getting desperate

Joao Sapiro

ok you guys remeber my shit kicking pc that had psu problems ? well, since i have all my stuff there and all my work, formating is is out of question since i have to do loads of stuff that sincerely i cant...whats the best solution ? rpair windows !

when it gets to the part : installing devices, it advances till the part that says "34 minutes left" and my screen gets black like if it is turned off, and i cant say if the computer is working or not since it apparently stops using screen...what the hell is happening ???
ok, i create a floppy of SATA\raid drivers 32 bits , boot from winows cd , and selet the option to repair. all good here, but wait :


in the part it says : instaling

sledgy

It's running into a device that it can't handle. My guess is that it's a malfunctioning device. In this case I'd troubleshoot by brute force approach. If you have an old video card you can use try installing that since it's hanging at the display detection. Next I'd swap the motherboard/memory.

bearkub

No offense man, but from all the trouble you are/having been having with that machine, I think it may be time to throw in the towel and take it to a professional.

Joao Sapiro

i wish i could , im at spain and the guy that assembled this fixes stuff for free , the problem is i cant pay a professional as i have little money to it i payed 3000 euros for this piece of shit and that guy will make what i spent worth not even that i have to force him to blow m socks !

please keep giving suggestions

Motz

pop the drive into another system and recover the data first. then rebuild windows. That is you absolute safest bet. You may also try a semi-risky OS rebuild here: http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

It may no work and you may loose data. Like I said, just get your valuable files off the drive first which is simple if the drive is functioning and the file system is fine.

On a side note. If your mobo has custom 3rd party raid drivers, you may want to get a floppy or cd of those drivers. When you first setup widows it asks you briefly to press f6 i think to install these drivers. Technically a windows repair, is'nt what you think it is. Or is'nt what it should be.

Joao Sapiro

i used the CD from the motherboard and made a floppywith the sata and RAID drivers needed for it , and yeah i also did the pressing F6, then i press E and select the drivers from the list ( appears me two ) and then i hit enter, and it detects the copy, all in etc, but it always stops at 34 minutes and is pissing me off...

notman

Fill me in with what you are doing... that first post in confusing. Are you saying you're trying a reinstall of windows? One thing you may want to try is to boot from the windows disk, then tell it you want to do a new install. Then when it gets to the screen where it says there is another version of windows, choose to repair it. This is different than the repair option you get earlier in the install process.

I still think your motherboard is screwed though

rawkstar

i've had it crash while installing windows all the time, ended up fixing it by pulling all the ram out and leaving just one stick in then put everything back in when i installed everything.

notman

Good point... you should try using just one ram stick (if you have two installed)

Joao Sapiro

ok , here are the exact steps :

1 - i started by putting the motherboard cd in the driver and boot from it, and choose to create a disk with the drivers etc needed for the F6 part. It didnt work as the drivers didnt allow windows to detect the hard drive.

2 - i used the disk in windows and made the disk from the program they had , SATA\RAID drivers 32 bits, etc...

3 - Reboot with windows CD on drive, choose to boot from CD all ok , i press F6 and when it asks me to specify what to install i have to press E , i put the floppy disk and select
all the drivers it list ( they are two and have "recomended" next to them ) , i select them and press Enter , and it starts loading some stuff and it then detects my hard drive and the copy of windows XP , i select it and choose repair R .

4 - it starts copying the files, etc everything ok , the windows setup starts and goes to the "installing devices part" where it seems to block at 34 minuts left\turns off monitor.

5 - i havnt had lunch nor breakfast with this as i am very frustated !

ewooz

[ QUOTE ]
pop the drive into another system and recover the data first.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, that's what I did when my work PC crashed. The motherboard was destroyed. I simply took the hard drive out and installed it in another PC. Took me 5 mins. That's the safest bet. And you can then take all the backups you need and stuff. But of course that would be a problem if you do not have another PC available. Perhaps borrow it from a friend or something...

Also try to check every card, take them out and re-insert, see if there's any dust or something causing trouble...

Motz

are you actually using the sata raid features? If no your sata bus will be picked up as a standard sata setup with no raid. Have you tried to install windows without the raid drivers? I have the same setup, My mobo supports RAID but I don't use it yet.

The system turning off the monitor is odd. Windows setup does'nt have power off or standby features at that point. It may still be a power issue from the first thread, it may be your xp cd is scratched, your mobo or ram may be bad.

Do what the other folks said, exchange one hardware item at a time. Start with the ram. Use one stick at a time durring the install. Alternate if it fails. If both single sticks fail, swap the video card. If that fails try a diferent cd/dvd drive. If that fails, well you get it.

You need to take it to a shop at the worst, or a tech friend. You dont live in the states, or i'd offer some assistance. Number one priority, get that drive to another SATA ready system and backup your data. All this re-installing could cause issues. I hope you are not formatting or changing file system when you install.

JKMakowka

First of all, get a Linux live CD like "Knoppix" and see if that runs fine (if so it really is most likely a windows problem), and while you are at it try to save your important data to a usb stick, just to make sure.

