that it will reboot the pc in > 15 seconds. However, it does not reboot and AFAICT it's as if all the > prior setup work is lost and am back at square one. > > I still haven't figured out if my problem(s) is a CMOS/BIOS problem, > problem somewhere else on the mobo or conflict between BIOS and Windows > config (because it hangs at point "building DMI pool"). > > I also would like to figure out why the pc does not perform the "soft" > reboot at the end of the Windows Setup Install process. I read > somewhere that that was probably a result of BIOS settings, but the > stuff I've read is usually as clear as mud describing the settings. > These were the two clearest articles: > > http://www.dewassoc.com/support/bios/awardfaq.htm > > http://www.buildeasypc.com/sw/bios_setup.htm > > John I admire your diligence and tenacity in continuing to carry through suggestions. As Paul suggests possibly changing the bios chip, since you continue to get a lack of completion of the DMI information. I might consider that, but would be very thoughtful to necessary cool and steady hand coordination to actually changing a bios chip while the computer is on. He has additional recommendations to changing the chip and they may be viable. However, I'm still unsure if that's the problem. Though mentioned that it probably wouldn't work I would go to the degree of just checking the mb maker's website to see if there is a newer bios available than the one you have programmed on the CMOS chip. It might be worth flashing the bios, thinking that the current bios is partially corrupt. You did mention that you were having trouble with your floppy drive. I would not even consider flashing without having a reliable one. If another is available exchange them, since a bad flash would render the cmos chip to be totally useless. It would seem though that at this point you could rule out the hdd from being part of the problem. I'm not sure how much RAM you have onboard, but I believe one needs 125 mb to install XP. If you have two chips and you still have 125 mb left after removing one of the chips then try the installation again. I know that it's a long shot but bad RAM can cause quite a bit of mysterious occurances to happen. If the same incomplete install happens substitute the other chip and try the install again. If none works and you've gone through the flashing of the bios successfully then I would go the route of replacing the mb (that would be for myself talking now) rather than replacing the bios chip on an older machine. -- Jan Alter bearpuf(a)verizon.net |