HELP - Delayed Write Fail Error Message?

[Sammy5000]

Hey Guys...

Just purchased a Sapphire ATI Radeon 9700 Pro (128 MB, 8xAGP, etc) for my system. After initial install, with drivers that came with the package (Powered by ATI drivers, ver 7.83), I was prompted to reboot, and received the following error message - "Delayed Write Failed....Windows was unable to save.....This could be caused by a failure in your computer hardware, network connection." From there, I get several pop ups, at which point renders my harddrive useless and I am not able to do anything.

Since my computer was shot, I decided to delete the partition, reinstall Windows XP, and start over. Once I did that, I loaded ATI Retail drivers (Built by ATI Drivers ver 6.14.01.6307) and everything was working well, until a day or two later, on a reboot for the installation of XP Tuneup application, I got the same error message! I am at a loss. I am not sure if it an ATI Driver problem, a Windows XP problem, a HDD problem.

As a side note, I did not have any problems with my previous video card, which was an ATI Radeon 7200 (which happen to use the same retail drivers that the Radeon 9700 Pro uses).

Here are my specs:

OS - Windows XP Home
CPU - 1.2 Ghz Athlon Thunderbird (O'ced at 1.411 Ghz - 8.5x166)
Mobo - Asus A7V333 (Rev 1016)
Memory - 512 MB PC2700 DDR (Crucial)
HDD - Maxtor 80 MB UDMA
HDD2 - Maxtor 20 MB UDMA
Video - Sapphire ATI Radeon 9700 Pro
Sound - On-Board C-Media

Let me know your thoughts. Thanks!

 

[Bacinator]

That error typically happens when the computer cannot write temporary (page file I presume) information to your hard-drive. There are many causes, but is usually due to your hard-drive being pre-occupied with another task.

BTW, your page file is hard drive space your computer allocated to act as memory, in case your RAM is unavailible, or when more memory is required.

Run a drive diagnostic to be sure.

 

[Bacinator]

I posted 3 links for HDD tools here.

 

[earthman]

The previous poster is describing this correctly. Check your connections. This can be caused by a bad or loose cable. I have seen a new cable solve this problem. The installation of a new video card may only be coincidental.

 

[Bacinator]

I would hope drive diagnostics would catch a loose cable.