XP Prof. Doesn't Boot

Admin note: this turns out to be hardware rather than OS so moved from XP to hardware

I had an 80gig Western Digital hard drive and when it was about a year old I returned it under warranty because of the following problem.

I bought another WD 80 gig hard drive on sale and it acts the same way.

After I have set the system to hibernate it hangs up with no warning message. Nothing works, so I have to manually turn the PC off. When I try to boot it will only boot in Safe Mode. I can find no clue in Safe Mode as to the problem. When I copy the 20 gig WD hard drive to the 80 gig the latter will now work. But then when I use the 20gig backup drive it does the same thing.

On one occasion it would not boot even though it had not hung up on going to hibernation. I tried the Wetern Digital download program for problems and none shows up. I'rm totally baffled.

 

Perhaps you may want to consider joining the many thousands of experienced users who do not use Hibernate for that exact reason. There is no clear answer to the problem that seems to pick on certain systems more than others.

 

I unchecked hibernation and I still have the boot problem with no warning messages. I realize this doesn't give you much to go on. I have scanned it, etc. Any ideas at all?

 

I've got an old computer that used to act something like this. It didn't involve hibernation though (didn't have it). On mine, if I installed a prorgram (windows upsdates also) and it offered to reboot after the installation it would hang while booting before it got back into windows. If I selected to reboot later and then restarted normally it wouldn't hang. I finally updated the bios and that took care of the problem. Maybe updating your bios would help. Two hard drives that do the same thing make me wonder if this isn't hardware related.

 

As I advised, don't use Hibernate or Standby and you'll be safer from data loss and system corruption.

This is typical of what those features can do on some systems

When you are required to shut the system down under those conditions, the Registry will flag the drive as "dirty." When that happens, it can cause the Safe Mode boot or else an automatic checkdsk /f offer.

There won't be any since it a flaw in the system features mentioned.

I don't know what that means since you havent told me about this drive yet.

Again, I need more than that. What is this 20 gig drive? It doesn't sound like any part of the original problem. Are you restoring an image from it or merely certain files. What format are they in.

If you have disabled Hibernate and Standby, can you finally get the system to boot normally? If so, what causes the problem to reoccur, if it does? Give me all the gory details and maybe something will become apparent for a fix.

ps. Sometimes a drive gets flagged as dirty and the registry entry doesn't get dropped after the chkdsk is run. That problem has been discussed in the forum before and may be revelant to your woes. Ya think?

Please see this thread for further on "dirty" drives.

 

The 20 gig drive is a copy of the 80gig and I use the 20 gig as a full backup. It is also a Western Digital HDD. From what has been written here and further experience I have concluded that setting either Hibernate or Standby is not workable. If I use either mode the PC will within a couple days or so hang up before entering the mode and then is no longer accessible except in Safe Mode.

I must then go to the 20 gig HDD and copy it to the 80 gig and I'm back in business unless I use the Hibernate or Standby modes. What puzzles me is that for months I have employed the Hibernate mode with no problem.

If I use the normal Shutdown mode I don't have a problem of boot up the next time. Thanks for writing.

 

Please post your MOBO and Processor type/speed since this is thought to be specific to those and will help other to understand and accept the decision you have made.

 

I don't know why it worked before and it doesn't now (maybe SP2???) but I would agree with surferdude. Don't use it. You say it causes a problem with either standby or hibernate. I've never had a problem with standby (I've never tried hibernate) when I've tried it but I don't use it anyway. I set the monitor to turn off after so many minutes and leave it at that. I think the power savings you get from standby or hibernate (unless it's a laptop) aren't worth the problems they can cause. I will say though, I've never seen any problem from having the monitor shut off after a certain period of time. I can't say for sure but my guess is that turning off the monitor is the lion's share of the power savings. Maybe I'm wrong but that's always been my understanding. If anybody else cares to argue this point, go ahead. I'm always open to differing opinions.

 

MOBO is ASUSTeK A7N266VM . Processor is 1.80gigs AMD Athlon XP.
I have not yet installed SP2.

 

Addendum-
Yesterday I was working with the 80 gig and decided to close down which I did in the approved way. Later when I went to boot up I could only Safe Boot. so I went to my 20 gig backup. That would not boot up at all!

I did a Safe Boot to the 80 gig and while in Safe Boot copied that drive to the 20 gig. When I went to the 20 gig no problem then in booting.

I called a technician who has done work for me; he is baffled.

I have, as mentioned , disabled both Hibernate and Standby. I'm no geek but it doesn't take one to realize there must be a serious problem in the system somewhere. I left the PC running all nite and hesitate to close it down until somone can give me a clue or the technician finds time to see what's going on.

 

That is strange. I was thinking maybe drivers were getting hosed but that wouldn't do it. If that were the case, copying the drive to another one should yield the same safemode only thing as it does on the first drive. My own thoughts are a hardware problem of some sort but other than flashing the bios I'm at a loss what to suggest next. If you haven't tried that yet, you might give it a try. Maybe surferdude has some idea or maybe Rockster or one of the other hardware people will see this and have some idea.

 

I too would lean toward it being a hardware issue. XP is much too robust to give a problem like this. Especially with no error message rendered.

Substitute HD and RAM for starters. Then BIOS and MOBO come last. If you have no substitute parts, you'll have to throw down some coins for a bench tech.

 

You may all wish to comment.

There may be something changing the boot records (MBR). The "copying" resets the MBR, then the virus, trojan, malware(?) or corrupt antivirus(?) changes it back.

Matt

 

Well, it's an interesting thought mattman. I'm not really sure though. If Pete's using a disk imaging program to do the copy, wouldn't the MBR get copied too? If so, that would rule that idea out I would think. I'll wait to see what the others say about this. Even if it turns out to not be the problem, I nominate you for a gold star award for the idea anyway.

You've got me wondering now though. Guess I'll have start re-thinking about this.

 

You may want to investigate your ACPI settings in your BIOS setup under power management. Could be you're trying to use a standard that doesn't permit a return to SVGA after hibernation or standby. Have seen this on a few ASUS boards and it will produce symptoms similar to those you describe.

 

I had the PC back to the technician yesterday. He ran the drive thru a different antivirus. Nothing significant showed up. He confesses to being baffled but did suggest that I not connect my printer and scanner for a couple days. He wonders whether there are some driver issues. Both devices are USB connected when in use.