Hooobi's consolidated perpetual problems thread - Last Update: New HD and Reboot Issues

[Hooobi]

It was working fine, then I shut it down to move the IDEs around for a fresh install of windows and now everytime I boot, the LCD shows "25" and I get this siren wailing.

I've tried moving the IDEs back and flashed the CMOS numerous times (I think I did that right).

Does anyone have any idea how to fix this?

EDIT: After following splice's advice the system worked fine for a few boots. Now, it's doing the exact same thing again and no matter what I do: remove all cards, insert one at a time in different positions, reset CMOS... it doesn't make any difference.

Anyone ever get so frustrated with something that they just want to smash it? Well... I'm getting there...

EDIT #2: After a mod expressed his concern at the number of threads I've been posting regarding the multitude of problems I've been having. I decided it might be prudent to consolidate, so.... here we are.

Currently I'm having problems with a missing 10 GB of HD and also with an annoying reboot issue, please scroll down for details.

To those who were affected by my "cluttering up" of the forums... I apologize.

 

[splice]

25h
Early PCI Initialization:
-Enumerate PCI bus number.
-Assign memory & I/O resource
-Search for a valid VGA device & VGA BIOS, and put it into
C000:0


So, I would suggest removing all your PCI cards and see if that works. If it does, start replacing them one at a time.

Also, swap your video card, if possible, and see if that does anything.

 

[Hooobi]

thanks... I'll give it a shot right now...

 

[Hooobi]

splice: you just saved this friggin thing from sleeping with the fishes...

pulled out both cards and it worked fine plugged them in one at a time but in different slots... everything seems to be working

Thanks!

 

[splice]

Good, deal. Glad to help.

 

[Hooobi]

It's happening again

 

[human2k]

How about an RMA?

 

[Hooobi]

Originally posted by: human2k
How about an RMA?

Well, that is a last resort. I've already RMA'ed the RAM on this thing and had my system up and running and was able to install both win98 and upgrade to win2k.

Personally, I'm starting to think this thing is possessed and I need you guys to help me exorcise whatever demons lurk within...

 

[Hooobi]

Unbelievable... after leaving it shut off for a few minutes it's now posting.

Guess we'll see if the demons have fled, or if they'rejust lurking behind the RAID controller...

 

[kgraeme]

I ditched my 4G4A+ after strange boot problems. It would have been a really nice board if it would boot reliably, but something was just weird about it. Most of the time it was the during POST as it loaded the Highpoint. It actually wouldn't load and would just hang there. Occasionally, it would also just not power up. Nothing would happen when I hit the switch.

Got an ASUS P4B533. Less features and more expensive, but so far no quirks.

 

[John]

Try a different powersupply.

 

[Vinny N]

Hoobi...

demons?...hehe, wait till the paranoia sets in...

Get another board, do you really want to second guess yourself or the board everytime anything goes wrong?

I sure wouldn't. Of course I'm neurotic and obsessive compulsive

 

[Hooobi]

The powersupply is a brand new Antec 350w that just came in with the board and stuff.

At the moment, the system seems to be working fine and I've moved my primary drive over to the SCSI adapter.

Of course, now I have a new problem... Windows tells me that one of my old drives is "not formatted" and asks if I want to format it. I really don't want to lose the 80 gigs of stuff on there. And yes, I have posted this problem in the hardware forum.

Regarding the PS. How can you tell if you're having problems with it? Do the numbers in BIOS regarding voltage/etc. give any indication?

 

[Hooobi]

Originally posted by: Vinny_N
Hoobi...

demons?...hehe, wait till the paranoia sets in...

Get another board, do you really want to second guess yourself or the board everytime anything goes wrong?

I sure wouldn't. Of course I'm neurotic and obsessive compulsive

Well... at the moment most things seem to be working. As soon as I get a few critical components installed I'm going to create rescue disks just in case (if I can remember how).

I really don't want to hassle with RMA'ing the board unless I have to. I've already pissed away something like 30 hours this week trying to get this thing running properly and can't really afford to keep wasting time on the thing. So.... I'm praying things hold...

 

[John]

The powersupply is a brand new Antec 350w that just came in with the board and stuff.

Simply because a part is new does not exclude the fact it could have issues.

 

[Hooobi]

That's why I was asking about diagnosing it in BIOS. Would that be a good way to see if it's working properly?

 

[John]

Originally posted by: Hooobi
That's why I was asking about diagnosing it in BIOS. Would that be a good way to see if it's working properly?

You cannot diagnose a psu in the bios by reading the voltage levels. Think of it this way, your 256MB stick of memory may register as 256MB in the bios and os, but it could still produce memory errors. Your best option is to swap with a known good powersupply.

 

[Hooobi]

Well... that PS is the best I have at the moment. I just bought it to replace my old Antec 300w PS that I thought might be bad.

 

[splice]

I seriously doubt that it's the power supply. That motherboard sounds like the problem. My Epox 8KHA+ had a wierd boot problem when it would sometimes freeze when it was going to detect the IDE devices. The problem went away after I disabled the BIOS setting for displaying the PC Health stats on boot. Really odd stuff. I've liked all my epox boards that I've owned, but most of them have had little quirks like this.

 

[Hooobi]

Yeah... this one seems to have a number of *quirks*, the latest being that most of the time when I restart windows, it hangs just after the initial stats screen at the point where it normally loads the highpoint and scans for drives.

If I shut if off and back on again, it usually works.

Hoping to get all these quirks ironed out one day....

 

[John]

Originally posted by: Hooobi
Well... that PS is the best I have at the moment. I just bought it to replace my old Antec 300w PS that I thought might be bad.

Were you having this same issue when you replaced the Antec? If not what caused you to replace it? You seem to have a lot of random issues with this computer you are working on.

I seriously doubt that it's the power supply.

Splice, until he fixes the problem it is not wise to rule out any component.

 

[Hooobi]

Yeah... it's been driving me nuts. Apparently I may have gotten a bit carried away with creating new threads for each problem because I was WARNED.

I replaced the original PS because when my computer originally died... I assumed the mobo fried and replaced it. When I plugged in the new mobo I smelt something funny followed by a *plink* and opened the case to see this very hot little black piece (I later found out it was a "power converter") lying on the bottom of the case. So then, I had to order a new mobo and went ahead and replaced the PS for good measure, assuming that's what had melted the thing.

Now things are running ok except for a couple of annoying issues:

I'm missing 10 gigs on my new drive that's not in either of my partitions and not sure how to get it back. One partition is 39 gigs, the other is 117 gigs and the whole drive is 160. Again, I'm running win2k

More annoying than that, however, is the fact that most of the time when I reboot from windows, the computer hangs right after the "hit x for bios" screen, at the point where the highpoint bios normally loads. If I shut it down and power back up... everything loads just fine. This has happened a number of times. Someone in the thread that got locked as a WARNING mentioned that the same thing had happened to him because he was using the highpoint as an extra controller, and not running RAID off of it, which is the same thing that I'm doing. But I really would like to keep using those highpoint connecters if possible b/c my new HD is 133 and this way everything gets to be master.

Again... suggestions regarding any of these issues is welcome.

Maybe I'll change the title of this thread to "Hooobi's consolidated perpetual problems thread" so I don't anger anyone...