Asrock Dual SATA2 freezes/hangs when loading Windows

[imported_Imp]

Yup, I gave up too except all my ports SATAI and SATAII were busted. I didn't want to RMA since I'd be out of a computer for over a month, have to remount and had to take the CPU out (this freaked me out the most since I have no idea how to get the heatsink off safely; if I have to take it out in two years, can break it and not feel too bad). Anyways, nice to know there's some kind of sad and lame and happy ending to this...

 

[qsrk]

Congrats Athlon, and count me in! I replaced my motherboard today with a rev. 1.05, and all is good after a whopping 10 minutes on SATAII ! We'll see in a week...

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

bad news :-(
for 2 days all ok...then other problems :
now my XP loads from sata2 controller with sata2 drivers, but I still have cold boot problems! XP freeze (when there is the blue bar moving) and then i must power it off, restart it and then I get a strange coloured screen and a VPU recover error. I click on restart and it restarts correctly and it's fast and stable for all the session. I don't know what to think now....maybe I have a bad videocard? But why my 9500 can run Doom3 or other videogames perfectly?

 

[qsrk]

I doubt that your cold boot problems are motherboard related. I think that most people, myself included, only had cold boot problems on SATAI ports. And with that, the motherboard would not even see the HDD on the cold boot - not even start loading Windows.

BTW, I may avoided the cold boot problem on my last motherboard by selecting "Not installed" for the IDE slave drives. The problem went away somehow.

 

[imported_Imp]

From all the things I've seen, cold boot problems seem to occur on both SATAI and SATAII ports. This IS by design and happens to just about everyone so there's nothing to really do about it. The errors and 50 times in a row not detecting the HDD weren't normal. My IDE HDD has never had a problem being detected. Just be happy it boots at all?

I have no idea what's up with your VC. Could you clarify what you mean by restart and then CPU error? Is this a BSOD or in "DOS"? I'm guessing your card worked fine before the new mobo, so doubt it's that. Good luck.

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

I agree with Imp. The problem is that first time XP loads (after it freeze), first i get a strange coloured screen and then a message from Ati drivers (VPU Recover) that says I have hardware acceleration not working and I must reboot to have again that working. In fact windows are drawed very slowly. So I reboot (from XP) and then it loads XP correctly without freezing and video card working perfectly. It's not a bsod...I suppose I get this msg instead of a BSOD because ATI drivers "recover" the bsod but disabling acceleration (2d and 3d). I suppose something get corrupted during loading and booting. I think my videocard is ok

 

[imported_Imp]

Sounds like a screwy/broken driver. Have you tried reinstalling windows AND installing the AGP driver for the mobo before the ATI driver?

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

This XP installation was done first installing:
1) XP SP2 and patches from windowsupdate
2) DirectX 9.0c
3) ULi integrated drivers 2.13 (agp driver inside)
4) ATI driver

Trying to fix problem I tried reinstalling AGP Driver
and then reinstalling Omega Driver...but I have the same problem....with a new driver

 

[qsrk]

If you have BIOS 1.60, is AGP Deep FIFO disabled? That is for nvidia cards only. Make sure AGP fastwrite is disabled, since it can cause problems. Have you always had this exact problem, or could the freezing on your previous motherboard have corrupted your Windows installation? Might be time for a fresh install if SATAII looks stable. ULi has v2.20 of the integrated drivers - perhaps they will fix your problem.

 

[qsrk]

Running rock-solid for 5 days! UNTIL NOW! Just had the cold boot problem on SATAII - 3 failed resets too. Then I changed the slave IDE ports to "Not Installed" and booted okay - for now. Regardless, no freezing on the new motherboard so far.

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

@qsrk
I have stock bios 1.50. My asrock is stable too...no freezes and BSOD any more! Fiuuuuu! It remains a strange cold boot problem...first time I start my system in the morning, I get a freeze of the blue bar moving. To let XP loads I must turn OFF the power supply...then I restart it and XP loads well. I tried to power up system, after I hear the BEEP of the post, I power down (before XP begins to load). Then I turn back on power supply and XP loads WELL!! Strange problem...maybe my Enermax power supply is causing this? Maybe I should try the normal power plug and not the sata one provided from enermax noisetaker?

