AB9 QuadGT Cannot install O/S - everytime boot to floppy or CD the system reboots

[g0dM@n]

AB9 QuadGT Cannot install O/S - everytime boot to floppy or CD the system reboots

Abit AB9 QuadGT with E6400
2x1GB Crucial Tracer Ballistix PC2-8000
OCZ 600W Power Supply
X-Fi Fatality Sound Card
2x74GB 8mb cache Raptors
NEC 3540 IDE DVD Burner
3.5" Floppy Drive
NOT overclocked
Watercooled CPU and GPU, no leaks

Here is a summary of basic occurrence/attempts:

I used the RETARD method of booting to CD and creating the floppy... Abit's too cheap to make one themselves.

The motherboard would make the BEEP BOOP BEEP BOOP [infinite cycle] sound when you turn it on, so I had to go and disable the sound for when CPU Fan is at 0rpm (since there's nothing on CPU header b/c I'm on water)

Then I enabled RAID for SATA in BIOS and rebooted
The motherboard REFUSED to give me the CTRL+I option to enter Raid Utility (I didn't even know shortcut anyway). It would ONLY show the JMicron utility where it says "Push any button to continue..." Even then when I pushed any button it would NOT go to JMicron Raid utility.

So... I disabled the JMicron controller. After doing so, I was able to FINALLY (after 2 hrs) see the CTRL+I option to create the raid array on my 2 raptors as 128kb raid0 stripe.

Rebooted after creating Raid. Now, I couldn't select my DVDRW as 1st boot device until I enabled the JMicron sata controller back. (does that make sense?)

Finally, I was able to boot from CD, BUT... as it begins to load the CD it says "SETUP IS INSPECTING YOUR COMPUTER'S HARDWARE CONFIGURATION" and instantly after the computer reboots.

So I figured, why not flash the bios... well, I created the floppy and all to flash bios, set 1st boot device to floppy, stuck in floppy, saved and restarted, and whenever it starts to boot floppy, the PC reboots.

So, I figured oh maybe it's cuz of the CPU fan header not in use... disabled that and still no go.

No matter what I do... this board has something else up it's sleeve... I originally had other problems initially, but right now I just can't get the Raid Utility to show up unless I disable the JMicron controller, and I can't boot to CD or DVD when I have the JMicron enabled...

I think I can only boot to CD if I have SATA set to IDE instead of RAID... what the heck????

Should I RMA? I don't wanna spend another 4-5 hours on this junk tonight.

 

[dudleycpa]

I looked at abit's website. Awful the faq for raid hasn't been updated in years.

I'll keep looking elsewhere (I'm sure you tried already).

 

[Rattle]

you have to have the jmicron enabled becuase it runs the IDE channel.

if you want to disable it you need a sata rom.


put that ***** of a mobo on the bench with cpu, 1 stick of ram, gfx card and power her, try to see if she goes like that.

 

[g0dM@n]

i hate this board... still acting like a jerk...

gonna try a few more configs.

if i cannot get it to work tonight, i'm kissing this board goodbye, and picking up a p35 asus p5k deluxe... it's just that i spent SO MUCH TIME to make it so freakin neat, and i'll have to start from scratch again... it's a lot of work to change a mobo in my case b/c i fit wires so neatly.

 

[Rattle]

did you try it on the bench before you put it in?

always

always

always bench test before you waste your time.

I dont even WC and I wont put the ***** in unless she fires up for me outside, thats how lazy I am lol.

 

[g0dM@n]

did you try it on the bench before you put it in?

always

always

always bench test before you waste your time.

I dont even WC and I wont put the ***** in unless she fires up for me outside, thats how lazy I am lol.

Wanna hear the God's honest truth? This is like THE VERY FIRST TIME EVER that I didn't test before putting it in... The reason is I hadn't much time lately, so I was like "never failed me before, so I'll just do it up"... I hoped to God this wouldn't happen, but oh well... guess there's no such thing as "just this time"...

I'm trying to boot Norton Ghost floppy disk, and so far it's loading drivers... it didn't reboot yet.

Maybe (I hope) it's just a weird coincidence where my floppy was bad, and the cd-rom needs to be replaced... we'll see.... I'm going to test EVERYTHING individually, except for the CPU cuz I only have one...

Testing the PSU will be a major pain in the butt b/c I don't wanna touch my server, and my other two PCs have the wires all behind the motherboard nice and neat... I'd have to take whole computers apart to test PSU...

Wish me luck.... tonight is the last night I play with this... if I spend all night and don't get anywhere, so long Abit.

 

[g0dM@n]

Oh wow, you guys have GOT to see this!!!!!!!!!

Link at [H]ardforum...

