Extremely slow windows install

[Dakyris]

Hi, I've been having this problem ever since I got my motherboard back in November but I wasn't active on this back then and the other places I tried weren't useful at all.

For the system specs look at the signature.

Here's the problem. When booting from the odd to install/fix/reinstall windows, the system takes 8-10 minutes for the first step (the black screen with the white "Windows is loading files..."). I know this isn't normally this long because my laptop takes about 1 minute to load the files.

The rest of the installation is slower than usual too (didn't time it properly).

The blu-ray drive is on the native sata controller, same with my SSDs. I tried removing everything except the boot drive and the ODD but it changes nothing.

I used that blu-ray drive in my previous build and it didn't have that problem. I also tried an alternate drive (DVD, not 100% sure about the model) works perfectly in my spare build, same issue with this one.

I tried with less ram, no changes either.

I tried various BIOS, no changes. Now in 2.1, the bios that enabled IB and there's no turning back. At least everything works well for the moment.

So I'm kinda wondering why this is happening. As I said before, tech support from ASRock has been completly useless so far (when they answer at all).

This is not a critical problem because it will eventually install but it takes over 2 hours instead of the 20 minutes my other computers take. It's simply annoying.

I'm only raising the issue now because I'm probably gonna reformat soonish depending on whether I get my new video cards or not (don't need to reformat for that but I like cleaning it up a bit once in a while anyway).

I'm open to suggestions.

 

[wingman99]

Sounds like you still have a bad motherboard.

 

[Dakyris]

Sounds like you still have a bad motherboard.

Quite possibly, I just find it weird that everything seems to be working fine at least in general. I do have the occasional bug that may or may not be linked to the motherboard but so far I found workarounds.

I mentioned a few of these in other posts but I'll repeat them here.. for posterity or whatever haha

The other issues that may or may not be related are :
-My boot drive seems to lose its MBR quite often, I worked around by creating the MBR on the second SSD and change the boot order to scan that one instead. It's not ideal but it works. Repairing win7 would work for a week or so and then I would have to do it again and with the previously mentionned issue with loading the win7 installation, repairing the MBR would take 20 minutes or so. SSD was tried in another build for a month, no issues there.

-My video cards started crashing when playing BF3 and other graphically intensive games. I updated the BIOS to the latest version and it fixed most of the issues, my OC might have been a bit too aggressive so I changed that too (vid cards would crash with stock frequency too). I also updated the vid cards vBIOS, it helped too.

-I tried accelerating the raptor with the Patriot pyro ssd (I know, I know... overkill but the pyro was heavily discounted and gave me free shipping, I ended up paying around 50$ for a 120gb SSD so I'm not complaining). The IAstor would crash and the raid array used for SRT would get corrupted. Lost more than half the content of the Raptor to corruption like that. After 4 months like that I gave up and deactivated SRT, everything was fine after that (and deactivating the RAID means I won 7 seconds on the boot time before windows even tries to load).

-I kept the best one for the end... My previous monitor was a Dell WFP3007-HC, for some reason the image would get a bluish tint. Here's an example :

I used that monitor and those video cards for almost a year before and everything was fine until I used them with this motherboard. After trying in vain to get support from ASRock, I contacted EVGA and DELL, both authorized a RMA but DELL was faster and offered an advanced RMA so I tried a replacement monitor (my current 3011) and the problem was gone. It seems the problem was some kind of incompatibility between mobo, vid card and monitor. I also tried to use my pair of GTX280's on this mobo with the older monitor and the problem would be present but not once per hour like with the 570's.

EDIT : For clarification...

3007, GTX 570x2, ASRock : blue tint after a few minutes of gaming, sometimes up to 1 hour between events. Turning the monitor off and/or unplugging and replugging would help for a while.

3007, GTX280x2, ASRock : same problem but only once every few hours, sometimes a few days between events, same work around

3007, GTX570x2, EVGA 790i FTW, no problem for over 8 months. Retested before shipping and it was still working fine for over a day

3007, GTX280x2, EVGA 790i FTW, no problems for over 14 months. Retested before shipping and it was still working fine for over a day

3011, GT570x2, ASRock : no problems so far.

 

[Dakyris]

So... no suggestions at all? I ordered the vid cards today, they should be here early next and I was hoping I'd be able to try a potential fix of 2 while reformating.

Oh and *bump* hehe

 

[wingman99]

Keep us posted i have no ideas for your slow windows 7 install, maybe your motherboard controller is not working correctly.

Looks like you also have a monitor problem.

 

[Dakyris]

Keep us posted i have no ideas for your slow windows 7 install, maybe your motherboard controller is not working correctly.

Looks like you also have a monitor problem.

Don't worry about the monitor, as I said, that happened back when I got the motherboard a couple of months ago, it was fixed after 2 weeks of testing. I was able to narrow it down to mobo and monitor. Changing 1 would fix the issue, I ended up changing the monitor because Dell offered better service, never heard back from ASRock.

