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ABIT AT8-32X Boot Problem

Starbuck1975

Starbuck1975

Lifer
The AN8-32X MOBO on my previous rig died, and Abit RMA sent me a refurbished AT8-32X as its replacement.

I just finished building my system, and I am having some odd errors during the BIOS post sequence.

Initially, I only connected the following components:
Athlon X2 3800+
2x1GB OCZ DDR400 RAM
Sony DVD-ROM set to Master on IDE channel 1
Plextor DVD-RW set to Slave on IDE channel 1
eVGA 8800Gt
Razer Tarantula keyboard.

My current SATA hard drive has my previous install of WIN XP Professional, so initially, I chose not to hook it up to my machine on the first go.

I booted my computer for the first time, and sure enough, the ABIT start screen came up with the option to hit DEL to enter setup or TAB for the post screen.

I hit DEL.

The following message appeared "Entering Setup...." but my computer did not go into the BIOS immediately. The "Entering Setup..." message just sat there staring at me.

I waited a few moments, hit Reset, and tried again...I hit DEL when prompted, and this time I was able to enter the BIOS immediately.

I checked all my bios settings, ensured my SATA devices were set to IDE mode, checked that my BIOS was picking up my IDE drives, and I chose to disable the ABIT start screen and the onboard audio.

Saved my BIOS settings, and exited the BIOS. The BIOS went through the post, attempted to boot, couldn't find a device to boot from as expected, and gave an error message.

I hit Reset thinking everything was fine at this point.

System reboots. Instead of the Abit Start screen, my system went right into the POST screen as expected given the bios setting changes I previously made.

It detected my processor, RAM and two IDE devices no problem.
It is also showing Phoenix Award bios V6.00 PG at the top of the screen.

I hit DEL to enter setup, and the "Entering Setup...." message came up again, but instead of going immediately into the bios, it lagged as it did on the first boot attempt...instead of hitting Reset, I decided to wait this time...after about 10 mins, my system finally entered the BIOS.

I thought maybe my machine didnt like the fact that there was no hard drive installed...so I connected my SATA hard drive from my previous system to SATA port 1 on the MOBO (this is the hard drive with WIN XP Professional already installed from my previous system) I figured worst case scenario, I would get into the OS, and it would throw a fit over the MOBO change.

Rebooted my system, post screen came up, and this time it recognized that my hard drive was installed, shown as the IDE Channel 3 Master, as expected.

I hit DEL to enter setup, and same problem...waited, and it took a good 10 minutes to get back into the BIOS.

Checked my boot order, and ensured that my hard drive had boot priority...saved my BIOS again, and rebooted.

Post screen comes up, everything detected, but the post screen stops after detecting all of my IDE devices...it makes no attempt to go through the boot device sequence. It recognized that I have a HD installed, my BIOS is set to boot from the HD first, but it never initiates the boot sequence...it just hands on the post screen.

I checked my MOBO, and it is showing a post code of 75, "Detect & Install all IDE devices".

Long story short, what could be causing the boot sequence to lag like this? My system is detecting everything just fine, but when I hit DEL to enter setup, it takes at least 10 minutes to enter the BIOS? Given the post code of 75, it appears that my system is hanging on the IDE detection sequence. Any thoughts as to why it is taking so long to enter the BIOS, and not attempting to boot from any of my IDE devices?

On the Abit forums, someone mentioned that their Saitek gaming keyboard caused a similar lag, so that could quite simply be the cause of my problems. When building a new system, will a vanilla USB keyboard prevent such conflicts, or will I have to dig up a legacy PS2 keyboard to be safe?
 
First, make sure that all the data/power connectors are fit tight. Loose cables will surely cause delay as such.
Second, I would appoach the trouble-shooting with process of elimination. You might need a BIOS flash, or firmware update for optical drives, etc. If you can, try booting with the operating system partition only (disconnect the others). And add other disks/drives one by one. If the board has a secondary disk controller, disable it in the BIOS.
 
I've seen this with a backwards floppy cable. You won't hurt it reversing it on the drive. Don't ask me why but it seems some boards hit parts in a random order on post (note the word SEEMS...). Depending on what gets hit first and how quick your bios will let you in you may wait for this timeout on the floppy.

