boot requires setup each time

[teddbb]

Suddenly one day each time I boot my pc with xp it stops at a screen which offers 1 of 2 options

retry or enter setup utility

enter setup utility and scrool down to primary drive 0 which says unknown device.

hit enter and it is set to auto. change setting to off- change it back to auto and hit enter again. back to main menu of utility

I have another hard drive but dont know if it is primary 1 or secondary 0 or 1 and so I have set the other 3 choices for off.

only changes that I make. Hit esc save changes and exit. loads windows and I am good.

this happens very time. thought it was the internal battery and the cmos was lost each time. but the time and day are always correct. Have not changed the internal battery yet did not want to fix something that maybe wasnt broken but will break something else if I fix it.

Also I have seen other answers to cmos type problems like clocks slowing refer to the battery as the bios battery. Dont want to lose bios details if I pull the battery but that isnt the way I understand how this works. dont have a back up and cant find a source for the bios version I have so I can flash it if I lose it.

I have gotten the system details for the hard drive and none of the numbers such as heads etc match the choices 2-47 or whatever they are. Have not removed drive and looked at any details that might be written there.

So my question is. How do I boot normally. How do I figure out what number of the 45 different configurations available in setup my hard drive is or does AUTO work. Is it the battery so that even if I get the hard drive id right the machine will still boot the same the next time.

You get the idea. whats causing it, how do I fix it? if it involves getting the right hard drive config how do I figure that out. And then secondary to all that is what is the other hard drive in the machine. primary 1 secondary 0 or secondary 1.

 

[mpilchfamily]

Pulling the battery will not cause you to loose the bios. It will only reset the saved setting for the bios. Technicly there are 2 chips involved here. One is the bios chip. The other is the CMOS chip. The CMOS chip is what holds the saved settings. The battery supplies the CMOS with a charge so it can maintain its stored data and keep the system clock going while the power is off. Chances are the data in CMOS has gotten currupted. This sometimes happens and a nice reset of the CMOS will fix the problem. Just pull the power from the wall and take out the CMOS battery. This will clear the data and give you a fresh start. Just be sure to go into the bios and reset the date, time and other information as needed. If you still have problems then the HDD may need to be replaced.

 

[teddbb]

thanks that relieves my reluctance to do anything that might mess with the bios.

what about the hard drive id in setup. will setting it to auto once the battery is replaced probably do it or do I have to figure out which profile of the 47+- my hd fits.

also what is the 2nd hard drive likely to be primary 1 or secondary 0 or 1 or will putting auto in all four categories work.

and lastly if replacing the battery doesnt allow an automatic loading of windows xp then you say the hard drive might be the problem. in what way. as I understand it formatting a hard drive puts a sort of cmos on it as well. could reformatting the hard drive do it or you think replacing might be the only cure if the battery doesnt do it.

thanks