Strange XP booting issue

[Demo24]

This computer has been going for a number of years and I haven't done a fresh install of XP in at least 3 years. It's no longer an option to do this, so please don't recommend me to reformat and start over.

Basically everything seems to work fine, except in the past few weeks booting has become a much longer process. The comp posts fine, then immediately switches to the HD to begin booting the OS. Except it delays here for 60 secs. On the screen is the XP loading menu, but it is very very dim and you have to look for it to see it. After 60 secs pass, it brightens up, the blue bars go by a couple times and it boots into the login screen.

The interesting thing is if I restart the system, this issue does not appear. It only appears when I first turn on the system.

Any ideas as to what could be causing this? Kind of annoying to wait. My only guess is HD issue, but it passed a test and seems to be working fine. Anyone recommend any HD tests?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Your HD could be failing.

 

[JesseKnows]

Any interesting events in the system event log?

 

[Demo24]

Yeah, that's kind of my fear. I guess I'll go looking for another HD test to see. There's nothing interesting in the system log. Just the occasional system error, mostly program faults of some kind or another. Not very frequent and mostly caused by my actions.

Kind of disappointing considering the HD was suppose to be a bit beefier than normal.

 

[sivart]

If it only happens from a cold boot, it may be a voltage issue with the power supply. Have you tested that?

Just a guess.

 

[Underclocked]

or maybe a new CMOS battery?

 

[Demo24]

HD is fine, I tested it with seatools and it passed. I'm lingering more towards memory at the moment. Gotta do some more testing though.

I'm on a old DFI board, aka nforce 4. It's finicky with voltages and especially with memory. Also seems to have an annoying tendency of killing memory after a couple of years.