 

[wagex]

man, id try to swap out the motherboard and see what happens, at the least id issue an RMA and wait for the new one.
also are you using a disk from Microsoft or a burned copy?

 

[Dakyris]

man, id try to swap out the motherboard and see what happens, at the least id issue an RMA and wait for the new one.
also are you using a disk from Microsoft or a burned copy?

Retail disc (upgrade disc actually but I tried other discs and they did the same). I think I'll try to prepare a usb installer next time and bypass the whole controller issue.

Swaping the motherboard is not really an option. ASRock sends me back to the retailer, retailer says they only handle the first 30 days and the remainder of the warranty has to be handled by ASRock and in both cases I'd have to ship the motherboard out of the country and pay for shipping. It'd be almost cheaper to buy a new board and now have to worry about it being lost/damaged in transit, ASRock not doing a damn thing about it, etc.

EDIT: In either cases, no advanced RMA is possible, I'd have to ship the motherboard, they'd look at it MAYBE fix it or send me a new one. I'd be without my main computer for close to a month (or more) if my past experiences are any indication (1 week to ship to them, 1 week waiting for them to do something about it, 1 week to ship it back to me)

 

[Dakyris]

Ok so I had the time to prepare a bootable USB drive with the win7 installation. The first step "Loading the files" took about 20seconds... MUCH better than 8-10 minutes. I didn't continue past that because I'm not ready to reformat just yet but it gives a good idea that the issue is not present when using the USB drive.

At least I know how I'll reinstall my windows. Now I just wish I could figure out what's wrong with the SATA controller/mobo.

 

[wingman99]

I had a motherboard sata controller give trouble, the only thing that would fix it was to replace the motherboard, i even tried a sata ad in card and that did not work.

 

[Dakyris]

I don't think I'm ready to replace the motherboard just yet but I'd like some suggestions for a potential replacement. Considering the lack of support I got from ASRock I would probably have to buy a new one instead.

Parameters :
EDIT
-Case is large enough to support EATX should that be necessary

-CPU is cooled by H80 so clearance around the CPU is not a big issue unlike some other coolers.

-A complete watercooling kit is planned for next year (would WC cpu, and the 2/3 gpus, possibly 2 seperate loops.
/EDIT

-I currently have a SB chip and don't plan on getting an IB any time soon because I don't consider the change would be significant. I don't have any preferences for a specific chipset, whatever fits my needs is fine.

-SLI is a must, I currently have 2 570's and I have 2 670's on the way. Ideally 16x/16x with the possibility for Tri-SLI

-OC capabilities, it must be able to withstand a bit of OC'ing, right now my 2600k is usually around 4.6/4.8GHz and it's stable. I'd like to keep it around that same level.

-I have quite a few hard drives and SSD, it should have at least enough SATA ports to handle them (3 SSD, 1 raptor in SATA 3, 2 HDD and 1 blu-ray drive in SATA2, so probably 4 SATA3 and 4 SATA2)

-Should have a PCI-E x1 slot left after installing 2 dual slot vid cards (having 1 between the top vid card and the cpu like my current setup is fine)

-USB3 and the possibility for front panel USB3.0

-NOT ASROCK, I'd lean more toward ASUS and EVGA but I'm open to other suggestions

-Stability, reliability and possibly the quality of support should be considered.

-Price is not an important factor, current board was around 400$ so that would be my limit

-This one is really low priority but I kinda liked the way the Z68 extreme7 looked.

Thanks.

 

[wingman99]

Here is my PICK ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77 LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131821

GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD5H-WB LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128549
I know Gigabyte has good support.

 

[Dakyris]

Good options, I kinda like the Sabertooth and it's not too expensive ($250).

But I have some concerns :
-My current motherboard has a NF200 chip to have 16x/16x PCI-E 2.0 lanes, this one is limited to 8x/8x and since I'm using a SB chip those are PCI-E 2.0 not 3.0. I'm worried that it would bottleneck the GTX670's.

-It only has 2 16X slots so tri-sli is out of the question (not that big of a deal but it does limit future expansion plans.

-I hope those tiny fans they use on the board-wide cover are not too loud/high pitched that could ruin a good board.

The rest seems fine, enough ports (SATA, USB) and no useless add-ons like bluetooth or wifi that some boards include.

I know it isn't availble yet but have you see the Maximus V Formula (not the uATX Gene but the EATX version)... Any thoughts?

 

[wingman99]

From what ive seen the 8x/8x will not limit the GTX 670 SLI.

I'm not a fan of overpriced boards when your only going to do a mild overclock, I think it's not necessary, just purchase a board with features you want.

 

[Dakyris]

From what ive seen the 8x/8x will not limit the GTX 670 SLI.

Even if it's PCI-E 2.0 8x/8x?

I'm not a fan of overpriced boards when your only going to do a mild overclock, I think it's not necessary, just purchase a board with features you want.

