ASUS P4PE won't boot from CD-ROM: help!

[abeness]

Hi, folks. I'm mystified by this, hope you can help. I just built a new rig, but it won't boot from the CD-ROM drive--which makes it hard to load my system!

ASUS P4PE mobo w/Promise SATA/RAID controller (PDC20376)
latest release BIOS, ver. 1002
P4 2.4B GHz, 533 FSB
512 RAM, 2 x 256 PC2700
2 x 80 GB UltraATA 100 HDDs on the Promise controller, 1 on primary IDE, the other on primary SATA via an Iwill I2S adapter. RAID 1 configuration.
No HDDs on the primary or secondary IDE controllers; 1 older NEC CD-ROM as secondary master.

CD-ROM is set as the first boot device, but the system won't boot from it. I've confirmed that the drive is good--can read a CD after booting from the floppy, and can boot from CDs in the system it came out of (an old Dell P2/266). Error is "disk boot failure, insert system disk and press enter". CD-ROM is NEC CDR-1901A, manufactured in July 1998. Shouldn't be TOO old...

Before the Promise FastTrack controller loads, just after the system detects IDE devices (only the CD-ROM is attached to the IDE buses), the error "Hardware monitor found an error. Enter Power setup menu for details" appears, with an F1 to continue. It's not a very clear error message--doesn't seem like the Power menu in the BIOS is a problem, I just tried reloading default values and still get it. If something like "power user" setup is meant, well, I just don't see anything amiss.

CD-ROM is attached with a 40-pin cable, and is auto-detected as "NEC CD-ROM DRIVE:28C". UltraDMA2 is set automatically. Setting the BIOS to CD-ROM instead of auto has no effect.

On a lark I tried disabling the Promise controller and putting one of the HDDs on the primary IDE bus, but no change.

Any ideas? Could something possibly be amiss with the CD-ROM drive that would prevent it from booting one system while it boots another system just fine?

I've been trying to find tech docs on the ASUS site that might shed light on this, with no success. I've tried to get into their forums but they're so poorly designed that they ultimately crash my old Celeron 400/W2K/256 rig--maxed out the processor after pumping IE up to 125 MB RAM usage until it hung, and there are no topic titles anyway. Useless. Too bad. Finally resorted to trying to get in on my Mac (700MHz G4, 640 RAM), and it killed that too. Ouch.

Any suggestions on this boot problem will be appreciated. Thanks!

Abe

 

[corkyg]

The basic question is this - are you using a known bootable CD?

 

[abeness]

Hi, Corky-g. Sorry I wasn't clear. Yes, of course, known bootable CDs, but it can't hurt to ask. I tried booting with the same two CDs I booted with in the old system that the CD-ROM came out of. WinXP Pro and a Norton SystemWorks CD for good measure. Neither boot with the P4PE board.

P.S. The hardware monitor error was due to the low PSU fan RPM from my Antec TruePower 430. Still getting used to this mobo... maybe I can adjust its sensitivity. I'd rather be able to boot the damn thing, though... <g>

Abe

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I bought a Dell pulled 52x black CD-R from the FS/FT forum and no matter what config or cable I used it wouldn't work in my P4PE/L so I put in a Acer 48x and it worked fine. So I tried a lite-on 16x DVD and a Sony 40x CD-RW and they all worked fine, put the dell back in nada! So I put it in the A7N266-VM I was building for my niece and it worked perfect! so that makes 2 of us now and leads me to think it's a compatability issue, but I'm open to explainations why an ATAPI drive working with one intel chipset board wouldn't work with ours I'd suggest flashing the firmware on the drive if you can find a newer version for that drive than's on it and really want to use it with your board to see if that resolves the problem, I just swapped drives and moved on myself. You could also try disabling any/all HDDs to see if that clears it up, but it didn't work for me. Anyways, good luck

 

[boomerang]

Same board, I had same problem.

Set first option to CD-ROM, set remaining to None for first boot.

Worked for me.

 

[abeness]

Confound it! Thanks, guys. Unfortunately I don't have another drive handy, and setting the other boot devices to "disabled" didn't do the trick here. I found FW 3.03 from Dell and flashed it (was 3.02), but that didn't work either, and neither did disabling the HDDs on the Promise controller, or moving one of them to one of the main IDE controllers. I'm reluctant to try the beta BIOS 1003 from ASUS.

I agree, it seems odd that a standard ATAPI drive would work in one system but not another. Maybe the fact this is an OEM Dell drive has something to do with it. There were those reports a while back about Dell using non-standard PSU pinouts.

Oh well, I had planned on picking up a DVD burner anyway... just wanted to wait till they came down further in price. Maybe I'll just pick up a standard CD-ROM for $30 for now.

Thanks again, and if anything else comes to mind please pass it on.

Abe

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I suspected as much based on my own experience with that issue, but save yourself some money and head over to the For sale/for trade forum here at Anandtech and pick yourself up a nice used CD drive for 10-15$ shipped, just make sure it's not a Dell pull

 

[abeness]

Thanks, DAPUNISHER. I'll remember that for next time--just picked up a Lite-On 52x for $27 locally cuz I can't screw around here this time, and it booted fine. On to seeing just how fast I can install WinXP on a 2.4 GHz rig to a RAID 1 setup...

Thanks again to all.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: abeness
Thanks, DAPUNISHER. I'll remember that for next time--just picked up a Lite-On 52x for $27 locally cuz I can't screw around here this time, and it booted fine. On to seeing just how fast I can install WinXP on a 2.4 GHz rig to a RAID 1 setup...

Thanks again to all.

Good deal! post back how that baby overclocks if you essay it