New hard-disk boot problems

[Phirax]

I recently (within the last week) replaced a failed hard-disk with a new 200 GB Seagate drive. However since I installed the new hard-disk I come to encounter weird behavior when attempting to boot WinXP. From a cold boot, for some reason, roughly halfway through the WinXP boot process, the entire system hangs with no error. It’s just as if it pauses, and my IDE LED stays lit permanently. No changes were made to my WinXP installation, as it is located on a perfectly fine (condition wise) original hard-disk (a Hitachi). The drives are running on the same IDE channel with the Hitachi as primary and the Seagate as slave. I always have to hard reset 1 sometimes 2 times to get WinXP to fully boot. I never experienced this sort of problem with my previous hard-disk. I’ve checked everything from the BIOS (even flashed with an updated one. Note, the BIOS always detects both hard-drives and all other drives without hiccup), through to power testing and all is ok. If I disconnect the Seagate and cold boot WinXP has no problem starting at all. The only thing I haven’t done is run the drives on separate IDE channels, as doing this would break my setup, due to the design of my case, ala DVD/Burner and hard-disk physical location within my case (in other words cables do no reach, so makes it pointless). I’m starting to wish I’d never gone with Seagate, since I’ve always had Hitachi and Maxtor drives (at least of recent times). I’m pretty adept with computers, but this has got me stumped, any ideas?

 

[pat]

I recently (within the last week) replaced a failed hard-disk with a new 200 GB Seagate drive. However since I installed the new hard-disk I come to encounter weird behavior when attempting to boot WinXP. From a cold boot, for some reason, roughly halfway through the WinXP boot process, the entire system hangs with no error. It’s just as if it pauses, and my IDE LED stays lit permanently. No changes were made to my WinXP installation, as it is located on a perfectly fine (condition wise) original hard-disk (a Hitachi). The drives are running on the same IDE channel with the Hitachi as primary and the Seagate as slave. I always have to hard reset 1 sometimes 2 times to get WinXP to fully boot. I never experienced this sort of problem with my previous hard-disk. I’ve checked everything from the BIOS (even flashed with an updated one. Note, the BIOS always detects both hard-drives and all other drives without hiccup), through to power testing and all is ok. If I disconnect the Seagate and cold boot WinXP has no problem starting at all. The only thing I haven’t done is run the drives on separate IDE channels, as doing this would break my setup, due to the design of my case, ala DVD/Burner and hard-disk physical location within my case (in other words cables do no reach, so makes it pointless). I’m starting to wish I’d never gone with Seagate, since I’ve always had Hitachi and Maxtor drives (at least of recent times). I’m pretty adept with computers, but this has got me stumped, any ideas?

jumpers.. master/slave or cable select?

 

[Phirax]

Jumpers on my Hitachi is set to Master, and the Seagate is set to Slave. My BIOS has no problems picking up the drives, both have correct handle and size reported.

 

[BustedSony]

I recently (within the last week) replaced a failed hard-disk with a new 200 GB Seagate drive. However since I installed the new hard-disk I come to encounter weird behavior when attempting to boot WinXP. Note, the BIOS always detects both hard-drives and all other drives without hiccup), through to power testing and all is ok. If I disconnect the Seagate and cold boot WinXP has no problem starting at all. The only thing I haven’t done is run the drives on separate IDE channels, as doing this would break my setup, due to the design of my case, ala DVD/Burner and hard-disk physical location within my case (in other words cables do no reach, so makes it pointless). I’m starting to wish I’d never gone with Seagate, since I’ve always had Hitachi and Maxtor drives (at least of recent times). I’m pretty adept with computers, but this has got me stumped, any ideas?

You haven't done any process of elimination to test if in fact the Seagate IS buggy. I sincerely doubt it, since that's the brand I use almost exclusively in my systems and I have never ever had a problem. First, TRY the Seagate somehow as master on the secondary IDE, disconnect the DVD-rom for now. If it works there... Second, is the IDE cable firmly connected to the MB? Change the Primary IDE cable, it may have been damaged while moving things around, that commonly happens with older 80-conductor cables.. And while we're at it, was the memory disturbed? Try reseating it, often the Dimms are bumped while installing a new drive. Third, another thing often overlooked, maybe the power supply is marginal, and the new drive puts the power demand over the top. One final point, was the failure of the previous drive completely self-caused, and not a result of something else, the same issue now affecting the Seagate? Trust me, the Seagate drive is good.