Motz

JK, he's not even in Windows yet, the install is some horribly rudimentary application that very rarely fails. It's meant to be as compatible as possible, running in extremely low level hardware access modes. But it's a good idea to test. You can even most likely recover your files to a secondary drive that way. I know Ubuntu and Slax can access NTFS fairly easily.

Sage

When my pc recently died on me I was able to access the data on my harddrive by converting it to an external hard drive. I bought a hard drive usb enclosure, it cost me 20 usd. It might help you to easily backup your data by taking it to a friend's pc. I didn't know those devices existed so I thought it might help to share. Windows automatically detects the device and has the drivers for it. Good luck.

Alex

sledgy

This isn't about a hard drive controller driver issue. It's locking up while detecting hardware which is well after where it asks to install Windows. You have hardware that Setup can't deal with because it's broken. If you have files on the drive you need you should get those backed up before troubleshooting any further.

Joao Sapiro

ok , i spoke with the technitian and he told me that there were missing files in my windows that thanks for the previous shutdowns got deleted ,so im formatiing ( putted windows on my backup disk ) and lets see what happends...

ebagg

This might have been suggested, but I'll throw it in there for hope of helping; since reformatting the drive is out of the question, why not get a new hard drive as your master drive? HDs go for so cheap these days it'll barely cost you anything to get a new one, use it as the master and install windows on that one.

FightingChance

As an aside, you if try to access files on a hard drive that was once your main windows install, and those files are inside a protected space (like My Documents for your login), you will need to re-assign the owner and permissions of the directories/files to yourself on the new Windows install, even if your login name, rights and password are the same.

Joao Sapiro

ok...i formated C ,and saved most of my files so theres no real bugger , i am currently installing all the progies etc , i really hope that nothing goes wrong this time

P.S - when instaling drivers i it better to completely unistall the others or i simply run the instaler etc ?

( n vidia graphic card, realtek audio etc...)

and the other question is : how do i delete windows fro the backup disk ?


thank you soo much for you guys help !!

Thegodzero

I have been doing just what ebagg said for years now. Every time my comp dies i just buy a new one and make it the new master and put the other one as a slave then reinstall shit and keep moving on.

Psyk0

Here's a tip: it's probably too late, but you should create 1 partition for the OS duh (like 20 or 40 gig) of course install winblows & software on it. Put all your "important" gimp pr0n on the other partition(s).

Now next time something blows up you can restore a backup or format and reinstall without losing/moving your important data.

notman

[ QUOTE ]

P.S - when instaling drivers i it better to completely unistall the others or i simply run the instaler etc ?

and the other question is : how do i delete windows fro the backup disk ?

[/ QUOTE ]
Usually the drivers from the manufacturer can safely be installed without removing the default windows drivers. Remember to do all of your drivers, including the chipset/motherboard drivers.

Is your backup disk just another hard drive? If so, the best option would be to just copy the files off that you want, and reformat that drive.

Mark Dygert

This is the experience almost everyone goes through. This is the road some of us must travel before building our own systems. Its a well traveled road even if not everyone goes down it.

The Journey:
- You don't want a pre-built as your needs are higher than what they build or the systems they make that actually do what you need are too expensive. Not knowing or not wanting to build your own you decided to have one built, by a friend, by a small local shop, by a family member.

- In an effort to come in under actual build cost but still dig you (the customer) for full price, cheap parts are used. This maximizes profits and they get to test out new cheap hardware. Pieces the person wouldn't normally use but hey profit is profit and its not their system. If the test is successful, meaning they don't have to spend hours building a proper system after yours goes up in a puff of blue smoke, then they can (sucker) use the parts in other systems.

- Something goes wrong, lack of support leaves you to your own devices, much frustration fallows, maybe even the use of improvised tools such as hammers, axes and large magnets are called in to fix the problem. Normally its duct tape, spit and 50+ trips/orders of misc parts, that keep the system running for the next few year.

- Finally the frustration grows to a new level, the hardware becomes out dated and the alter of shame is replaced. This is the cross roads. Hopefully your travels have provided you with some much needed skills and you have learned what NOT to do in the future. At crossroads the signs read:

5mi to Doiturselfville:
With a big knot in your stomach and stories about people installing their processor incorrectly buzzing in your head, you do your research and build your own. Magically the last systems problems seem small and petty and your issues that pop up are nothing compared to last one.

OR

50mi to Ohshitnotagainhaven:
You fall into the same old trap, doomed to repeat your previous crimes against custom computers. Like the poor, lost, pink sock that never finds its mate or its way out of the dryer. Or the monkey that can never figure out that if he just lets go of what was in the trap, he could get his hand out the hole and go free.

Don't be the pink sock wearing monkey...

Joao Sapiro

lol vig , that made me chuckle eheh , i fall for that in my last computer heh , this one is built by a long friend of my father, everything i top quality as i saw him and helped him to put the pc up and running eheh , we werent counting on the psu issue , he thought that 560 W would be enough , so after thing mess he sent me free a psu specifically for the sli`s...lets just say im REALLY unlucky with computers...