unknown startup hang

[faun]

hello guys
biiig problem here
i installed W7 a good few months ago, and prior to the problem i hadnt installed any new software or changed any hardware. the problem that occured randomly a few days ago:

Verifying DMI Pool Data...
hangs
when i change bios to boot CD first (i.e. my W7 disk to try and get to recovery console)
Press any key to boot from CD or DVD....
hangs there aswell.

ive left it for a while, simply to see if it wants to do anything, but no, its frozen till i turn it off or reboot. i can get into bios, but changing what little settings ive dared to has made no difference so far.

the big problem here is that the HDD contains all of my uni work to date, and since it was a fresh install only a few months ago, i hadnt really backed it all up.
so any help would be most appreciated, im at a loss!

 

[roban]

I would remove the drive and connect it to an external USB enclosure. Then connect it to another computer and copy all of your documents and other irreplaceable files.

Then run chkdsk [your drive letter]: because I think you have either a bad sector or a corrupt MBR.

 

[faun]

@ roban, thanks for your fast reply, im currently trying my contacts to see who has either an enclosure for use or a spare bootable HDD that i can use to browse my one with.
with regards to the bad sector, i dont know what that means? im not sure its a corrupt MBR tho, as i dont get any errors about invalid partitions or missing OSes, bios DOES recognise the drives that i have installed; that said, im really not an expert on the matter, so if you could explain why you think it could be either of these things please educate me

 

[roban]

The reason I suspect a bad sector is that it hangs at post and will not boot. I have had 2 clients with the same problem this week and their problems were viral as well and some viruses can also harm a hard drive so don't rule that out.

I performed the same routine I outlined for you as well as booting from a SuperFDisk CD.

Another thing you might try is changing your CMOS battery. You can get them at any drug store or hardware store. I would try this first as it's an easy $3.00 fix if it works. Usually a #CR2032. This battery powers your BIOS.

 

[faun]

hmm, without sounding too presumptuous at this rate id have to rule out a viral infection, as im pretty safe with my internet browsing and prior to the error i hadnt had any runins with any dodgy goings on.

Never heard of a SuperFDisk, care to tell me what that is please?

well my mobo is an ASUS AX78, im wondering if that changes what kind of CMOS battery i should get? is there a "general" battery that most boards come with?

 

[Nibiru2012]

Usually a #CR2032

faun - he just told you the battery number... CR2032. It's a lithium battery about the size and thickness of US Nickel.

 

[catilley1092]

I recall a similar looking battery in my notebook, I removed it for a minute, reinstalled it, and my BIOS went into some kind of "reset" mode. This was when I was having trouble with it. I thought it would clear all of the computer's stored information (run time, errors & so on). But it didn't. At least I now know what that battery is for.

 

[Nibiru2012]

What it does is keep the changes and options that one chooses saved in the BIOS EPROM chip. When you pull it out, the BIOS is automatically reset to it's default options.

No operating system information is stored on the motherboard itself.

The motherboard is basically a glorified electronic traffic cop. Guiding, sending, telling, directing, etc.

 

[faun]

thanks for all the replies.
i had a friend on the phone with me last night, and since it was still being detected by BIOS i managed, by switching SATA cables with 1 of my slave drives and my W7 disc, managed to boot into recovery and slowly copy my most important data over to the slave. I then tried installing W7 on that drive, but it (the disc) said that since there werent any drivers loaded on it, it couldnt be done. on top of that, being NTFS didnt seem to matter (FAT32 default wont allow it to install an OS, right?)
and any fixmbr commands in the command prompt failed. We deduced that my primary drives' OS/partition has been flagged as inactive, and ive no idea why.

 

[Nibiru2012]

You would have to install from a BOOT UP situation, not through Windows.

Windows 7 will not install to a FAT 32 file system, only to an NTFS partition.

Also, this may help, I have found that Windows 7 installs work better when a single hard drive is connected to the motherboard. For some reason, Windows 7 can be finicky about that... sometimes.

Be sure your hard drive has been set as a MBR type of hard drive, not a GPT type.

From Wikipedia:
The MBR is not located in a partition, it is located at a main boot record area in front of (with a lower LBA sector number than) the first partition.

When a data storage device has been partitioned with the MBR partition table scheme (i.e., the conventional IBM PC partitioning scheme), the master boot record contains the primary partition entries in its partition table.

 

[faun]

hmm.
raises the question of why W7 wouldnt install on my slave drive, when its an NTFS?
it said there werent any drives present, which is fair enough, but ive not known that W7 installation disc needed drivers to install?
- i tried loading my OS drive without any of the slaves present, didnt work. but thanks for suggesting.

i gave it to my friend, and he used a partition fixing...software thing, it scanned the drive and fixed the MBR, but, when i tried it in my system, it hung like normal. soooo now were thinking either the drive is super f***ed and a wipe will do, or, its my system locking up somewhere. Personally, id like to ask anyone here how my system could do that? ive not come across such a problem before, and obviously my system previously has been fine. i.e. no bad shutdowns, installs, new software or hardware prior to this problem.


FYI , im learning alot from all your answers, so thank you!

 

[faun]

also of note, since apparently seagate drives are "super s**t", were considering simply scrapping the faulty drive and getting a new one. so...this whole thread might become moot.