This may be an way to think about it but I prefer spending a bit more on the motherboard than most because I firmly believe that it's a rather important part of the computer, if your motherboard sucks, the whole computer will be affected. While price isn't always a good indicator of quality, I didn't want it to limit it either, hence the rather open budget. I'm simply looking for the best board that will fit my needs and will be stable/reliable.

As for the mild overclock, I was actually planning on getting it higher than this but 4.6/4.8 was the most I was able to get out of the extreme7 without crashing every 5 minutes. If I can get higher than that I'll take it! I usually stick to a lower overclock for the first year of the rig's life and then crank it up slowly. I just don't want to burn components to quick and end up replacing stuff too early (kinda like replacing the ASRock after only 8-9 months)

It's a shame I got a bad ASRock, it seems in general they are pretty good but now that I've seen what their support looks like I'm gonna stay away from them.

 

[wingman99]

lots of people are using the PCI-E 2.0 8x/8x for SLI GTX 680 with no bottlenecking. The 4x/4x shows a little hit in performance.

ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77 LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX
Smart Digi+,TUF w/5 yrs warranty,Thermal Armor
Allot of people like this board.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131821

As far as board failure i've seen the expensive ones fail just as much as the cheaper one's.
People here at these forms love ASRock, you just had some bad luck, iv heard ASRock support sucks, also ASUS i've seen complaints about the support sometimes.

You bought the extreme 7 and had bad luck, that board is for overclocks with LN2 at 6.0GHz+

 

[Rotary]

I had a 3011 dell with 3 5870s and i always got this like ones in a blue moon

after giving my wife the 3011 she said its not messing up so i ordered 3 27'' to my 5870s and it never did it again lol, I just end up putting 680s in anyways but yeah, maybe it was my MB

 

[Dakyris]

So I'm even weaker than I thought and went ahead and bought the Z77 Sabertooth. Since I already bought a mobo and 2 vid cards, I decided to go all out and grabbed an i7 3770k (so I don't bottleneck with the PCI-E 2.0 and upgrade to 3.0).

I'm gonna transfer the Extreme7, the 2600k and the 570s to my spare computer (which I use for LAN parties, when I have some kind of hardware failure on my primary build or when I want to play something on the TV instead of my regular monitors). It's gonna be a nice upgrade from the Q9550 currently in my spare build and the Q9550 will be a nice upgrade for my father's work computer. I recycle a lot haha.

If I'm able to finally get some decent support and it doesn't cost $80 of shipping to RMA the board, I'll try to get a replacement, otherwise it will stay like this in my spare build where it won't bother me too much.

 

[wingman99]

Sounds goood, I hope you have good luck this time.

 

[Dakyris]

Sounds goood I hope you have good luck this time.

Only time will tell but I'm infamous for my particularly bad luck...

That's why I usually err on the side of caution and get slightly more expensive components with better warranties, I usually end up needing them.

I don't think I've told the story of my laptop here... Should be midly entertaining.

Here's the backstory:
A couple of years ago (4-6), I was in university and living in a miserably small apartment with no room for a desktop and I would have to move to a different place every 4-8 months (internships). So I decided to get a desktop replacement.

After much research and comparaison I decided to get a Dell XPS 1710 fully equipped. It ended up costing a bit over $4000 after the 3 years full coverage extended warranty. It was 17" and had a Core 2 Duo (don't remember the exact model but I think it was the T9600 @ 2.8gz), a Geforce 7950GTX and a nice 1920x1200 resolution.

Everything was well for the first 2 years (the original warranty's length), the laptop was powerful enough to run any game at max details for its resolution, I was happy. It was a bit heavy and hot but I liked it, I would carry it around in classes and use it to game while traveling, etc.

Then it started... The laptop was idling on a wooden table and I was doing something else, when I turned back to check something on the internet the laptop was off... Weird I thought. I tried to boot it again and... nothing... So that evening I call Dell, get some indian dude to troubleshoot it and after 2 hours they decided to allow a RMA. A couple of days later I get a box, ship it to them, etc.

Laptop comes back, the report says they replaced the motherboard, the ram, the vid card and the harddrive... Wow that sounds like a major failure.

I try it, everything looks fine. But I decided to remove the hard drive and replace it with a slightly better one, I didn't format it or anything and left it in my drawer, just in case.

Everything is fine for a couple of weeks and then the EXACT SAME THING HAPPENED AGAIN. I call again and the first thing they ask is to reformat (AGAIN) so instead I swap to the old harddrive with the clean windows install, same problem (no kidding). Get a RMA, send it back...

Turns out that specific motherboard had a thermal issue and the RAM slots connections would eventually melt.

I'm dead serious, this happened 6 times over a period of 8 months (considering it took well over a week to send the laptop and recover it, that doesn't leave much in terms of online time). After the 6th time, it stopped. The laptop is alive and well now but I replaced it by a desktop between the 5th and 6th time.

I was really glad I paid a bit more for the extended warranty, someone else in my class had a similar laptop, his videocard died after 2.5 years and they wanted $1700 to replace it out of warranty.