 

[Phirax]

You haven't done any process of elimination to test if in fact the Seagate IS buggy. I sincerely doubt it, since that's the brand I use almost exclusively in my systems and I have never ever had a problem. First, TRY the Seagate somehow as master on the secondary IDE, disconnect the DVD-rom for now. If it works there... Second, is the IDE cable firmly connected to the MB? Change the Primary IDE cable, it may have been damaged while moving things around, that commonly happens with older 80-conductor cables.. And while we're at it, was the memory disturbed? Try reseating it, often the Dimms are bumped while installing a new drive. Third, another thing often overlooked, maybe the power supply is marginal, and the new drive puts the power demand over the top. One final point, was the failure of the previous drive completely self-caused, and not a result of something else, the same issue now affecting the Seagate? Trust me, the Seagate drive is good.

Ok, here is what i have done so far:

1. Removed the Seagate from my system and booted with only the Hitachi drive in master. Left DVD-roms etc connected on other IDE channels, and left my SCSI drives connected. BIOS detects fine. System boots fine.

2. Removed DVD-roms etc, and assigned the Seagate to my secondry IDE channel as primary (so the Hitachi and Seagate are on different IDE ports). Left SCSI drives still connected. BIOS detects fine. System has same problem on cold boot.

3. Kept same config as 2., however set both Hitachi drive and Seagate to auto-select (aka cable select). BIOS detected fine. System has same problem on cold boot.

4. Kept same config as 3., but switched Hitachi to secondry IDE, and Seagate to primary IDE. BIOS detected fine. System has same problem on cold boot.

5. Removed all devices, except for Video & Keyboard & RAM, moved Hitachi back to primary IDE and set to master, moved Seagate to secondry IDE set to master. BIOS detected all changes fine. System has same problem with cold boot.

6. Kept same config as 5., however removed RAM modules replaced with spare DIMM. Once again BIOS detected fine. System still has problem with cold boot.

7. Kept same config as 6., however forced CPU to run a slower speed in BIOS. Still problem with cold boot.

8. Kept same config as 7., however removed spare DIMM and replaced with original DIMMS. Still same problem with cold boot.

9. Kept same config as 8., however replaced PSU with a spare. Still same problem.

10. Kept same config as 9., however put original PSU back in, and replaced the ATA133 cable for an older ATA66 cable on the Seagate channel. BIOS detected fine again. System still had same problem with cold boot.

11. Took a hammer to the Seagate, and left it in pieces (hehe just kidding), I actually gave up, and rebuilt my PC.

The Maxtor i had previously was due for a failure, had it for ages, and to be fair had quite a fair bit of abuse, removed many times to transfer data to others PCs. And just to note, my PSU is an Antec 480watt True Power.

I don't doubt Seagate are great, I've heard many good things, thats why I bought it in the first place.

 

[pat]

I would try another ATA100-133 cable. they are rather sensitive to bad connector. plugging and unplugging often make them fail.

 

[bweir]

What are your system specs. Pls include the PSU in the list! Thx-

 

[linux_0]

What are your system specs. Pls include the PSU in the list! Thx-

Yes please do post your full specs for us so we can help you further.

Here's a few things to try ( general troubleshooting ):

Replace the PATA IDE cable.

Try the drive in another system and see if the same thing happens there.

Please run memtest86 for 2-5 passes or 8-12 hours ( overnight )

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/software/memtest86-ISO-burning-HOWTO-ftopict230767.html



Or if you need to burn it under windows follow these instructions:

Download

http://memtest86.com/memtest86-3.2.iso.zip

+

http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/download/ISORecorderV2RC1.msi

Unzip memtest86 and record the ISO to a CDR with ISORecorder ( you must have XP SP2 ).

http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/HowTo.htm



http://www.kernel.org/pub/dist/knoppix/KNOPPIX_V4.0.2CD-2005-09-23-EN.iso

+

http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/download/ISORecorderV2RC1.msi

Download the 700MB Knoppix disk + ISORecorder, burn the ISO to CDR boot up and see if the system still freezes during boot.


You might also want to update your BIOS if a new BIOS is available for your motherboard.



Good luck :-D

 

[rtsPlayer]

The first thing I do is put the seagate as master on ide1. the dvd drive as master on ide2. then install a fresh copy of windows xp from cd.

 

[Phirax]

My system specs..

Antec Truepower 480Watt PSU
AMD Athlon 2800+ Barton (no overclock)
Asus A7V8X BIOS Rev 1014
Kingston HyperX PC3200 (2x 512MB)
EVGA Radeon X850XT 256MB (AGP 8x)
Creative Audigy 2 ZS
AudioTrak Prodigy 192
Compro VideoMate PVR Gold Plus
LSI Logic 53C810 SCSI Controller
Realtek RTL8139 Ethernet
Hitachi HDS722580VLAT20 HDD
Seagate ST3200826A HDD
Sony CRX220E1 CD-RW
Sony DDU1612 DVD-ROM

(I have not included my SCSI Drives)

 

[linux_0]

My system specs..

