Problem occurred when plugging in floppy drive.

[WasTech]

So what is that error? Everything seems ok now. If I get thet error again then I'll have to do something. I'm so mad at myself, I didn't have everything backed up and I lost alot of personal info that I needed. What is the best way to back up files with XP?

Thanks

I got a new error with windows yesterday. It was something about missing System32 file. WinXP would not load and it gave that error in black screen. It said to boot with XP cd and hit " R " I just restarted Win and all was fine. It really looks like I'm going to have to reformat C: 120GB

Hello eyeC, You there???

 

[eyeCpc]

You'll have to excuse the delay since a few things came up at this end lately.

When seeing any missing system file error always write down the exact file name. Once at the recovery console and drive letter for the optical drive the XP disk is in like D:> you can manually expand a replacement file from the I386 folder on the installation disk into the system32 sub folder in Windows.

One quick example would be system32,dll seen as system32.dl_ with the "expand system32.dl_ C:\Windows\system32" command entered to see the replacement file expanded from the compressed CAB type archive file to the unpacked system32.dll file as seen on the drive.

Lately due to a problem with the old dsl router here I went to grab the latest 8.0.1 version of AVG to see the install failed due to missing ??? blah blah blah such files from an incomplete download before the network went down. I just now fininished downloading 4 copies to insure file integrity as well as for both versions of Windows in use here.

On occasion you'll see a minoe glitch come up where one system file won't load up correctly where you can use the manual replacement method without having to reformat an entire drive. That's a last resort when Windows has to see a full reinstall when too many problems are present.

 

[WasTech]

Oh, There you are. No problem..

I got AVG to install..
I'm not sure what the problem is here. I havn't gotten the errors but sometimes when I boot up comp there is no picture at all just blank screen. No ASUS logo or anything. Then I reboot and it's ok again like nothing is wrong. What the h***?? I never had this problem before. Should I call ASUS tech?

 

[eyeCpc]

It sounds like a possible glitch with the boot information or possible wear and tear on the hard drive itself taking a toll. When setting a drive here with no OS as the default boot device all you see is a small flashing cursor in the upper left hand corner of the screen. That was before Vista went on the second sata drive formerly used for storage now that an external drive serves that purpose.

No post screen at all proceeds a drive problem however like a need to reseat the video card if that isn't going on you. These are the two more common hardwares if it isn't a minor connection problem or the card is now lifted up in the slot a little. Have you used a can of air cleaner lately? Sometimes dust and dirt buildup in and around the slots on the board will tend to cause problems.

 

[WasTech]

That was my 1st thought when I got a black screen, loose vc or bad vc but I never had a prob with this card Nvid 128mb TI200 AGP 4X even now when I restart comp everthing is fine no loss of video. My hard drive is brand new so I don't understand what you mean "Wear and Tear"? The MB is also brand new ASUS A8V-X just got it a month ago.

When you said about SATA problem is this a problem with WinXP? Because my drive with WinXP on it is E: and my storage area is named F: my C: is my zip drive A: is floppy and D: DVD-RW. Can that be the problem is it because I have a SATA Hdrive and WinXP isn't setup right for it and doesn't see HD as C:. It's also suppose to be 3.0 read speed. If this is the problem what do I do. I have to get what ever this is fixed soon. I hate wondering if my comp will start right. I'm also afraid to install all my software incase I have to reformat E: drive.

I was looking in the BIOS. My HD is being seen as third device for some reason and I can't change it. Because of SATA?

Thanks

 

[eyeCpc]

Once you get into the bios and the boot order you may see floppy, cd rom, and hard drive in that order. You can change the first if needed to hard drive and disable floppy until or in case you need to boot up with one.

When looking in the integrated peripherals or similar section outlined in the user manual you highlight the hard drives item and press enter to bring up a screen there. The + and - keys on the NumPad or those designated are used to bring the sata drive to the top of the list to make that the default hard drive and boot device there. If you have two satas you would move the OS drive to the top.

When booting up in Windows you should always see C for the Windows drive with only one copy of Windows installed. Windows should see the zip drive as floppy and optical drives as something other then C. If the boot files are one drive or a first partition and Windows was installed onto a second that would be one instance for seeing the default as something other then C.

With Vista on the first of two satas here XP was seen as D when installed while the Vista drive(ide at the time) was plugged in since the Windows installer will look for an ide drive first if present. Somehow the wires got crossed when you installed Windows there to be seeing XP as E.

Here I unplugged the ide drive then and proceeded to reinstall XP as a stand alone on the first sata to then see it see itself as C while booted in that version. Once the Vista was replugged back in XP added that as a new hardware found and saw that as F. When in Vista XP was seen as F. That being due to two optical drives taking D and E.

