VERY messed up computer problem.

[RyanVM]

I'm having major issues with my girlfriend's computer and any help you guys could lend would be GREATLY appreciated.

First off, the obligatory specs:
MSI 6340M Ver1 KT133M Chipset Mobo
AMD Duron 750 (NOT OVERCLOCKED)
Version 4.7 BIOS
IBM Deskstar 60GXP 20GB Hard Drive
Linksys 10/100 Network Card
Generic CDROM/Floppy Drives

For some background information, this computer originally ran WinME until last September when I upgraded her (full format/install) to WinXP SP1. The computer ran flawlessly for her until about a month ago. She called me to tell me that upon turning her computer on one day, that Windows was immediately BSODing on her immediately after the WinXP splash screen displayed on bootup then restarted itself. This continued in an endless loop.

Over the phone, we tried to launch the WinXP recovery console to run scandisk because I figured that maybe a file had corrupted itself or something. The computer was unable to see the hard drive. I figured dead hard drive (it IS an IBM after all ). I told her the bad news that the hard drive was likely dead and would need replacement and she likely lost all her data. Not an acceptable answer to her, she decided to try booting up one more time, and IT WORKED...perfectly. Like nothing had ever happened.

I had her ran Norton Disk Doctor on the drive and it found no errors. Needless to say, I wasn't convinced that she was out of the woods, so I had her backup all her important data and set her up with backup software that would do nightly backups of her important stuff.

All seemed to be well until about a week ago when she called me to say that the problem had returned. She was having internet connection problems so she shut her computer down. When she turned it back on, she was greeted by the same BSOD/restart loop that she had seen earlier.

This takes us to today. Still figuring it was/is an IBM problem, I downloaded their drive fitness test and ran the advanced test on her drive. It passed with ZERO problems. Just for kicks, I performed a Low Level Format on the drive and its MBR.

I then booted off the WinXP CD to reinstall Windows. Imagine my surprise when WinXP setup reported the drive's size as 2016MB rather than 19000MB!!!! I took the drive out of her computer and put it in my own and examined it with Partition Magic 8. My computer properly recognized it as a 20GB drive and PM8 said there were errors with the partition table on the drive. I thought, "Great! That was probably the problem all along!" I fixed the errors, put the drive back in her computer, and restarted WinXP setup. Sure enough, WinXP Setup now saw the drive as 20GB!

I installed WinXP on the computer, reinstalled her apps, and all seemed well - until I shutdown for the first time. Upon turning the computer back on, THE SAME PROBLEM HAPPENED AGAIN! This problem only happens when I shut the computer off. Restarting does NOT cause any problems.

This is where I'm currently at. I apologize for the length of this story, but there's a lot of info to this story! I'm currently in the process of getting a new hard drive for the computer to verify that it's not a hard drive issue. Does anybody have a clue what this could be?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Malladine]

Could still be a bad HDD man...certainly sounds that way considering the discrepancy between restarting and actually shutting down.

What kind of stuff does she need that would prevent buying a new hdd (a maxtor/seagate!)? Could just install a CDRW and burn.

A question: If you shut it down and the problem occurs, how do you boot it up correctly to remove the issue? Or do you have to go into PM8 again?

 

[WarCon]

If your dealing with bad data being written to the hard drive, which is what this sounds like, you could have several different problems. Your original idea could be correct, but there are other possibilities. You could have a bad IDE cable, a bad controller on the motherboard, bad ram, maybe even a marginal powersupply.

For the memory you could run memtest86 overnight to see if its the culprit. (Runs off of a boot floppy)
Swap IDE cables to see if they are faulty.
To test for the motherboard or powersupply you would have to do swap testing.

Good luck

 

[PhaZe]

write down the code it gives you in the blue screen.

you can go to the microsoft knowledge database and search the code and it will tell you what it means.

 

[RyanVM]

OK, I managed to figure out a way to make it boot. If I boot into Safe Mode with Command Prompt, it allows me to boot. I can then restart the computer and use it normally.

When I restarted, I was able to go into the Advanced System Properties and tell it not to reboot upon a system error. The blue screen is caused by an unmountable boot volume!

New hard drive time...

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Did you use the recovery console after booting from the XP CD and run fixboot, fixmbr, and chkdsk /r/f?

 

[RyanVM]

Like I said before: "Over the phone, we tried to launch the WinXP recovery console to run scandisk because I figured that maybe a file had corrupted itself or something. The computer was unable to see the hard drive"

I just had a very good conversation with an IBM support person, however. He suggested it may be a dying BIOS battery. Given the circumstances and nature of the problem, I'm thinking that this very might be. That would explain why it came from nowhere after a year and a half, why it only happens from cold boots, why the drive passes all tests OK and reads fine in other computers.

I'm going to get a new one tomorrow and try it out. I'll let you guys know what results!

 

[RyanVM]

Well, a new BIOS battery didn't fix it. Oh well, at least it was only $2...

 

[RyanVM]

OK, I quit

I borrowed a Maxtor 3GB hard drive from somebody to try installing WinXP on that computer with. IBM refused to replace the drive since it was passing their tests unless I was able to install successfully on another drive.

I installed WinXP on the drive, did all the random updates from WindowsUpdate, and shut down. Turned the computer back on, computer booted no problem! I think to myself, great, it's the drive!

So for kicks I hooked up the 20GB drive to show another person the problem. I turn the computer on, AND IT BOOTS NO PROBLEM! I shut down. Turn the computer back on. Boots up no problem. Shut down, reboot, no problem.

Beats the living crap out of me what happened, but the problem seems to have gone away! Once again, I quit

 

[WildMonkeyLover]

Re-install from scratch with the full format option (not quick), if it detects HD errors or if just plain doesn't want to do it buy another HD.

 

[RyanVM]

Did you read my last post wrong? I said it works now.

 

[Bacinator]

I had similar problem. Ended up being hard drive. Poo. My Problem