xp pro weird startups??

Hello all,

I have a weird startup problem, every 10 to 15 startups my computer fails to start and hangs before the windows screen normally comes up, if I go into the bios and change the first boot device to something diferent, ie cd-rom then reboot I get the update success and the computer boots, then 10 or so more restarts I get the same thing, I then change the bios to first boot to something else and it works again???

I don't think it is virus related I have TPF Pro instaled and Avg, the machine is a P4 3.4 intel Hyperthreading computer, LGA 775 processor, Intel® Grantsdale chipset and ATi X600 Pro 256MB PCI,plenty of ram etc.

The bios is about a year old, so thought I should start there, has anybody had any similar problems.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

The fact that changing boot order solves it makes me think that the delay caused by booting to bios, then changing settings and saveing and allowing it to boot solves it is what is solving your problem.
There are two things I would suspect immeadiately.One is that although it is only a year old, the motherboard cmos retention battery may be older and weak. Replace the battery, they are cheap. Do it quickly (do not leave the pc with no battery in the motherboard) so that you do not have to reconfigure your bios.
If that does not solve it, I would suspect a power problem. You could try making sure that the boot drive is connected to one of the shorter power connectors, preferably a non branched one and possibly try disconnecting power connectors to unnecessary items (like your optical drives ) for a while. If that solves it, a new power supply may be in order.

 

Thanks Guys, its not one for hijackthis which is a great program and I suspect it is hardware, I will test the power supply and change the cmos battery and see if that helps.

forgot to mention it is on xp pro sp2 all upto date.

Boot drive is a Serial ATA Hard Disk with 2MB Buffer, cpu fan speed 1770, battery 3.05, cpu temp 46, system temp 33.


Thanks for the speedy replies

regards

 

Agreed, dust on the fan can slow it down and some motherboards will not complete the boot until the fan reaches a safe speed.

So a good de dusting is worth a try along with verifying the fan speed is adequate .

The sata drive bit makes me wonder if that may be the cause too. Something about the configuration.

 

have a chasis/case fan which is running at 1800rpm, both are low noise fans
have changed the cmos battery and reordered the power leads, and got rid of a few unused bits of hardware, will see if it works, will probally upgrade the bios in the next few days as there is one available??

What about the ata config should I be looking at, the pc has been running fine for a year so its a developed problem???

The problem is still happening so the above has made no difference??


Can anyone explain any benifits to having the bios cached? It isn't at the moment?

 

Okay , since it ran fine for a year, I would say it is more than likely not a config problem,but rather a hardware failure or heat/dust issue.

 

today I am going to buy a psu tester, and some compressed air, give it a clean.

Its a fic motherboard, will keep you posted unless you have any other ideas,
perhaps reset defaults in the bios and see if that works?? As it is pre startup and after it loads the irq's

regards

 

Do you by chance have a jump drive, a usb hard drive, or a card reader pluged in?

I have seen some USB printers with card readers do this also.

 

no none of the above, psu passed all tests and the fans combined are now running at about 3000, cpu fan has gone up 500.

It is baffling me????

same thing, change the boot device, and I get "update success" after verifing DMI and then a few boots later locks up again???

 

when was u'r last clean install? that's always an option. even a repair install but ... i'd opt clean.

i would update the bios. and any MB based updates like chipset stuff since SATA is in play. heck ... i'd do all MB level updates avail no matter what

 

clean install less than a month ago(legit operating system aswell), updating the mb drivers is good advice and which they are all pretty much up to date as i use Driver Genius to keep the sytem up to date??

This is a pre boot problem which probally means I need to do a bare bones start up then keep adding bits until the problem happens again, as it it is random and happens every 10 to 15 times this will take some time??

does anyone know of any good mainboard testing software??

regards

 

i'd be curious if u've the ability to remove the sata from the equation for test. eg - will it boot ok w/ a standard ide drive solo?

since many bios' have numerous (and confusing) sata setups (w/ raid, w/o raid, w/ other ide controllers, w/o such) ... will switching the system to ide only stop the problem? if so, i'd start really examining the bios' options on sata. or any of the bios' options on boot setup/order too.

i'd also consider maybe backing up on the SATA driver if there have been updates and the one u'r running is current.

i'm not familiar w/ burn in software. maybe check the disk w/ it's diags and the MB maker's site for guidelines on system diags?

 

The bios is set to boot with multiple h/d types ata and ide?

I can put another operating system in on an ide cable? and try that, it is interesting that you think the ata are the problems(I have two)?? Is this common??

There hasn't been any updates for my sata drivers for some time, but will see if i can roll back drivers.

 

I flashed the bios which seems to have done the trick(but not for the faint hearted), thanKs all for your replies.