 

[Dragon Specialist]

I would be real interested in seeing your solution to this. You need to look in your windows logs (XP SP2?) and look at the Event Viewer - System logs. In mine, I can see where the "Controller Failed" on the disk. My problem and system are a little different than yours so I won't stress you about my issues. Let me know how this works out, or what you see in the system logs. You can even look back to see when you know it failed and possibly determine the errors in there at that time.

E-mail me..... I really am interested.

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

I have no errors in system logs! I have minor errors when applications crashed or other things happened. Yesterday I tried to log the freeze using the /bootlog option in boot.ini, but I noticed nothing! Any other ideas? It's a bit strange to start up my system, then power off and then power on again every morning.

 

[Dragon Specialist]

Sorry for the length, but trying to get to the bottom of this. I'm not convinced this is an actual hardware problem yet, but getting more convinced some IRQ's are getting mixed up and accessing the hard disk when it shouldn't be.

IF the problem is truly a "Disk" or "Controller" issue you may see something like this in the System Event Viewer like I do after reboot:

"The driver detected a controller error on \Device\Harddisk2\D.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp."

The link to microsoft doesn't offer much help except to tell you to replace the cable or check the drive. I really think this is more of an issue with interrupts or possibly a cross from the IDE hard drive and SATA drive not truly being differentiated within Windows.

If you look in the system tools, system information, see look at the IRQ's being occupied by the various Services. I was told by "ECS Helpdesk"(not really much help so far...) that I needed to download the latest bios and software for the motherboard. I have done this with the same result.

Some have mentioned the mouse moves, or doesn't, but the screen may be blank or halted. This appears to be hardware accessing the same IRQ's or at least not letting an interrupt go after it's been discarded, and therefore the system kind of hangs. This can be for a long period, or short, depending on how "stuck" the system is. On reboot, of coursce, the IRQ's are reinitialized and therefore everything goes ok... for while.

Now, in my case, I was fine while the drive was partitioned and formatted with the system up completely before I connected the drive. Once the system rebooted, I experience the same characteristics, only ALL THE TIME. Before reboot, I can format, write to, and read from, and even load software on the drive. After Reboot, nothing works. Going to try the removal of all except motherboard, video, and hard disk tomorrow. Maybe this will at least answer the question. I'm beginning to think the IDE Drive and the SATA Drive actually use the same interrupts.

Here's my current IRQ. If you want to talk offline on this, send me an e-mail. I really want to get this solved as I think in the long run, this is the way most systems will go.

IRQ 0 System timer OK
IRQ 3 Communications Port (COM2) OK
IRQ 4 Communications Port (COM1) OK
IRQ 5 Hauppauge WinTV 878/9 WDM Aux Driver OK
IRQ 6 Standard floppy disk controller OK
IRQ 8 System CMOS/real time clock OK
IRQ 9 Microsoft ACPI-Compliant System OK
IRQ 10 NVIDIA nForce PCI System Management OK
IRQ 13 Numeric data processor OK
IRQ 14 NVIDIA nForce3 250 Parallel ATA Controller (v2.6) OK
IRQ 15 NVIDIA nForce3 250 Parallel ATA Controller (v2.6) OK
IRQ 16 NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 4000 OK
IRQ 17 Hauppauge WinTV 878/9 WDM Video Driver OK
IRQ 20 Standard Enhanced PCI to USB Host Controller OK
IRQ 20 NVIDIA nForce3 250 Serial ATA Controller (v2.6) OK
IRQ 21 Standard OpenHCD USB Host Controller OK
IRQ 21 NVIDIA Network Bus Enumerator OK
IRQ 22 Standard OpenHCD USB Host Controller OK
IRQ 22 Realtek AC'97 Audio OK

 

[Dragon Specialist]

For a short question on your post Athlon64SSE3, Did you look in the SYSTEM log or the APPLICATION log. From your response, that looks like the application log you looked at.

