- Joined
- Dec 23, 2002
- Location
- Doylestown, PA
I have been without my main rig for a few weeks now, and I can’t take it anymore...I need some help, here is the problem: About three or four weeks ago my computer stopped booting reliably. It would go through the initial boot sequence fine, but when it would go to load windows, the computer would restart randomly. I found that if I switched the power supply off, and waited for a good hour, and then tried to boot, it would boot into Windows fine.
Then it got really bad. The computer wouldn’t boot into Windows at all...it would reboot when in got to the loading Windows XP screen, and wouldn’t stop. So I figured that I had some hard drive corruption, decided to suck it up, and format the drive, put a fresh install of Windows on there, and vowed to always back up my drives again.
For some reason I could not get the computer to boot from a CD, so I borrowed a Windows 98 SE boot disk and attempted to format the drive from that. It was successful, but the computer would still not boot from the CD. So I took an old drive that I had lying around with Windows 98 on it, booted to that and tried to run the Windows XP setup from there. Didn’t work.
I got so frustrated that I tore the whole thing apart and re-did the entire thing trying to figure out if some power connector was loose or something, and I even put a brand new CPU in to see if that was the problem. Tried booting from my Windows XP CD and it finally worked.
This is the current dilemma: When I try to set up Windows, initial blue screen that shows up runs through its course and loads all the necessary files to go through with the installation, but for some reason it says that there are no hard disks present. My BIOS recognizes the drive fine as the primary master, but Windows will not let me load to it. The drive is formatted, no partitions, no nothing, and Windows will not see it.
I am at a complete loss at this point, and I have no clue what to do. I have very little money at this point, and I don’t want to have to go and buy a new hard drive and find out that it isn’t even the problem. Does this sound like the hard drive is the culprit or the motherboard...what?
Thanks for any help that anyone has to offer.
With best regards,
Tray
Then it got really bad. The computer wouldn’t boot into Windows at all...it would reboot when in got to the loading Windows XP screen, and wouldn’t stop. So I figured that I had some hard drive corruption, decided to suck it up, and format the drive, put a fresh install of Windows on there, and vowed to always back up my drives again.
For some reason I could not get the computer to boot from a CD, so I borrowed a Windows 98 SE boot disk and attempted to format the drive from that. It was successful, but the computer would still not boot from the CD. So I took an old drive that I had lying around with Windows 98 on it, booted to that and tried to run the Windows XP setup from there. Didn’t work.
I got so frustrated that I tore the whole thing apart and re-did the entire thing trying to figure out if some power connector was loose or something, and I even put a brand new CPU in to see if that was the problem. Tried booting from my Windows XP CD and it finally worked.
This is the current dilemma: When I try to set up Windows, initial blue screen that shows up runs through its course and loads all the necessary files to go through with the installation, but for some reason it says that there are no hard disks present. My BIOS recognizes the drive fine as the primary master, but Windows will not let me load to it. The drive is formatted, no partitions, no nothing, and Windows will not see it.
I am at a complete loss at this point, and I have no clue what to do. I have very little money at this point, and I don’t want to have to go and buy a new hard drive and find out that it isn’t even the problem. Does this sound like the hard drive is the culprit or the motherboard...what?
Thanks for any help that anyone has to offer.
With best regards,
Tray