Upgrade woes, please help!

[Fuzzyblob]

Whenever it comes time for me to upgrade/build a computer, I always feel like a devout Muslim about to be put to death by firing squad; sure I know it's a good thing because it'll eventually transport me to nerd heaven where I'll live in bliss with seven virgin computer components, but why does the process have to be so darn painful and dramatic?

Weird metaphors aside, I recently bought four, not seven, super-sexy virgin components to spice up the ol' comp-miester (OK I lied; we're still in metaphor-land), including the always lovely Intel 6600 Dual Core CPU, an Asus PN5W Deluxe MB, two sticks of OCZ PC-4300 DDR2 RAM sized at a gigabyte each, and to top it off the PNY "second fastest video card on the consumer market today" 8800 GTS. Impressive, nay?

So last night I began work installing my master-piece comp config, and everything seemed to go well. Then I tried turning it on.

Now, from here on out, the story gets a little more complicated. You see, the computer worked completely fine until it came time to boot into Windows, at which point the monitor lost a the signal for about half a minute (which makes sense because that's the amount of time the MB is set to wait for a hanging hard drive, 35 seconds) and then the computer just shut off. I tried it again. This time before Windows started up it displayed the screen that says "We're sorry for the inconvenience, but Windows couldn't load on the last attempt. Do you wanna continue in Safe Mode or start Windows normally?" Telling it to start normally led to the same result as before with the dead screen, 35 second hang time, and then auto shut down, but having it start in Safe Mode showed a cascading list of files being loaded until it came to one that I think was labeled as something like "system/Drivers/Mup.sys," hung for less than a second and then shut down. (Under repeated testing, this consistently happened when it got to the Mup.sys file.) Call me crazy, but I felt this might have something to do with the hard drive, so I tried a few things to try and solve the problem: first, I switched out the current IDE cable for a never before used one (didn't work), tried unplugging my two DVD drives and using their IDE port for the hard drive (didn't work), changed the jumper setting for the HD from the default CS setting to the Master setting (didn't work), pulled the drive out of the case then attempted to boot up in case it was the heat or something shorting it out in the case (didn't work), then I threw my hand up in despair (surprisingly enough, this also didn't work).

All these symptoms seemed to point to a faulty drive, but today I made a diagnostic disk with Maxtor's software, ran an in depth test and it found no problems whatsoever!

Other miscellaneous things I've tried include booting up with the sound card removed, again with the video card not plugged in, with my two DVD drives not plugged in and the hard drive attached to the CD-ROM's IDE port, all to no avail.

Here's the list of specs:

* 120gb Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9
* 2 DVD drives
* Asus P5W DH Deluxe Motherboard with BIOS revision 1305 installed
* Core 2 Duo 6600 Intel CPU
* 2 gigs of OCZ PC-5300 DDR2 Performance Ram
* Audigy 2 ZS sound card
* PNY 8800 GTS video card
* Aspire X-Alien case with 420 watt power supply

I know that this is a ridiculously long message and an overly complicated problem, but I'm really desperate to get this thing working. Any help you guys can give me would be more than welcome!

 

[daveybrat]

I can tell you right now what your problem is, power!!....or lack thereof in your case.

That 420Watt Aspire power supply that came with your case is far too underpowered to be running Core Duo and an 8800 video card. You should look into a 500Watt + Enermax, Antec, Enhance, OCZ, etc. brand power supply and you should be good to go.

 

[Fuzzyblob]

Huh, well the P/S certainly seems to be the villain of choice, here and in other places, but I'd still like to chime this in: I suppose the P/S might be the problem, I have reason to believe it's not the culprit. The reason is that I've tried temporarily removing the sound card, one DIMM of the RAM, and unplugging the video card and both DVD drives, yet the boot up still fails in the exact same place every single time. If you tell to boot Windows normally, there's a pause, a blue screen of death flashes on the screen for a couple milliseconds, the display goes dead for around 20 seconds, and then the whole thing just shuts off. If you tell it proceed in Safe Mode, it shows the files as they're being loaded, pauses once it gets to one called (I think) c:/Windows/system32/drivers/Mup.sys, the screen signal is lost, the computer just stays there for about 20 seconds, and then it turns off. It seems that if lack of power or something like that's the problem, it wouldn't be so predictable and always stop at the same file (Mups.sys), especially if the power supply didn't have to feed as many components, and even more so if it was the video card. Am I completely off the mark, and also, do you have any recommendations for a power supply? Will anything do as long as it's ATX, 500watts or more, a good name brand and has a good warranty? Thanks.