 

[yodap]

also of note, since apparently seagate drives are "super s**t", were considering simply scrapping the faulty drive and getting a new one. so...this whole thread might become moot.

That blanket statement about Seagate drives bothers me a little. I have an 8 year old Seagate 80G and two 3 year old 500G and zero problems. How ever they recently took over Maxtor and are selling those pos's under their name now. I guess one needs to do their homework when looking at Seagate drives these days.

 

[roban]

As an addendum to the BIOS battery in order to reset the BIOS the battery should be removed for an extended period of time. I leave it out for 6 hours or more. After removing the battery and power cable and battery in case of a laptop, press the power button for about 15 seconds to completely discharge the motherboard.

 

[Nibiru2012]

That blanket statement about Seagate drives bothers me a little. I have an 8 year old Seagate 80G and two 3 year old 500G and zero problems. How ever they recently took over Maxtor and are selling those pos's under their name now. I guess one needs to do their homework when looking at Seagate drives these days.

Like Yodap I haven't used a Seagate / Maxtor drive in years since the buyout.

I am a firm supporter of both Western Digital and Samsung hard drives. Both are the best on the market in my opinion, always get very good reviews and feedback.

faun - What exactly are you doing during the install? Please be as concise and specific as possible, as that will help us to better understand what's going on here.

Also how do you have your drives configured in the BIOS? Did you set the hard drives for IDE mode or AHCI mode?

The more info we get, the more concise and clear it is on your part, will enable us to get your problem resolved quicker.

Thanks,
~Nibs

 

[faun]

My slave drives that are "fine" are samsungs, and a new drive that im looking into buying is WD.lol

well, im not really TRYING anything during install, i just follow the prompts as normal to install W7, and i get a prompt when at the section that asks for partitions or drives that you want to use to install W7 on. at that table, none of the drives are shown, and a popup that states there arent any drivers for the slave drive and therefore cant install. but i havent really tried to take it further to be honest, as at that point i simply went to the repair section of the W7 disc, gained access to my drives, and copied over data that i wanted to save.

im going to be honest, ive no idea how my drives are configured via bios, they never needed to be looked into as far as i could tell :/

i was told today, of a situation which i thought insignificant at the time, but is something that apparently can be an issue = drive lag. i had, when my primary drive was fine, times where when i accessed my slave drives to browse folders etc, a 2/3 second lag or delay before it caught up and showed me the contents. i had it simply down to alot of information being loaded and the fact that im not running a good amount of ram (only 2gb 800) but was told it might be a sign of my system being....off?

 

[Nibiru2012]

Disconnect one of the two hard drives. Make sure your DVD drive is set as the first boot device.

If you don't have a copy of the ABIT AX78 motherboard manual, then download it from the ABIT website. You'll probably need it.

Press DELETE key on bootup to get into the BIOS screen.

Select LOAD OPTIMIZED DEFAULTS and press F10 to save and restart your computer.

Go into BIOS again and in Advanced BIOS Settings section. Make the DVD drive as the "First Boot Device". Press F10 again to save and reboot.

Put the DVD into the drive and restart the computer, sometimes it takes another restart to do it. If it asks to "Press any key to boot from CD/DVD drive." Do it within 5 seconds and the install should begin.

Don't install from the Windows desktop.

Go here to read about the rest:
How to Perform a Clean Installation of Windows 7 - Part 1 of 3

 

[faun]

those are quite clear instructions....
however, ive already done all that. W7 WILL boot with the slave drive attached, but installing dosent work when its past the initial stages, i.e. selecting language etc. after that is where it says theres a lack of drivers. BIOS isnt the issue with installing W7 on the HDD.
i have the screen up right now with where the lack of drivers becomes an issue. a message pops up saying that a required CD/DVD drive device driver is missing, and that if i have a floppy/cd/dvd or flash drive to insert it.
it, (the prompt screen) is asking for me to select the drivers to be installed, and another message pop up saying
"no device drivers found. make sure that the installation media contains the correct drivers, then click OK".
i have the option of browsing folders to look for said drivers, but none of the available attached devices obviously contain any. I have no idea what these drivers are needed for, since ive obviously never needed a driver CD/DVD before when installing...

 

[Nibiru2012]

Well, I don't know what wrong then. If your computer is NOT setup for a RAID then I have no idea why this is happening.

Did you try leaving a drive unplugged just to see what happen?

Just curious. Other than that I am at a loss and you'll hopefully find someone else to help you.

Are you using the a purchased install DVD? I have read that if one burns the DVD at too fast a speed from the ISO image file that this message appears.

Some with this issue have gone the USB flash drive install route and it's worked fine.

 

[faun]

hahaha, ill try leaving it drive free to see what it says, i have a feeling itll hang just for fun.
its a downloaded/burnt CD, but its worked before - i actually made a point of burning it at 16x instead of 24

but as for new news, the drive has, after numerous mbr fixes etc, been tested in another system and it works. so its MY system thats causing the problem = one of the theories is ofc that bios has been reset and im going to have to manually configure my processor and ram speeds again - but my question is, how did the lithium battery lose its charge? its understandable that it can do that when its left unplugged for extended periods of time, but this occured 1 random morning, i.e. its been plugged in and switched on at the back for weeks - although prior to this, i went on holiday for 3 weeks and left my pc in storage, and it appeared to be no worse for it?

--
or failing that, its probably a hardware failure?