Not knowing you had just bought a new drive I was looking at possible wear on an older drive as a possible cause there. It sounds like you are running an old card on a new board that supports an AGP 8x/4x card and would be a step up going for a new 8x model in the long run. The fact that picture has returned shows that the card is still good however. If the problem returns it would be most likely the card itself now showing itself as being on the way out.

The other problem of course is a likely need to unplug the zip drive as a possible cause for seeing Windows as E not C. Since zip drives use the ide not floppy cable the Windows installer saw that as an ide device overriding sata and automatically assigned that as C. If you do end reinstalling XP first unplug the zip drive until finished to see if C is then seen in Windows.

The boot order section of the bios is easy there where you highlight the first to bring up that menu to set floppy, cd rom, hard drive where you simply change that to cd rom or hard drive usually hard drive with the second cd rom and third disabled. If your board as it should have the press F8 option to bring up a boot device menu seen next to the press DEL to enter bios setup at post you can simply leave the boot order at hard drive and bring that menu up to select the optical drive the XP install disk is in when going to see Windows corrected. When the setup files are finished being copied there's no need to re-enter the bios to change the boot order since hard drive is already set. The Asus A8N Deluxe in the last build here as well as the Asus model now used see that menu.

 

[WasTech]

Yea, I know how to do boot order. When I installed XP I only had the DVD connected not zip. I know first boot should only be essentials. Please don't take my words as arrogant. I'm just trying to tell you what I know. So how do I change the IDE device order. The only thing I can change is (TYPE) Auto, CDROM, ARMD. (LBA) Disabled, AUTO. (Block) Disabled, Auto. That's it and like I said WD 640GB is 3rd device. If you want to see what I'm looking at please dl my maual here.

http://dlsvr03.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket939/A8V-X/e2210_a8v-x.pdf

ASUSTeK Computer Inc.-Support-

I called ASUS TS yesterday. He had me pull 1 of my RAM sticks and then check for a few days if it gets black screen again. Today when I started it up I got black screen. So I shut it off put my other RAM stick back in and started it again. I figure it can't be that stick it had problem with w/out it in there. BTW black screen is not correct the screen looks almost red and no blinking cursor at all. So now it is up and running again everthing seems fine. I don't get this at all. Do you think it has anything to do with IDE order? Thanks

 

[eyeCpc]

When in doubt toss the floppy and cd rom option out!

In other words set the hard drive as the first in the order and disable the rest. This will force the system to llok at the hard drive and not an empty floppy or optical drive for boot information there.

If you have the zip drive on the primary ide cable while the hard drive is on the secondary ide channel that still shouldn't see Windows seeing itself as E however unless there was a disk in the zip drive while Windows was being installed and the installer tried to write mbr entries there. And that doesn't add up either.

Did you split the 640gb drive into different partitions at all? Windows going on a second or third partition would be the only thing to account for why Windows is seeing itself as E without another hard drive present.

Meanwhile the LBA or Logical Block Addressing should be enabled. Especially on older boards that allows support for larger capacity drives.

 

[WasTech]

No, the Zip is on 2 as slave to DVD. Yes, I did split the drive 120GB is Win and approx 480 is storage. I run with selective startup. What if I made changes in there? Remember it is intermittant prob but alsmost a guarentee on cold start. Did you look at my MB manual?

 

[eyeCpc]

Apparently the 480 partition is the first on the drive itself with the 120gb primary as the second. That saw the XP installer place the boot files on the storage partition being first since the installer always looks for the first to begin with while XP was installed on the second. That simply explains why Windows is seeing itself as E not C.

A friend went with the exact model board for a 2006 build while I've been Asus models seeing nForce not VIA or SIS chipsets for several years now. You have the AMI bios there while the NVidia nForce models by Asus see the Award bios.

The basics are still see there for setting the hard drive as the first item in the boot order by highlighting each and pressing the enter key in order to select hard drive or disabled rather then a floppy or optical drive installed. Also make sure that the Plug'n'Play option is set for yes, the LBA mode is set to auto, and with the full screen logo for Asus disabled you can watch how things are progressing during the post tests like what drives are listed, how much memory is installed as that is counted up, and the options for entering the bios setip.

If available the optional boot device menu key shown next to the press DEL now to enter bios setup will also see the press F8 or another assigned F key designated for that there on the first post screen. For Asus boards it's typical to see the F8 key for that while Gigabyte, MSI, and other makes will use the F4, F12, or another key for their optional menu.