This old pc, whats wrong with it?!?!

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XxMe_LoCoxX

Gawd
Joined
Apr 19, 2002
Messages
561
hi, my friend gave me this old pc with a 500mghz procesor on it, i was planing on using it as a jukebox, how ever there is a big problem with it, i have tried just about everything i could think of, so now i come to you, for a lil profesional hellp.

the problem is every time i turn it on with just a freshly formated 80 gig hd, after the POST it tells me, veryfing dma pood data..........................boot disk failiure, insert system boot disk and press enter. how ever it also does this when there are no cd, floppy or harddrives hooked up to it. im all out of ideas, could some one please hellp me out?

thanks.
 
You need to reinstall Windows, or it's possible that the 80GB is dead. Also check the Bios to make sure that it is set to boot the Hard drive.
 
allready tried all of that, the bios boot order was the first thing i checked, the hdd is brand new, i installed win2kpro on it using another computer, and also allready tested it using two other pc's, also i forgot to mention, for some reason it only picks up the cd drives, if i hook up both cd drives and the hard drive it will only pick up the cd drives, it even gives me this message if there are NO devices hooked up to it, no hard drives, no floppy drives and no cd drives, just the videocard.
 
this may sound dumb, but have you replaced the BIOS battery? It sounds to me like the drive geometry data is not getting saved in the BIOS and so the BIOS doesnt know what to do with the drive. It's possible that the HDD is dead, but it sounds like a BIOS thing to me.
 
May be IDE controller problem???? Reload the chipset drivers. :eek:
 
It cant find the operating system, if there are no drives connected to it I dont see why you would expect anything else to happen. Some older computers require you to manually setup the cylinder / head / etc counts before it will detect a drive, but 500mhz seems recent enough. Try a different cable or something, once it detects your harddrive install an operating system like normal.
 
What are the jumpers on the hard drive set to? Cable select? Master? Is it plugged in on the same cable as anything else?
 
ok, ive made a few progresive steps by changing some options around in the bios, but i still dont know what's goin on, i took the hard drive out of this computer im on rightnow, and put it on the old box, when i turned it on it managed to somewhat startup, but right after the os starts to load, where it tells you press f8 for startup options, it shuts down and the computer resets.
on top of that this bios has way too many options and i put everything back to default on it, exept for the boot configuration witch is set to cd, c, a.

second, after this, i tired puting in the new 80 gig harddrive and i managed to get to the windows 2000 setup, after i do the format and all that stuff, the computer is suposed to restart and go to windows to do the windows setup, but thats where we come to a halt again, it gives me another error message.

by the way the procesor in the motherboard isn't actually on the motherboard, its on some sort of slot. if that hellps any, and the jumper is and has been on master. right now im trying the instalation proces again, ill let you know how that goes after its done in about 30 mins.
 
ok, the message i get after goin through the first part of installing windows after it reboots is, couldnt open boot partition to check for signature.
and it takes me back to the windows 2000 setup.

now i dont know if its still because of some bios options or what.
 
We really need your specs... Mobo brand and model if possible, is it an Athlon classic or a p3.. Is the cmos battery good, To check: alter some settings in your bios from default, and turn off the computer, unplug it, and hit the power button.. Then plug it back in and recheck to see if the settings stayed.. Or just check the bios clock to see if it is keeping time..

Oh and by the way I experienced symptoms just like yours when the caps on my Abit Ka7-100 started to give out.. They leaked all over the damn place.. Hopefully that is not the case here..
 
XxMe_LoCoxX said:
second, after this, i tired puting in the new 80 gig harddrive and i managed to get to the windows 2000 setup, after i do the format and all that stuff, the computer is suposed to restart and go to windows to do the windows setup, but thats where we come to a halt again, it gives me another error message.
Click to expand...

And that error message is?
 
well, i can defenatelly tell it isn't the battery, because the bios holds the time and all the changes ive made to it, as far as specs, i can't really tell what sort of mobo it has, the mobo might be a qdi mainboard legend>??? maby?, ram it has about 191mb of pc100 ram, its 3 - 64 mb sticks, the hard drive is brand new, 80gig WD, and it has a compaq power suply, this is a frankenstein folks. i know the hard drive is good because like i said, when i use this computer, the hard drive boots up flawlessly, no problems, untill i put it in the old computer, then it just wont boot up, it restarts after it begins booting up windows.

oh and like i mentioned before the procesor is a 500 as far as i can tell, but it isnt directly on the mobo, its on some sort of slot, its removable like a videocard or a soundcard, later i will take a picture of the mobo it self and try to upload it somehow if i can find somewhere to host the immage.
 
ok, here is where im at right now, just to clarify.

win2kpro cd on cd drive, 1 new 80gig hdd hooked up.
i start the pc, then i am taken to the win2k setup, i errase the current partition, format the drive using NTFS, the current reading is 76317 MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on bus 0 on atapi.
after the partition is formated it starts to coppy the files necesary to instal windows 2000, after this is done, the computer prompts for a reboot, after it reboots i get this message
couldnt open boot partition to check for signature, and im taken back to the main win2k set up screen.

how ever, if i take the hard drive out of this computer i am currently using, it will start to boot up windows normaly, then after 3 or 4 seconds it reboots.

im tired and out of ideas, i dont know what else to do.
 
My next step would be to update the bios, take a good hard look at the motherboard and find out what brand and version it is. If that doesnt work I would try my luck with another operating system.
 
Like a few people have been asking here, what are the specs for your computer? Like what processor does it have, motherboard, whether or not its custom built, etc.
 
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