I've also seen this with later boards (recently as last month with a Gigabyte DS3L) where the DVD burner (single drive here, HD was sata dvd EIDE alone) was not ATA66 (80pin). I was using an old cable from their upgrade pc because I just switched out the board/cpu/mem/vid. I switched to the gigabyte ata66 cable and boom went right through. I didn't have time to see if it was just switching to ata66 caused it. Something special in Gigabytes cable? Problem with that board recognizing that drive without ata66? It worked fine the day before on old setup. Nothing in this PC made sense regarding why the problem went away based on everything I know about cables/dvd's/pc's etc. I'm still baffled. It makes absolutely NO technical sense. None to anyone I bounce it off of. Never heard of a board completely flipping over a known good cable. I even tried it in another system. pfft.

Another example with the same board much earlier...LOL (I've built a lot of them base on this series...I own a DS3R myself, whole family has this series too). In my haste to build this system of old parts/new (another upgrader) I inadvertently got a molex 4 pin (white plug, you know) on a motherboard stud from the old board. Old board was longer than new (3 rows of screws vs. new board with only 2 rows). I just was too lazy to remove the row that would normally have the board bumping up near the butts of the DVD drives. All kinds of weird stuff happened and hanging just like you're seeing. Long bouts before bios entry. I could see it was timing out like you see. But why, on what? Went through the usual swap floppy (some of the old floppies in peoples machines don't mark pin1...bah, I know they won't fry and I'm in a rush...LOL) and get the perm light on it (ok that's not it). Flip cable back. Hmm, disconnect Eides. A change but still basically the same just slightly different hang time and order it seemed. Finally after a few more things I look around and see the molex up against the backplane. Still not quite able to see that it was on a stud (there was a lot of crap in this PC, cables everywhere and a mess blocking my view. I pulled and it was stuck. I realized it was on a stud then and pulled a bit harder (powered off during each of these episodes mind you). Plugged her back in and booted. It proceeded to boot the windows CD...

Broke out in laughter over the fact nothing fried and on top of it felt seriously stupid about wasting a good 1/2 hour or more just because I was in such a hurry to finish it. Mind you only one of the 4 leads was hooked on this stud (didn't bother to see which) but it was a hot one (left or right depending on your view). A humbling experience for someone with over 1000 builds and A+ certified...LOL. I can blame it on not being able to see much in all that crap but still I felt silly and my dad got a good laugh at my expense. He ribbed me for days. "hey check those plugs bozo"..."Hey, did you check those plugs?"...Endlessly. "What...Got a problem? Did you check those studs?"...Can't a guy get a break? So all this week I've been ENDLESSLY ribbing him about me giving him my e2160 hand-me-down (it runs at 3ghz easy so it's not that bad)...HAHAHA. I got my E3110 coming and he missed his chance by hours. He reacted to slow to me telling him where to get them. "Hey did you order that part you wanted yet? It might run out" hehe. Now he's waiting for the next batch or something in quad. "I wonder how cool my new chip will be" "I wonder how fast it will go"...LOL. Endlessly. With the kicker yesterday once I had a tracking# "I wonder how long it will take YOU to get one"...:evil:

Long story short 😀 check the floppy, change ide cable to ata66 if not already or just change it period, and check for shorts. Pull the cable off of each molex and inspect them. If one looks way to big pinch that lead a bit to close it up for a tighter connection when you plug it back in. The other poster has a good point about plugs. I'd guess an on/off short of sorts on a plug (loose fitting molex on a drive, or y cable etc) would act similar to my stud episode. If said plug comes off REALLY easy, pinch the big leads. Yeah you might end up with them really tight, but that's not a problem really. Just a bit tougher to pull it off later if needed.

Oh, take any discs out of the dvd's (makes no sense I know...should be able to boot a windows disc obviously). Might try swiching Eide from master to secondary. Not talking master slave here, but rather Eide 2 instead of this chain being on eide 1 if that makes sense... Also If you're in Sata1, plug your drive into sata 4 on the board. Not sure about that board you have, if there are 6 or 8 sata's on it try 1 and 4 of the 2nd set also. Is there any different response from the PC through all of this?
 
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