Help needed: problem installing XP on new system

[kony]

Apparently there are 2 versions. If there is
on board video then the monitor will be
connected over near the mouse/keyboard connectors.
Then memory allocation is done on the advanced bios
menu under chipset configuration.
There won't be a way to turn off the onboard, except
to not provide memory for it if you have a PCI or AGP video
card inserted.

That will turn it off. Earlier video like KM133 couldn't be turned off
but it didn't provide the AGP port, only chance for adding a video card
was one PCI-based. KM266 should do so automatically when AGP card is
used.. AGP is a port not a bus, only one device will be enabled at a
time.

 

[GJ]

The board is the K7VM2 R3.0. It has, as you say, the monitor connector next
to the mouse/keyboard connector. I took the video card from my own PC and
installed that and turned off the shared memory for graphics - still no
luck. Tried a brand new memory stick, still no luck so doesn't look like
memory is the problem. So I'm down to it being a problem with the
motherboard, or processor, or the settings, but I'm at a loss as to what.

 

[kony]

I've just ran memtest, just on the standard mode, and let it do 4 passes.
It came up with no errors - however, it only seemed to test 96 meg (I
assume, since the message on the screen said "testing 96K - 96M") and also
next to Memory it said 96M, even though its a stick of 128 meg installed.
I'm even more confused...

Maybe the memory isn't the problem, but a mere 4 passes on memtest86 isn't
conclusive, it should be ran for several hours even on a system that
doesn't have any problems.... a day or longer on a system that does.

 

[GJ]

The board is the K7VM2 R3.0. It has, as you say, the monitor connector next
to the mouse/keyboard connector. I took the video card from my own PC and
installed that and turned off the shared memory for graphics - still no
luck. Tried a brand new memory stick, still no luck so doesn't look like
memory is the problem. So I'm down to it being a problem with the
motherboard, or processor, or the settings, but I'm at a loss as to what.

 

[kony]

<snip, snip, snip?>

I was hoping the problem would be resolved already, because the opening
post was a whopper... so many varables and so little background info that
it pretty much needs redone completely... likely the size and arrangement
of the info has turned away some posters from responding.

... new hard drive (Maxtor 40GB Fireball 3 5400RPM)
and tried to install it. Turns out that the motherboard seemed to have gone
as well.

Turned out? What, EXACTLY, was the situation?
You are quite sure the motherboard was the problem, not some other,
heatsink, fan, power supply, etc, problem?

I'm already confused... friend had working system, then attempt at adding
new hard drive, and suddenly motherboard fails?

Suggested he get a basic system without hard drive and I would fit
hard drive and his CD writer and DVD rom to the new system. Got case,
motherboard (ECS / ASROCK M810LMR) chip (Duron 1600 mhz) all assembled and I
put in hard drive, CD and DVD drives. Pretty straightforward so far...

That new case, did it come with a generic power supply (what power supply
is being used, make/model) or did you reuse the original? Had/have you
done any testing of either power supply? These questions may be premature
since I don't know what the original problem was.

Set computer to boot from CD, Stuck in the XP CD, get to the "press a key to
boot from cd" and try to format the harddrive to NTFS. The formatting gets
to 100% then a new page comes up with the message "Setup was unable to
format the partition. The disk may be damaged". Odd I thought as it was a
brand new hard drive. Tried again but this time doing a quick NTFS format.
Seemed to get through that OK, then it started to copy files from CD, then
got a message "could not find xxx file" (or something). Tried this a few
times and the file which it stopped at seemed to be random. Maybe it was
the CD, I thought...

Did the motherboard (at the time) support hard drives over 32GB in size?

Attached the hard drive to my own PC, stuck in the XP disk, hard drive
formatted and installed XP first time, no probelms at all. Stuck the hard
drive in the other PC and it got to the xp loading screen then came up with
a bunch of errors about configuration and settings (sorry can't be more
specific) which was fair enough as the computer has different motherboard,
processor etc. to mine. Tried to reinstall XP and came across same problems
as before again. Thought maybe it was the IDE cable which was taken from my
friend's old PC...

Stuck a new IDE cable in, same problems... Thought it was something to do
with the CD or DVD drive, so put MY CD drive (which installed XP onto my PC)
into the new PC (whilst removing the other CD and DVD drive), same problems.
Also tried it with the CD IDE cable from my PC too, still no luck.

If all else fails you might've just copied the CD to a folder on the HDD
while it was in your PC. However you might've also checked the bios on
his system to confirm that the new drive was detected properly, in
addition to rechecking the jumpers on it and any other device on same IDE
cable. Also resetting the board's bios to defaults, possibly updating the
bios, might be helpful.

There are other weird things happening as well. Computer hangs at random
places during startup e.g. when the message comes up to press a key to boot
from CD. If it gets passed this point and it starts to load files to
initialise the installation (before it tries to format drive) sometimes it
hangs here, or I sometimes get messages saying "The file xxx could not be
found". Basically the problems seem to happen on a random basis and it just
seems luck that it gets to the formatting stage.

I'm at a standstill as to what to try next.

