[Butterpants]

Just built a system for a friend and all was going well....until I hit a snag as I installed XP.

The rig posts fine, configured the bios to boot on HD, then Cdrom and set most of teh other setting to default. Tossed in a slipstreamed XP + SP1 cd (it works fine, because I've used it to install on other systems before without a hitch) and proceeded to partition/format (ntfs) and install. About 3/4 the way in I noticed that I forgot to plug in the mouse (PS2?), and the system froze when I did. (during install)

So I said '#$%' a few times, powered it down booted again of the XP disc, deleted the c/ partition then reformatted it and installed again. Everything went smooth as a baby's ***. I modify some @#$$% settings (pagefile size or something) go to reboot and get this @#$head of an error:

DISC BOOT FAILURE.  INSERT SYSTEM DISC AND PRESS ENTER

Windows was fully installed the 2nd time, the HD is recognized by the BIOS as fine, but if I pull the XP disc out of the DVD drive, it will not boot.

What I have to do is, let it try and boot...get the error, toss in the disc, ignore the 'Boot from cd' prompts, and it then boots normally to XP. If I leave the XP disc in and reboot, it goes tot he xp install/recovery install.

If I use the disc trick and get to XP, the OS works perfectly. Explorer shows both partitions on the drive working perfectly.

While i'm no expert, I have built a few systems but I consider this some strange ****.

So then I'm thinking it's an MBR or or Boot sector issue. I go into the recovery console and /fixmbr /fixboot. Reboot after that and get the same error, but the disc trick works to boot to XP. I did notice once in XP that all was not perfect. I installed the nForce drives (v?) that came with the board and all the IDE lines were in DMA mode....but file transfers was slow. I then went over to Windows update and DL all the hotfixes. The DL was fine, but upon install it crashed. I rebooted and repeated and it worked flawlessly.

I have no idea what's up here and need options to try and fix this....or at least know what i did wrong.

Specs (I forget most of the specifics)
Asus nForce board
+2500
512 Kingston 3200
80 GB WD 8mb
Audigy 2
ATI 9600
XP Pro

 

[buddhafabio]

have you tried setting the bios from boot from cd rom to boot from harddrive???

 

[Butterpants]

have you tried setting the bios from boot from cd rom to boot from harddrive???

Yes I have tried that. I completrely disabled cdrom's as a boot device, but no dice.

 

[stars1234]

This is a tough one.
I have an idea on the slow down of the hdd or opticals though.

W2K & XP have a bug that if the machine goes through more than 6 CRC or unexpected problems in a row, it lowers the speed of the drives. It will keep lowering them until it goes past UDMA and to the bottom of PIO.

There's a MSKB on this, but essentially it says, there is a patch available if you want to call and pay to have them send it to you, or, simply go to the IDE controler under Devices in System and delete the drivers for the drives.
That will cause them to reset to full speed when you power up again.
But if you get the shut downs, in a row, the slow down will begin again.

That's at least one thing to watch for.

Bob