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

Dragon,
I looked at all logs, Application log, Protection log and System log, without anything strange.
My IRQ list is:
Risorsa Periferica Stato
IRQ 0 Timer di sistema OK
IRQ 1 Logitech PS/2 Keyboard OK
IRQ 3 Periferica infrarossi incorporata OK
IRQ 4 Porta di comunicazione (COM1) OK
IRQ 5 Periferica compatibile MIDI MPU-401 OK
IRQ 6 Controller disco floppy standard OK
IRQ 8 Orologio di sistema CMOS a tempo reale OK
IRQ 9 Sistema compatibile ACPI Microsoft OK
IRQ 12 Logitech-compatible Mouse PS/2 OK
IRQ 13 Coprocessore matematico OK
IRQ 14 Canale primario IDE OK
IRQ 15 Canale secondario IDE OK
IRQ 16 RADEON 9500 (Omega 3.8.221) OK
IRQ 20 Controller Open Host ALi da PCI a USB OK
IRQ 21 Controller Open Host ALi da PCI a USB OK
IRQ 22 Creative SB Audigy OK
IRQ 22 Controller Open Host ALi da PCI a USB OK
IRQ 23 Controller host OHCI compatibile IEEE 1394 OK
IRQ 23 Controller host standard avanzato da PCI a USB OK
IRQ 29 Adattatore PCI standard da PCI a PCI OK
IRQ 34 Adattatore PCI standard da PCI a PCI OK
IRQ 35 JMicron 20360/20363 AHCI Controller OK
IRQ 39 Adattatore PCI standard da PCI a PCI OK

 

[Dragon Specialist]

Athlon64SSE3

In looking through your IRQ List, I noticed this IS NOT ENGLISH!
Anyway, I figured out most of it, I thihk, but my spanish is a bit rusty and I think this is French anyway, right?

One of the things I was looking for was a definite IRQ for the SATA Controller. I see the definite USB IRQ's on 20, 21, 22 (with Creative SB also), and also the IDE at 14 and 15. I don't see the IRQ for a definite SATA Controller. If you review my IRQ list, you will see 3 distinct SATA IRQ's. In order for me to get these to appear, I had to turn the SATA on in the BIOS. Did I miss something here or is the SATA Controller listed and I just should go back to reading only English? Let me know.

 

[Dragon Specialist]

Athlon64SSE3

One more additional note... If your system hangs and is attempting to do a dump, if you turn off the machine before it completes, the dump does not register and the system logs will not be updated (sometimes). You may have to leave the machine alone until it figures out what it is doing. If it truly is an IRQ interrupt problem, this could take a loooonnnngggg time (or even never happen). In control panel, system, Advanced Tab, Startup and Recovery, there is an option to "Write an event to the System log" on System failure. This would need to be enabled before you would see anything in the System logs.

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

It's italian language....sorry but it's my language , I posted it thinking all of you could understand reading USB Radeon or Creative names . SATA controller on Asrock 939 Dual sata2 is Jmicron controller, on IRQ 35 and it's alone on that irq. I have no sound problems or usb problems, even If 20 21 and 22 are shared controllers. I already have enabled the logging function and I always give it the time to write anything....but I never found anything...as other people on this thread!

 

[Dragon Specialist]

Athlon64SSE3 and Other Interested Parties:

I work with systems all the time and it dawned on me that I actually have an HP Workstation with a Maxtor SATA 1 250GB drive in it. After looking at this machine, I'm thinking my theory on the IRQ errors may be incorrect. HP has both the Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet and the Intel 82801FB Ultra ATA Storage Controllers - 2652 on the same IRQ - 19. This also has an NVIDIA Quadro FX 1300 in it, so the NVIDIA is also similar (although much higher end than I build for myself). I also noted that this does not specifically state "SATA" in the IRQ list as I would have expected. The "Memory Resource" for the devices is different however, which is something I will need to check on my home system (You may want to look at this also, Athlon64SSE3). What I did find a little interesting was it occupies a SCSI Port.... This really is a SATA 1 drive. Do a search on Google for the Maxtor Model. I don't even think it comes in SCSI.
See below:

