Quake3World

Recently my pc has been doing odd things on a cold bootup. Seems fine when rebooting from warm. It takes several resets when booting from cold. It'll get to various stages of booting up before freezing, such as freezing very early at the bootscreen bitmap or even before that. Sometimes after booting and getting to the desktop, the mouse pointer freezes. And sometimes after it's been booted up for a while, I'll look at my pc and find the screen has gone blank as if the monitor had been turned off. Nothing happens if I press any keys so I have to press reset.

I did a chkdsk and it found some bad sectors. It replaced these it said and by the end of the check it said volume clean and booted up. I've done a virus check today with AVG and it found half a dozen of J|S psyme which it moved to the virus vault. It also says C:/Windows/system 32/ntoskrnl.exe changed but doesn't do anything to rectify it. Defrag analysis says I don't need to defragment. Any ideas what the problem might be? Hard drive failing? Motherboard? Something else?

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just before windows splash screen press F8 .. choose
boot with last known good configuration ..test stability
>>
Boot in safe mode "F8" then see if all is good.
check disk , check for virii etc ...test stability
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save all important files on backup disk then
system restore to a point where you know windows ran great. ...test stability
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boot normally
download Advanced Windows Care or JV16powertools .. scan repair registry , find\remove badass startup items ...test stability

make sure all hardware and wiring is seated properly ,remove dust\gunk\hidden spliffs anywhere it is seen inside the computer case.
...test stability
good luck MurD

Thanks ax. I'll do some of those things later. Already had done the chkdsk and virus check. Here's something else that's been happening and happened again today after several attempts to boot. It will sometimes go to the bios screen by itself. Could it be a cpu problem? It's saying improper cpu speed setting, but it's always been 1667mhz. I have an old athlon XP2000+ which is 1.7ghz.

They always round up when it comes to CPU speed, 1667Mhz is 1.7Ghz.

Download this app called HW monitor:
http://www.cpuid.com/hwmonitor.php

Run it for a bit and do stuff ( 2-10 mins surf the forums or something to waste time ), Take a Screenie (print screen), and post the screen shot and it should look something like this ( mine will have a lot more junk on it then yours... )


p.s. Cold boot issues: Hardware
running issues: Hardware/software ( could be one, could be both )

Thanks amidy, yep, I know that 1667mhz means 1.7GHz.
I have a horrible feeling the cpu needs replacing. However, I don't recall any other problems other than bootup regarding the cpu. Or maybe the really old bios file is incompatible with my new graphics card. I always get a dos type message at the top left corner as the first thing that shows up on booting, it details the 7600GS card I have before going to the bootscreen bitmap. I don't remember getting that with the previous card, the 9800pro. Anyway, here's some screenshots from various programs. I downloaded HW Monitor but it only shows one thing

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.fiv ... hot428.jpg

Here's one using MBM5. Temperatures might seem high, but it's always been like this, and putting my hand over the rear vent, it's running quite cool.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.fiv ... hot435.jpg

Here's some using CPU-Z

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.fiv ... hot431.jpg
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.fiv ... hot432.jpg
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.fiv ... hot433.jpg
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.fiv ... hot434.jpg

Hummm, Hwmonitor didnt show anything else?

i was mainly hoping for the Volts then the Temps.. Polomono's Run hot as hell... i had one for a bit and i almost went nuts trying to keep the thing cool.. Hello Thoroughbred B !

anyway, i'm worried that the PSU is kacking out, thats usually the first thing on my list when it comes to shotty boots.

edit: how long did you run MBM5?

try a slower cpu setting or bios defaults for that cpu ... test

heat does not seem to be the problem.
try disabling a case fans or two and see if the problem goes away.

borrow a psu from a freind .. 400 Watts or more

allo amidy

Yeah, I might try a lower cpu setting. Well, I doubt it's the psu. This is the fan:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/merlin.five/psu%20box.jpg

which was fitted march 2005. Do they tend to wear out after 3 and a half years? I can feel it blowing out cool air from the rear so the fan is working. I really need to open up the case and make sure all connections are tight.

AmIdYfReAk wrote:
how long did you run MBM5?

Not for long, just loaded it to see what my temps were.

Could you load it up and leave it run in the background for a bit? Continue doing what it is that you do on your comp..

then post a screenie..

And its no that PSU's have a life to them, i have a few that are 8+ years old.. and i've had ones that have lasted me ~2weeks... then there are others scattered in between.

i mention disabling a fan or two because it looks like you have 4.
if a video card is stressing your Available Wattage then stopping a fan or two might stabilize the system Thusly finding ze problem.
follow exactly what Amidah says , he nose his stuff.

How old is your motherboard? Sometime the mobo's battery needs to be replaced. The near dead battery can cause the mobo to lose settings and start-ups can become erratic.

I think I found the problem.

Ok, tomorrow I shall buy a Hitachi 500gb ide drive, (I only have ide), change booting to CD, connect new drive, put failing drive as secondary drive in secondary slave position, and install windows. That sound right? Now, I'll need to transfer everything from my failing drive to the new drive, that's about 100gb of files. Can I use the windows backup feature to do this? Or do I just right click on the whole volume (the old drive) and click copy and then paste the whole drive content into the new drive, or even open the old drive and copy all the folders? I'm just wondering if one method or another allows the programs to work without having to reinstall them, like existing games

Most games have registry entries so they will need to be reinstalled.

As for the data do what you said above then create a folder on the new drive (eg. BACKUPS). then open the old failing drives and copy relevant data to the new folder. There isn't much point in copying the system files from the old install over.

Will do Mr.T.