 

[mechBgon]

Unplugging the video card?! No no no, your virgin computer components will get to heaven first, if you make that kind of card pull all its amperage through the motherboard :Q Go out and get a proper commensurate high-quality power supply. I'd be thinking, oh, maybe a 600W+ Seasonic.

Also, if you had Windows installed already, and tried to simply force-feed the existing Windows installation a new motherboard, CPU, video card, and storage controllers, then put your old hardware back in there and back up your stuff. After that, reinstall Windows.

To begin with, I'd start Windows Setup, use Windows Setup to delete all the existing partitions on the drive (destroys the data, but I presume you know that). Then press the F3 key twice to exit Windows Setup. Now begin a second time, and carry on.

(1) remove all extra hard drives, memory-card reades and USB drives so drive letter C: doesn't get hijacked

(2) unplug all network cables and wireless networking devices so the just-installed Windows can't be attacked by network worms while its firewall is down

(3) reinstall Windows from scratch, keeping it offline until you at LEAST have the built-in Windows Firewall activated (on pre-SP2 versions of WinXP, this is called the Internet Connection Firewall and must be manually turned on; see the Windows Help on "firewall" for instructions). If you can pre-download the full Service Pack 2 installation file and have that saved on a CD, that's recommended.

(4) before installing motherboard or video drivers, update the system at Windows Update and enable Automatic Updates in Control Panel. Also fully enable Data Execution Prevention

(5) take a snack break while it runs a Defrag

(6) install motherboard drivers and reboot

(7) install video-card drivers and reboot

(8) install, configure and update antivirus software. Here's a good free one, leave out the optional security toolbar: http://www.activevirusshield.com And here is free antispyware software too: Windows Defender

 

[Fuzzyblob]

OK, what do you guys think of this P/S?
http://www.pricegrabber.com/search_techspecs_full.php/masterid=19777088

I know it's a little bit of overkill, but still, the difference between this guy and standard 600watter is about $20, so what the hell.

 

[D1gger]

Originally posted by: Fuzzyblob
Huh, well the P/S certainly seems to be the villain of choice, here and in other places, but I'd still like to chime this in: I suppose the P/S might be the problem, I have reason to believe it's not the culprit. The reason is that I've tried temporarily removing the sound card, one DIMM of the RAM, and unplugging the video card and both DVD drives, yet the boot up still fails in the exact same place every single time. If you tell to boot Windows normally, there's a pause, a blue screen of death flashes on the screen for a couple milliseconds, the display goes dead for around 20 seconds, and then the whole thing just shuts off. If you tell it proceed in Safe Mode, it shows the files as they're being loaded, pauses once it gets to one called (I think) c:/Windows/system32/drivers/Mup.sys, the screen signal is lost, the computer just stays there for about 20 seconds, and then it turns off. It seems that if lack of power or something like that's the problem, it wouldn't be so predictable and always stop at the same file (Mups.sys), especially if the power supply didn't have to feed as many components, and even more so if it was the video card. Am I completely off the mark, and also, do you have any recommendations for a power supply? Will anything do as long as it's ATX, 500watts or more, a good name brand and has a good warranty? Thanks.

You might want to check this link and see if you are having the same problem as these other folks.

 

[Fuzzyblob]

OK, so on Monday night I'm going to try repairing/reinstalling Windows, and whenever the P/S comes (probably about Thursday) I'll install that little bird and see if that makes a difference if the problem hasn't already been resolved by the Windows tinkering. So I'll get back to you guys on Monday with news of whether it worked or not, and thanks a million for all your help!

 

[Fuzzyblob]

Well, I'm currently writing this on the newly upgraded and fully functioning system thanks to a handy Repair installation of Windows, and to prevent any future issues yet to arise, a nice shiny 700watt OCZ GamerXStream P/S is slated to arrive tomorrow in the mail. Thanks to everybody for all your help and advice, it's been invaluable in solving this crisis! And now on to claim my seven virgin computer components....