Description Disk drive
Manufacturer (Standard disk drives)
Model Maxtor 7Y250M0
Bytes/Sector 512
Media Loaded Yes
Media Type Fixed	hard disk media
Partitions 1
SCSI Bus 0
SCSI Logical Unit 0
SCSI Port 1
SCSI Target ID 0
Sectors/Track 63
Size 232.88 GB (250,056,737,280 bytes)
Total Cylinders 30,401
Total Sectors 488,392,065
Total Tracks 7,752,255
Tracks/Cylinder 255
Partition Disk #0, Partition #0
Partition Size 232.88 GB (250,048,479,744 bytes)
Partition Starting Offset 32,256 bytes
_________________________________________________

Might be something to look at. This tends to lead me back to a driver issue and not an IRQ issue. Any thoughts? My motherboard is an ECS cheepo from Fry's.

 

[qsrk]

Just an update - the freezing problem has completely gone away since I RMA'd the motherboard. Thanks everybody for your support!

Also, I just ran Windows Update, and it reported that a new JMicron RAID driver is available:

Driver update for JMicron JMB36X RAID Controller
Date last published: 4/17/2006
Download size: 37 KB
Driver update provided by JMicron Technology Corp.

I'm going to leave it alone for now, but it may help others out.

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

I hope problem is gone for me too....after updating bios. I upgraded to 1.80 (dated 25/04/2006) and now my system booted correctly, without strange multicoloured screens or freezes! I will see how it work in this week....hoping that problem was really fixed (even if it is not on changelog, but sometimes they fixes things without writing anything)

 

[Athlon64SSE3]

I can confirm that bios 1.80 togheter with rma of the board (sigh..) fixed my freeze problem....all is working perfectly! Tried multiple cold-boot starts...all is ok

 

[hondaf17]

Originally posted by: boake
Let me summarize the methods we've found so far.

1) Switching sata mode (install in sata1 => change to sata2)
2) Relocating case to the floor from the desk.
3) Ventilating and Cooling chips.

We found 3 methods~!!! Way to go~!!!

I just got done reading as much of this thread as possible. I just built my brand new PC and I must admit I am having this cold-boot freeze problem!

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+
EPoX NP9+Ultra MoBo
Seagate 7200.9 160 GB SATAII HDD
Sony DVD Burner
ATI Radeon X1800XT 512 MB GDDR3 PCIe Video Card
I've using a 500W Fortron BlueStorm Power Supply

Based on this forum I think it's a SATAII problem as well. I have a question - how do I perform task 1, as you highlighted above? Right now I do NOT have any jumpers on my SATAII HDD - do I need to set it to master (it's my only HDD)?

My HDD is hooked up directly to the first SATA port on my MB.

Since my video card is enormous, I have to hook my DVD burner up to the IDE 2 connection on my MB. Any suggestions for tweaking my BIOS and accomplishing number 1, above? Anyone that had this problem it'd be great if you post your specific solution, or if someone has the same mobo as me I'd like to hear their story.

Thank you very much.

Oh - PS - my system is rock solid stable with this one exception!

 

[qsrk]

I thought boake my take this one, but here goes. Most HDD's do have jumpers to switch the HDD itself to SATAII mode, and I think most are shipped with SATAII enabled. Hitachi drives need to use a firmware utility to switch between SATAI and SATAII modes.

In the ASrock motherboard BIOS, you can use either of the SATAI ports (labeled SATA1 and SATA2, just to confuse you), and they will ONLY run in SATAI mode. Your HDD should work on these ports, as long as it is still set to SATAI mode itself. I'm reading through this thread again, but if I recall, you should be able to install on the SATAI port, with your HDD in SATAI mode. Once windows is properly installed and stable, you can then switch the HDD over to the SATAII port. If all works well, then switch your HDD to SATAII mode.

Let us know if this works on your non-ASrock mobo.