Now that i have used the quadgt and the p965-s, i think quadgt is just a better mobo, that is if you are not a total noob, because the mobo comes with 1.0 bios (which has problems) and it is almost impossible to reflash. I say almost impossible because mine would restart as soon i booted xp or vista from a cd, what's worse, it would restart when booting to DOS from a floppy ,
so i had to install a harddrive with vista already preinstalled and flash using the "flashmenu" app, but there were more problems there, the latest uguru that i got from the abits website crashed when reading the bios for backup (which means it would most likely crash when flashing the bios), so if you use that, make sure you read the bios for backup first,and if it crashes, DONT USE IT TO FLASH THE BIOS or it will corrupt it and you gonna be SOL, i had to use the flashmenu off of the CD that came with the mobo and that worked, ........but, there was no video after the reflash, no matter how many times i reset the bios, i had to pull the video card out, then boot the pc without the video card, then put it back in...

it was a major PITA but now the mobo is running great, much better than my p965-s did and its even cheaper now

peace

 

[g0dM@n]

I got an IDEA!!!

What do you guys think... what if I took the BIOS chip out of the Abit mobo and HOTFLASHED it in my 2ndary rig... in the DFI NF4...

Should I do that???

 

[Peepaw]

I got an IDEA!!!

What do you guys think... what if I took the BIOS chip out of the Abit mobo and HOTFLASHED it in my 2ndary rig... in the DFI NF4...

Should I do that???

I don't think so but I might be wrong.

 

[dudleycpa]

I got an IDEA!!!

What do you guys think... what if I took the BIOS chip out of the Abit mobo and HOTFLASHED it in my 2ndary rig... in the DFI NF4...

Should I do that???

I was just reading the thread at hardforum. How did he finally do it? With a different hard drive? That's ridiculous!

If you mess it up can you then rma it? Maybe it's time to cut your losses and move on.

 

[g0dM@n]

I was just reading the thread at hardforum. How did he finally do it? With a different hard drive? That's ridiculous!

If you mess it up can you then rma it? Maybe it's time to cut your losses and move on.

The question is how did he get windows on that other HDD to boot on the QuadGT board... did he have someone install windows on a HDD from a diff QuadGT mobo?

This is truly retarded...

I just swapped the bios chips... right now I'm on my DFI NF4 with the QuadGT bios chip in, but winflash says... "BIOS file Size doesn't match with MainBoard BIOS"... wish I can bypass that... I wouldn't mess up my DFI NF4 cuz I'm not touching the CMOS and the original chip is sitting on the desk...

I'm like out of choices...

 

[g0dM@n]

so hotflashing was a failure... couldn't get the bios chip to flash... guess it's not compatible with my mobo (although i would it would be...

 

[Deanzo]

Hey mate,
Dont know if you saw my reply to you over in storage.
But pm Heidfirst as he may be able to help, with any luck he may see this thread now its in here.
One of the down sides for Abit user now motherboards go under chipsets, is some of the Abit Mods would pop over and help from time to time when it was all more or less in one place.
Have you, would you post over there ?

 

[Rattle]

when I got my dfi p965 S I just took everything out of my asus p5b-deluxe and everthing worked. they are almost identical chipsets. in my case it works no problem. I dont think that mobo is much diff.

 

[dudleycpa]

when I got my dfi p965 S I just took everything out of my asus p5b-deluxe and everthing worked. they are almost identical chipsets. in my case it works no problem. I dont think that mobo is much diff.

I was thinking something similar. Another P965 would work.

Would setting it up non-raid, flashing the bios and then doing a clean install work?

 

[g0dM@n]

I was thinking something similar. Another P965 would work.

Would setting it up non-raid, flashing the bios and then doing a clean install work?

i can't boot from CD even without raid.

and guys i don't have any p965 chipset mobos around... this was my 1st core2 setup. i'm coming from a socket 939 AMD setup.

 

[dudleycpa]

i can't boot from CD even without raid.

and guys i don't have any p965 chipset mobos around... this was my 1st core2 setup. i'm coming from a socket 939 AMD setup.

I'm still on the 850E! Talk about stone age

I don't suppose Abit tech support is much help? Na this is too flaky...maybe RMA time.

 

[Rattle]

ditch the abitch and buy a dfi or asus

 

[g0dM@n]

ditch the abitch and buy a dfi or asus

i love you so much.

you're like the devil speaking, and dudleycpa is the angel on my shoulder.

i think the devil is on the right track... but man is it gonna be a ***** to take the mobo out and redo this all

 

[dudleycpa]

i love you so much.

you're like the devil speaking, and dudleycpa is the angel on my shoulder.

i think the devil is on the right track... but man is it gonna be a ***** to take the mobo out and redo this all

Thanks for the compliment (I think). I'm starting to think that NOTHING from my old rig can go into the new one. Some kind of cosmic voodoo curse.