If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. |
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#1
|
|||
|
|||
Cannot boot old PC
I have an old PC in my shed. It's an 'AMD Athlon(TM) XP1800+', 'ASUS
A7A266-E ACPI BIOS Revision 1011'. It has been running OK. I powered it down last night, after some hours uninstalling 40-50 unwanted programs from my C: drive ( originally showing 3% free space and after deletions 10%). But this morning I cannot get it rebooted. It stops after getting this far: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/...tProblem-1.jpg I reset and powered down several times. Also reset BIOS to defaults. But no change. I'm at a loss as to what to try next and would much appreciate the experts' advice please. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
#2
|
|||
|
|||
Cannot boot old PC
"Terry Pinnell" wrote in message ... I have an old PC in my shed. It's an 'AMD Athlon(TM) XP1800+', 'ASUS A7A266-E ACPI BIOS Revision 1011'. It has been running OK. I powered it down last night, after some hours uninstalling 40-50 unwanted programs from my C: drive ( originally showing 3% free space and after deletions 10%). But this morning I cannot get it rebooted. It stops after getting this far: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/...tProblem-1.jpg I reset and powered down several times. Also reset BIOS to defaults. But no change. I'm at a loss as to what to try next and would much appreciate the experts' advice please. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK Hi, First thing I would do is to boot using the O/S install disc and access the system repair menu (usually by hitting F8 after the post message). This will bring up several options including one to check and repair the main boot files. If that didn't work I'd then open up the case and look at the memory sticks. Let's say (for an example) that the PC has 2 mem sticks. I'd remove the stick that's furthest away from the CPU and try to boot. If that didn't work I'd then swap the stick I had removed with the one that's still in there and try again. Bad memory produces the same symptoms you have described. Hope this helps Andy |
#3
|
|||
|
|||
Cannot boot old PC
"Andy" wrote:
"Terry Pinnell" wrote in message .. . I have an old PC in my shed. It's an 'AMD Athlon(TM) XP1800+', 'ASUS A7A266-E ACPI BIOS Revision 1011'. It has been running OK. I powered it down last night, after some hours uninstalling 40-50 unwanted programs from my C: drive ( originally showing 3% free space and after deletions 10%). But this morning I cannot get it rebooted. It stops after getting this far: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/...tProblem-1.jpg I reset and powered down several times. Also reset BIOS to defaults. But no change. I'm at a loss as to what to try next and would much appreciate the experts' advice please. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK Hi, First thing I would do is to boot using the O/S install disc and access the system repair menu (usually by hitting F8 after the post message). This will bring up several options including one to check and repair the main boot files. If that didn't work I'd then open up the case and look at the memory sticks. Let's say (for an example) that the PC has 2 mem sticks. I'd remove the stick that's furthest away from the CPU and try to boot. If that didn't work I'd then swap the stick I had removed with the one that's still in there and try again. Bad memory produces the same symptoms you have described. Hope this helps Andy Thanks for the fast reply, Andy, which I'm reading on getting back home some 6 hours after my post. Before I left I opened the case, glared at the innards for a while, removed and reconnected the more obvious plugs. And it booted! HOWEVER ... XP would no longer find my main data drive D (one of my two 60 GB MAXTOR 6L060J3 HDs). And my system drive C (the OS partition on the other HD) is now showing only 19 MB free space instead of the 1.2 GB last night. I'm now about to head back to the shed. Could this be connected with my resetting BIOS to default settings? Whatever little I ever once knew about this stuff, is now a blurry memory. Primary and Secondary Channels? Master and Slave? etc, etc? IOW, I'm no techie ;-) The power and data connections to both HD sockets *seemed* OK, but as one of my first steps next I'll remove and replace them again. Any other 'obvious' things I should try please? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
Cannot boot old PC
On 06/04/2013 07:27 AM, Terry Pinnell wrote:
Thanks for the fast reply, Andy, which I'm reading on getting back home some 6 hours after my post. Before I left I opened the case, glared at the innards for a while, removed and reconnected the more obvious plugs. And it booted! HOWEVER ... XP would no longer find my main data drive D (one of my two 60 GB MAXTOR 6L060J3 HDs). And my system drive C (the OS partition on the other HD) is now showing only 19 MB free space instead of the 1.2 GB last night. I'm now about to head back to the shed. Could this be connected with my resetting BIOS to default settings? Whatever little I ever once knew about this stuff, is now a blurry memory. Primary and Secondary Channels? Master and Slave? etc, etc? IOW, I'm no techie ;-) The power and data connections to both HD sockets *seemed* OK, but as one of my first steps next I'll remove and replace them again. Any other 'obvious' things I should try please? I have had the power connectors to hard drives (both PATA and SATA) fail to engage properly, which can be frustrating to diagnose until found out. With the old PATA connectors, what helps is to "close down" the (metal) female sockets so that they positively engage on the male pin. You don't want them too tight, but you want them to definitely not be loose. I would also check (with a good flashlight) that you have inserted the ribbon cables correctly, and completely, into the drives. As to primary and secondary, those at the two channels for IDE drives on the board (you will have a primary socket and a secondary socket). Each of those sockets can have two devices, a master and a slave. Master and slave can be set a few different ways, either by the drive's position on the cable (if cable select), or by a jumper set on the drive. It looks like both of your drives are detected, as well as the optical drives, so they appear to be hooked up correctly. You might try going into Administrative Settings -- Computer Management -- Disk Management and seeing what the status of your drives are, but I wouldn't change anything unless you are sure of what you are doing. Jon |
