Odd things are beginning to happen. I did a fresh install of XPPro RC2 (2526?) last saturday, and all went nice and schmoove.
So I started "rebuilding" my system, installing various pieces of software and such, and a few quirky things started happening a few days ago.
First, the damn thing just plain can't recognize my USB Joystick (Saitek Cyborg 3D) from install of the OS. It recognizes a USB device, but I have the little (!) icon on the thing. If I unplug it and plug it back in, it sees it and loads up the HID-compatibable driver for it and works fine. But I reboot, and the (!) is back. I attribute this to USB just plain sucking. This stick detects fine in Win2K and 98SE. That's not a major issue though...
Now, a couple of days ago, I defraged the drive. Nice, fast, done. I went to "re-analyze" the drive to ensure it defraged properly (sometime Win2K leaves major fragmentation after a defrag)... The "analyze" errored out saying there were problems with the volume and to run chkdsk.
So I did, and it said there were problems, and to run /f. So I did - usually I see a "bad file index" as the error, and it fixes it, and sometime a bad security attribute, and it'll fix that. System reboots, and just for S&G, I run chkdsk again. It says it found errors and to do the /f thing again, so I do, and we'll end up with some similar errors being fixed. This is constancy now. Anytime XP runs, if I run chkdsk, it'll find an error somewhere in the file table or security descriptors or somethine.
So - I booted over to Win2K to check, and the Win2K drive has a bad volume bitmap.. but it gets fixed as well. chkdsk from Win2K on both drives, fix everything, and finally everything is clean. Boot XP - do a chkdsk and we find errors.
Just to be sure, I downloaded the Maxtor diagnostic utils, ran 'em, and the drive is fine (at least what SMART says and the read test - BTW, always use the drive manufaturers utils on the manufacturer's drives, and not others - I use the Maxtor thing on my WD drive as well - it ran fine, but MAN was it scarey!).
Now, the only thing I have done that maybe I shouldn't have, I installed the VIA 4.33V drivers, including the BusMastering IDE drivers in XP and 2K. I've heard people say to use the MS driver and not the VIA ones for performance and stability. Truth in lending???
Anyway, I have very few things installed on XP, and am at a loss. All I have is the VIA drivers, NVIDIA DetXP 21.81 drivers, SBLive! updated drivers from Windows Update, whatever the other fix is from Windows Update, Half-Life / CounterStrike, The Sims/Livin' Large/House Party, and WinAmp (2.76).
I'm fairly certain that's it.
Dual Boot, WinXP on C: NTFS, Win2K on D: NTFS.
Any ideas on what may be going on? Anybody have similar problems?
A couple other things (this morning, internet seemed to have died - we have had 4 cable/RoadRunner outtages in the past two weeks, but I didn't have any visible signs of a problem but slow/intermittant internet connectivity, so I had to give RR a call) - my Intellimouse Optical didn't "initialize" after rebooting WinXP - hard powerdown/restart got it alive again, and I'm having this internet connectivity issue which APPEARS to be a RoadRunner issue, but they don't explicitly have any planned/known outtages as of 3 hours ago, and I'm still down. Win2K has no net connectivity either, so I'm leaning toward RoadRunner, but maybe WinXP is screwing with my NIC? I know Gillbot lost 2 soundcards (fried) from WinXP - I said coincidence, but now maybe not...
SunnyD
So I started "rebuilding" my system, installing various pieces of software and such, and a few quirky things started happening a few days ago.
First, the damn thing just plain can't recognize my USB Joystick (Saitek Cyborg 3D) from install of the OS. It recognizes a USB device, but I have the little (!) icon on the thing. If I unplug it and plug it back in, it sees it and loads up the HID-compatibable driver for it and works fine. But I reboot, and the (!) is back. I attribute this to USB just plain sucking. This stick detects fine in Win2K and 98SE. That's not a major issue though...
Now, a couple of days ago, I defraged the drive. Nice, fast, done. I went to "re-analyze" the drive to ensure it defraged properly (sometime Win2K leaves major fragmentation after a defrag)... The "analyze" errored out saying there were problems with the volume and to run chkdsk.
So I did, and it said there were problems, and to run /f. So I did - usually I see a "bad file index" as the error, and it fixes it, and sometime a bad security attribute, and it'll fix that. System reboots, and just for S&G, I run chkdsk again. It says it found errors and to do the /f thing again, so I do, and we'll end up with some similar errors being fixed. This is constancy now. Anytime XP runs, if I run chkdsk, it'll find an error somewhere in the file table or security descriptors or somethine.
So - I booted over to Win2K to check, and the Win2K drive has a bad volume bitmap.. but it gets fixed as well. chkdsk from Win2K on both drives, fix everything, and finally everything is clean. Boot XP - do a chkdsk and we find errors.
Just to be sure, I downloaded the Maxtor diagnostic utils, ran 'em, and the drive is fine (at least what SMART says and the read test - BTW, always use the drive manufaturers utils on the manufacturer's drives, and not others - I use the Maxtor thing on my WD drive as well - it ran fine, but MAN was it scarey!).
Now, the only thing I have done that maybe I shouldn't have, I installed the VIA 4.33V drivers, including the BusMastering IDE drivers in XP and 2K. I've heard people say to use the MS driver and not the VIA ones for performance and stability. Truth in lending???
Anyway, I have very few things installed on XP, and am at a loss. All I have is the VIA drivers, NVIDIA DetXP 21.81 drivers, SBLive! updated drivers from Windows Update, whatever the other fix is from Windows Update, Half-Life / CounterStrike, The Sims/Livin' Large/House Party, and WinAmp (2.76).
I'm fairly certain that's it.
Dual Boot, WinXP on C: NTFS, Win2K on D: NTFS.
Any ideas on what may be going on? Anybody have similar problems?
A couple other things (this morning, internet seemed to have died - we have had 4 cable/RoadRunner outtages in the past two weeks, but I didn't have any visible signs of a problem but slow/intermittant internet connectivity, so I had to give RR a call) - my Intellimouse Optical didn't "initialize" after rebooting WinXP - hard powerdown/restart got it alive again, and I'm having this internet connectivity issue which APPEARS to be a RoadRunner issue, but they don't explicitly have any planned/known outtages as of 3 hours ago, and I'm still down. Win2K has no net connectivity either, so I'm leaning toward RoadRunner, but maybe WinXP is screwing with my NIC? I know Gillbot lost 2 soundcards (fried) from WinXP - I said coincidence, but now maybe not...
SunnyD
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