Antec Truepower 480Watt PSU
AMD Athlon 2800+ Barton (no overclock)
Asus A7V8X BIOS Rev 1014
Kingston HyperX PC3200 (2x 512MB)
EVGA Radeon X850XT 256MB (AGP 8x)
Creative Audigy 2 ZS
AudioTrak Prodigy 192
Compro VideoMate PVR Gold Plus
LSI Logic 53C810 SCSI Controller
Realtek RTL8139 Ethernet
Hitachi HDS722580VLAT20 HDD
Seagate ST3200826A HDD
Sony CRX220E1 CD-RW
Sony DDU1612 DVD-ROM

(I have not included my SCSI Drives)

Thanks for the specs. They look good.

Did you run memtest or Knoppix?

Are you using the latest BIOS for your board?

 

[spacemonkey05]

Have you checked your BIOS boot setting? Sometimes in the boot order, the BIOS will specify IDE-0, IDE-1, etc. Check to see what your bios thinks your system IDE drive is (channel 1, master is usually IDE-0, but check to make sure) and see what the system is set to boot to.

 

[Codesmith]

My vote it for memtest86 and running the manufacturer's test utlity on both drives and trying a different IDE cable. And double check the jumper settings, sometimes wrong settings will work intermitently.

With each manufacturer being a little different its easy to make a mistake.

Next I would try booting with just the hitach maybe 10 times just to see if it ins't a problem with the hitachi make worse by a 2nd drive on the same channel.

After that I would suspect that the Seagate is being a bad slave or the Hitachi is being a bad master.

The Drive Self Tests don't cover bad cables or bus sharing problems as the tests are performed internally.

 

[weilin]

well, XP might be a problem. XP natively only recognizes 137 GB.. it could be because of issues with teh 200gb hd that windows is getting caught on. Try installing hte 137GB+ patch and see if that helps. Its a long shot but.. well... i dont know what else to say.

 

[Codesmith]

Thats only for people who are pre SP1. Anyone who isn't at least patched to SP1a should either be pittied or shunned.

 

[Phirax]

Sorry, slow reply, unfortunately I haven't had time to run the memtest, I'll give it a go today (the memtest). For whatever reason, now i can't get windows to boot at all with the seagate attached to motherboard. And yes the BIOS is the latest. I also borrow'd a large 250GB maxtor drive off a friend, and tested to see if the motherboard was having trouble with the size, but no problems with the fill-in drive.

*Edit*

Ok I've run the Memtest, and let it do 8 pass's, no (0) errors reported. So there is nothing wrong with my DIMM's (which i already knew). Also booted off an older version of knoppix, and it had no problems booting, cold or warm (booted 20 times each).

 

[ArnisBirznieks]

I have the same problem with a Seagate 160GB Disk.
Problem not solved yet. Have tried to connect every which way but as long as the 160 is connected system will not boot up.
BIOS sees the Disk, so does Seagate DickWizard, so does Acronis but windows will not boot up.
Perhaps the MptherBoard is not compatible with the new Seagate.
My old Seagate 10GB Disk worked OK.
My motherboard is AS Rock K7S41GX running XP Home from a 80GB Master WD Disk.
Good Luck.

 

[linux_0]

I have the same problem with a Seagate 160GB Disk.
Problem not solved yet. Have tried to connect every which way but as long as the 160 is connected system will not boot up.
BIOS sees the Disk, so does Seagate DickWizard, so does Acronis but windows will not boot up.
Perhaps the MptherBoard is not compatible with the new Seagate.
My old Seagate 10GB Disk worked OK.
My motherboard is AS Rock K7S41GX running XP Home from a 80GB Master WD Disk.
Good Luck.

Sounds like it may be time to RMA the disk :-/

If a new BIOS doesn't fix the issue and you can't boot another system with this drive in it to hopefully flash the drive's BIOS, you're stuck :-/

 

[ArnisBirznieks]

Many more hours of searching, reading and fiddling I tried a different cable. And the system booted up with the 160GB connected.
From then on it was smooth sailing.
At least i will be able to sleep better now.
I hope your problem is as easy to solve.
Good luck. :idea:

 

[samir_nayanajaad]

I am surprised this hasn’t been mentioned, use a live cd Linux. Get the live cd version, put your dvd on one ide channel and the segate on the other both as master pop in the live cd and see if Linux can find it or use it.

The os will run slow as hell bc its from a cd but you will be able to reformat the hdd in Linux and then see if Linux has problems. The os will be running off the cd so that should eliminate the boot problems if they are indeed caused by the seagate hdd.

This is a link to dl ubuntu Linux either live or install versions

http://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/ubuntu-iso/CDs/5.10/

if linux still has a prob, RMA the hdd. and if you havent tried a new ide cable do so bc you have tried everything else