Little trouble getting windows to work after mobo change

S

sram

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jul 30, 2007
Messages
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Hello folks. My mobo went bad and I had to get a new one and install it. It is much healthier to reinstall windows after the mobo swap, so that was my plan. Anyways, to my surprise the very first time I turned the pc on after the swap, windows booted successfully with no problems whatsoever. I just restarted and put my windows DVD in to boot from it and format the OS drive and make a fresh install of windows. It booted, but freezed during setup. Since then, anything I try with this pc will be interrupted by an unrecoverable freeze. I tried many things. Safe mode, booting from another disk, trying to run useful bootable cd's with no avail(ubcd, gparted magic, avira......etc). It will just freeze somewhere in the beginning. Even booting into windows whicmh was successful the very time, just ends up being freezed.n I removed the other two drives and only kept the OS one. That didn't help. I have a feeling that is just conflicting drivers or something. If the OS drive get formatted and loses all old stuff, I think it will work.

What do you think I should do? it is a software problem/conflict I think because I can stay in BIOS for hours without facing the freezing problem!

Thanks
 
Are you still overclocked with the new board?
Have you thoroughly tested other components such as ram and video card?
 
Sorry for not being clear. The rig you see in my sig is my main machine. This is another machine. It is an AMD 3200+ machine with 2GB RAM and 3 PATA hard drives. The mobo used to be a gigabyte 7n400. It started to have its caps grow and leak. It was dying. So I bought a new mobo from a nice member here and now i'm not able to get started with it. Weird stupid issue. Hopefully the new mobo is not the culprit!!

Do you think it is the mobo?
 
ahh, I see.
So are you overclocking or not? If you are go back to stock clocks.

Also I've seen it a few times before that even if mobos from two makers have the exact same chipset windows is never really all that happy. You could try to boot into safe mode then uninstall all the drivers related to the mobo.

Now would also be the time to backup what you need from the old drive just in case things go south and you need to do a complete reinstall... Which BTW I'd recommend a fresh install anyway. that always seemed easier then trying to sort out driver bugs when swapping out major pieces of hardware on the computer.
 
pwrusr said:
ahh, I see.
So are you overclocking or not? If you are go back to stock clocks.

Also I've seen it a few times before that even if mobos from two makers have the exact same chipset windows is never really all that happy. You could try to boot into safe mode then uninstall all the drivers related to the mobo.

Now would also be the time to backup what you need from the old drive just in case things go south and you need to do a complete reinstall... Which BTW I'd recommend a fresh install anyway. that always seemed easier then trying to sort out driver bugs when swapping out major pieces of hardware on the computer.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply. Overclocking? The machine is for my kids so no overclocking. Besides, what will I gain for overclocking a 3200+ machine in the days of sandybridge. And like I said, I want to just do a fresh install of windows to avoid the problems you mentioned but the problem is that I can't even successfully boot into anything without freezing. Safemode doesn't help, it also freezes.

No data will be lost. The data isn't in the OS drive. it is somewhere else. I think I'll just format the whole disk in another machine, and see what happens after that.

Thanks.
 
Woah, I see now... so even with the windows install disk it will freeze during install??
Sounds like you could have one of many issues. I would suggest going into the bios and "load defults" and or reset the CMOS via the jumper on the motherboard (while mechine is unplugged).

You might also have a stick of bad ram... try to run "memtest86" and see if it picks up any errors. If it fails try one stick of ram then the other to determine if it's just one or both sticks.
 
How did you know your old motherboard was going bad? You most likely have faulty ram.
 
nOrVow said:
How did you know your old motherboard was going bad? You most likely have faulty ram.
Click to expand...

Well, I was having some issues plus the mobo was going to die eventually. Some caps were about to explode. They were leaking. The system started acting funny, and I knew it was the mobo because I had this problem before.

Faulty RAM? It is actually possible. The two sticks I have aren't the best quality. I think I should quit being lazy and run memtest. But, you know, being the enthusiastic I'm, I frequently check for parts errors using various tools. I don't remember the ram having issues, but will need to check again.


Thanks for the tip.
 
sram said:
Memtest reported no errors at all! In spite of that, I removed one stick, and viola things started working again.

I now know where my problems are coming from:

http://vip.asus.com/forum/view.aspx...e&id=20090922235529156&page=1&SLanguage=en-us

!!

God help me resolve this !
Click to expand...

If this is your board:
02.JPG


Are you using the BLUE slots with the ram?
 
sram said:
Yes, but why? In order to be in dual channel mode, you will have to use one of the blue slots.

So why?


Thanks
Click to expand...
I remember most NF2 boards having dual channel modes only when using the lighter colored slots leaving the black one empty. Though the layout of the asus board is a little different from how my epox NF2 is laid out.

Looking at the manual for your board on pages 2-8 and 2-9 shows that dual channel modes work when using slots 1 & 3 or 2 & 3.
perhaps a solder joint on one of the slots that you were using is bad?
 
Rule # 1

When building a new computer, never attempt to install windows without running and passing Memtest +


Specifically Test 3,4,5,7 More passes are better.

If the screen is full of red errors, either fix your settings in the BIOS and or replace your defective CPU, Memory or Power supply.

No errors.....great you can probably install windows.
 
Mackintire said:
Rule # 1

When building a new computer, never attempt to install windows without running and passing Memtest +


Specifically Test 3,4,5,7 More passes are better.

If the screen is full of red errors, either fix your settings in the BIOS and or replace your defective CPU, Memory or Power supply.

No errors.....great you can probably install windows.
Click to expand...

It is not really a new build. I just changed mobos. Things were okay before if I compare it to now. I wanted to avoid having the whole system die because of the old mobo. Now I can't even use it with the new one. Weird.

I ran memtest and it gave no errors (One pass though). And I don't see why it could be the CPU. Old cpu yes, but cpus rarely go bad. And the power supply is relatively new.

Thanks.
 
Something I read up on about this Asus that you're using... Make sure the memory speed is set for 333 and NOT 400MHz. Apparently the higher speeds cause stability issues.
 
You know what guys? I just installed windows xp and now everything is fine. I had to install it from the hard drive to avoid Optical drive read errors. Also, it was necessary to format the old partition that holds the OS, otherwise, it won't complete the install.

Back to windows XP. XP is fine in this machine. I'll just keep it. I think it is a wise decision.
 
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