#5
|
|||
|
|||
Cannot boot old PC
Jon Danniken wrote:
On 06/04/2013 07:27 AM, Terry Pinnell wrote: Thanks for the fast reply, Andy, which I'm reading on getting back home some 6 hours after my post. Before I left I opened the case, glared at the innards for a while, removed and reconnected the more obvious plugs. And it booted! HOWEVER ... XP would no longer find my main data drive D (one of my two 60 GB MAXTOR 6L060J3 HDs). And my system drive C (the OS partition on the other HD) is now showing only 19 MB free space instead of the 1.2 GB last night. I'm now about to head back to the shed. Could this be connected with my resetting BIOS to default settings? Whatever little I ever once knew about this stuff, is now a blurry memory. Primary and Secondary Channels? Master and Slave? etc, etc? IOW, I'm no techie ;-) The power and data connections to both HD sockets *seemed* OK, but as one of my first steps next I'll remove and replace them again. Any other 'obvious' things I should try please? I have had the power connectors to hard drives (both PATA and SATA) fail to engage properly, which can be frustrating to diagnose until found out. With the old PATA connectors, what helps is to "close down" the (metal) female sockets so that they positively engage on the male pin. You don't want them too tight, but you want them to definitely not be loose. I would also check (with a good flashlight) that you have inserted the ribbon cables correctly, and completely, into the drives. As to primary and secondary, those at the two channels for IDE drives on the board (you will have a primary socket and a secondary socket). Each of those sockets can have two devices, a master and a slave. Master and slave can be set a few different ways, either by the drive's position on the cable (if cable select), or by a jumper set on the drive. It looks like both of your drives are detected, as well as the optical drives, so they appear to be hooked up correctly. You might try going into Administrative Settings -- Computer Management -- Disk Management and seeing what the status of your drives are, but I wouldn't change anything unless you are sure of what you are doing. Jon Thanks Jon, will follow that advice. One important correction. I was mistaken in my reply to Andy. From some 2002 notes it seems that C and D are PARTITIONS of one of the 60 GB HDs, NOT separate HDs. C = OS, D = data. The other HD is used for backup and a large music collection. Now off to the shed. Tuesday 4 June 2013, 16:05 UK time. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
#6
|
|||
|
|||
Cannot boot old PC
Terry Pinnell wrote:
Jon Danniken wrote: On 06/04/2013 07:27 AM, Terry Pinnell wrote: Thanks for the fast reply, Andy, which I'm reading on getting back home some 6 hours after my post. Before I left I opened the case, glared at the innards for a while, removed and reconnected the more obvious plugs. And it booted! HOWEVER ... XP would no longer find my main data drive D (one of my two 60 GB MAXTOR 6L060J3 HDs). And my system drive C (the OS partition on the other HD) is now showing only 19 MB free space instead of the 1.2 GB last night. I'm now about to head back to the shed. Could this be connected with my resetting BIOS to default settings? Whatever little I ever once knew about this stuff, is now a blurry memory. Primary and Secondary Channels? Master and Slave? etc, etc? IOW, I'm no techie ;-) The power and data connections to both HD sockets *seemed* OK, but as one of my first steps next I'll remove and replace them again. Any other 'obvious' things I should try please? I have had the power connectors to hard drives (both PATA and SATA) fail to engage properly, which can be frustrating to diagnose until found out. With the old PATA connectors, what helps is to "close down" the (metal) female sockets so that they positively engage on the male pin. You don't want them too tight, but you want them to definitely not be loose. I would also check (with a good flashlight) that you have inserted the ribbon cables correctly, and completely, into the drives. As to primary and secondary, those at the two channels for IDE drives on the board (you will have a primary socket and a secondary socket). Each of those sockets can have two devices, a master and a slave. Master and slave can be set a few different ways, either by the drive's position on the cable (if cable select), or by a jumper set on the drive. It looks like both of your drives are detected, as well as the optical drives, so they appear to be hooked up correctly. You might try going into Administrative Settings -- Computer Management -- Disk Management and seeing what the status of your drives are, but I wouldn't change anything unless you are sure of what you are doing. Jon Thanks Jon, will follow that advice. One important correction. I was mistaken in my reply to Andy. From some 2002 notes it seems that C and D are PARTITIONS of one of the 60 GB HDs, NOT separate HDs. C = OS, D = data. The other HD is used for backup and a large music collection. Now off to the shed. Tuesday 4 June 2013, 16:05 UK time. Later... Looking in Disk Mgmt it seems that my D partition had somehow got its letter changed from D to J! I've renamed it D and rebooted. But everything is now glacially slow. Will report back shortly. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
boot device not found please insert boot media or select correct bootdevice | timO' | Asus Motherboards | 6 | June 16th 08 01:57 PM |
Dual boot XP and Vista by changing the boot drive in System Setup? | Jeff Ingram | Dell Computers | 1 | March 31st 07 05:43 PM |
oh boy .... 'Reboot & select proper boot device or insert boot mediain selected boot device & press a key' | ndy | Storage (alternative) | 2 | February 25th 06 07:22 PM |
QUESTION??? P4PE-Cold Boot- occassional boot fail--> replacement mobos the same? Any help pls | seeker | Asus Motherboards | 4 | May 21st 05 04:08 AM |
FDISK Equivalent To Fix Master Boot Record on Volumes In Windows XP - Boot and Repair Disk In XP? | The_AntiArt | Dell Computers | 5 | May 20th 04 01:37 PM |