Somethings I've noticed during this: If I enter BIOS setup (pressing F2)
and set the floppy drive and the CD as the only bootable items, then upon
reboot enter the boot menu (pressing F11) it lists the bootable times,
Floppy: 1.44 floppy drive, Hard drive: Maxtor..., CD: <blank>, like its not
recognising the CD drive, but the PC does auto detect the CD at startup.
Could it be a settings conflict between hard drive and CD drive? and if so
how would i fix this?

It shouldn't be, you should leave the settings on defaults, "auto" if
that's a choice. Leave all items as bootable, then with neither the
floppy or HDD being bootable, it should boot from the CD.

If the power supply is a low-end part like the mainboards, replace it.
Spending a lot of time troubleshooting but still ending up with all
questionable parts is potentially creating multiple problems. You have
another power supply, temporarily swapping it in might be telling.

On the other hand, if it's a decent power supply, visit a web forum and
see if there are issues specific to your motherboard.
http://forums.amdmb.com is one example.

Check temps too, verify the heatsink is being installed correctly. Set
the motherboard to the lowest (underclocked if possible) speed it'll run
and see if that makes a difference.

 

[GJ]

oh right ;-) I just assumed that it would keep going and going until i told
it to stop. Anyway, got some other brand new memory and same problems still
persist, so guess it's not that then. Got one of my friends around who is a
really good techie and he thought the problems were seriously weird and had
never seen anything like it before. He works in the networking/IT
department of a university so he has taken it there to let some of the other
techies take a look. Just wait to see what happens, I suppose...

G.J.

 

[GJ]

<snip, snip, snip?>

I was hoping the problem would be resolved already, because the opening
post was a whopper... so many varables and so little background info that
it pretty much needs redone completely... likely the size and arrangement
of the info has turned away some posters from responding.


Turned out? What, EXACTLY, was the situation?
You are quite sure the motherboard was the problem, not some other,
heatsink, fan, power supply, etc, problem?

I'm already confused... friend had working system, then attempt at adding
new hard drive, and suddenly motherboard fails?

To be honest, I don't know that the motherboard was the problem, but telling
the symptoms to a couple of more hardware technically minded friends, they
thought it was. The reason we thought this was the problem with the old
hard drive was when attempting to, for example, format it, it came up with
the error "cannot write to hard drive" or something like that. When the new
hard drive was installed and a format was attempted, same message came up.
When the old hard drive was connected as a slave to a different PC, it was
found to have a number of bad sectors. I didn't want to try to continue
formatting the new hard drive on the first PC as I thought there may be a
possibility that it could damage the disk. When formatting the new hard
drive on a different PC, it formatted no problem (and luckily no bad
sectors). Therefore assumed problem was with motherboard. Maybe it wasn't
but I didn't want to risk damaging a brand new hard drive.

That new case, did it come with a generic power supply (what power supply
is being used, make/model) or did you reuse the original? Had/have you
done any testing of either power supply? These questions may be premature
since I don't know what the original problem was.

It didn't actually come with a power supply so I used the one from the
original computer. You think perhaps the power supply is at fault? If so
could it have blown something on the new mobo? I have since been using the
power supply that I use for my PC (as I am working on it at my house) but
hasn't made any difference. Unless, of course, the damage has already been
done.

Did the motherboard (at the time) support hard drives over 32GB in size?

Don't know. However, I couldn't even get to the stage to even partition the
drive as I was getting the "cannot write to hard drive" before I even got to
that stage.

If all else fails you might've just copied the CD to a folder on the HDD
while it was in your PC. However you might've also checked the bios on
his system to confirm that the new drive was detected properly, in
addition to rechecking the jumpers on it and any other device on same IDE
cable. Also resetting the board's bios to defaults, possibly updating the
bios, might be helpful.

Checked jumpers on mobo and they are correct for the processor, BIOS seems
to be the latest version. PC detected the hard drive correctly. I did
manage to install XP when the hard drive was in my PC and it worked no
problem.

It shouldn't be, you should leave the settings on defaults, "auto" if
that's a choice. Leave all items as bootable, then with neither the
floppy or HDD being bootable, it should boot from the CD.

If the power supply is a low-end part like the mainboards, replace it.
Spending a lot of time troubleshooting but still ending up with all
questionable parts is potentially creating multiple problems. You have
another power supply, temporarily swapping it in might be telling.

On the other hand, if it's a decent power supply, visit a web forum and
see if there are issues specific to your motherboard.
http://forums.amdmb.com is one example.

Check temps too, verify the heatsink is being installed correctly. Set
the motherboard to the lowest (underclocked if possible) speed it'll run
and see if that makes a difference.

Thanks for taking the time to reply. Basically I've used componenets that I
know to work (CD drive from my PC, two different sets of memory, hard
drive's been checked, new IDE cables). The only things that have remained
the same are the motherboard, processor and case. Believe me, I wish I
hadn't been asked to sort this out in the first place, but when you work in
IT, non-computer minded people automatically assume you know everyting to do
with computers, even though I'm a programmer and my hardware skills are
pretty limited. Never mind, I'm sure it'll get sorted in the end, somehow
or other...

G.J.