AARRGGHH!! - Black Screen on startup... - Solved It :)

Perhaps you have a dodgy IDE cable?

 

HDDs are SATA and windows installed from the CD, so I don't think so, but thanks for the suggestion

Still got the BSOD

 

You were a bit unlucky for a first time assembling
Sorry for ya, but keep trying !

 

To find out exactly what the problem is, I'd have to see what the error is. Can you take a photo of the monitor when the error occurs?

 

Do you still have the "old" (possibly defektive) disk connected ? if so try disconnecting it during install on the new disk.

The only time i have ever seen this problem is when windows puts something wrong in the boot sector... the way to solve the problem on my machine was to run fdisk again, delete all partisions, and start all over.

 

I've heard about lots of SATA cables that have been faulty or were just plain crap.

Are you using the ones that came with the board or are you using seperate ones?

 

Didn't get it working last night, but I am in work now so won't be able to have another go until around 6pm tonight... To answer the questions posted overnight...

I will do so this evening - It gets as far as Verifying DMI pool........... - If I am trying to boot from CD after the install it also says Boot CD:

Welcome to the forums Yey, first chance to say it

No, I am only connecting one Hard Disk at a time now. when I had the 'possibly' defective Hard Disk connected I could not even boot from CD. I am now also thinking that neither Hard disk is faulty due to the Identical errors after windows install...

Can I access fdisk without being able to get into windows or DOS?

For these two disk I am using cables I bought separately, I will try a different one tonight.

Though if the cable was faulty would it still format the disk and install windows to it?



I had a thought that it might be the F6 install SATA drivers thing... But isn't that only for the disks connected through the PCI controller? Also my F6 key does not seem to work at the relevant time

Thanks for all the help guys , I'll keep you posted...

 

I have also had trouble installing the latest BIOS due to the fact that I am not currently able to create a bootable floppy as my other computer is a Mac, however the work laptop will be coming home with me tonight

I am currently on BIOS v12, the latest is v13.

 

I would definately try using the cables that came with the board. I'm not sure why you would be able to format it and install windows then not have it boot.

 

Confusing the hell out of me too

 

I noticed that you're running an Abit IC7-Max (i875 chipset) with one of the Pentium4 Cs, so this might possibly be of interest to you. While installing Win2K on both of my i865 systems (one a Shuttle SB61 and the other an Abit IS7) I kept getting blue screens and reboots until I raised the CPU, RAM and AGP voltages a bit in the BIOS - a few other people I have spoken to experienced similar problems. The other thing I experienced was that the boards were very picky about their memory timings with some RAM (incidentally, what RAM are you running in the system at the moment?). Anyway, have a look in the BIOS and see what voltages the board is reporting - if these are significantly below what they have been set to, then I guess it may be the same problem that I had.

I don't know whether these have ever been issues with the 875 motherboards, but considering that the chipset is near identical to the 865 it is certainly a possibility. However, even if they did affect the 875 chipset, I would have thought that by now they would have ironed out these irritating problems - both of my P4 systems were bought when the 865/875 chipsets were relatively new, so it's almost (but not quite) understandable to have a few teething problems.

 

Interesting... I will also have a look into that tonight.

I am currently running 4x256MB OCZ 4200EL

Also checking the board the Vdimm hard mod is already performed

 

If it's not an undervolting problem, it sounds to me most likely that you're looking at a hardware failure, the RAM is an easy place to start as you've got so many modules to swap around.

 

yep will def try the volting thing the RAM is under warranty all the way up to 2.9v anyway

If I remeber correctly from last night the rails looked like

3.32v

5.02v

11.73v

 

hmmm .... sounds like we (////\oo/\\\\ and I) might have similar problems (possibly undervolting) just with different symptoms (my problem can be found in this thread ... any help is appreciated).

This should be in both our intrests.

What constitutes a significant deviation from the set voltages ?

(my settings and system setup can be found in the above mentioned post... my largest deviation is about 0.05v (1.525v @ 1.47v) is that bad ?)

 

////\oo/\\\\: The main voltage rails look fine but what I found to be causing my problems were the voltages on the CPU, RAM and AGP - have a look at those in the BIOS and see what sort of figures you are getting. To be honest I really don't know if it is an undervolting problem, but I figure that it's at least worth a try. Especially since I experienced general instability while I was installing Windows which upping the voltages seem to cure.

If not then my money would probably be on it being a hardware fault somewhere or maybe some dodgy settings in the BIOS. Like Kameleon said, the RAM is as good a place as any to start.

To begin with, go into your BIOS and see if the memory timings are set to automatic (it will probably be listed as 'By SPD') - if they are then try setting them manually to the timings that the manufacturer recommends (do the same for CAS latency). This fixed stability problems that some people were experiencing with 865 and 875 systems. If this doesn't seem to help then try either different combinations of your current RAM (e.g. just a single module), or entirely different RAM if you have any lying around. Short of swapping everything in and out from other systems I don't know what else to suggest.

Edit: one last thing did occur to me: if you happen to have a standard IDE hard disk lying around (i.e. non-SATA) which you can try installing Windows on that would eliminate another possible cause.

aequitas: I had a look at your other thread and whilst the CPU voltage does seem to be a tad low, it seems to be very strange way for an under volting problem to manifest itself. For a start, if it were voltage issue I would certainly expect there to be some instability within Windows, particularly when the system is under heavy load - you said in your original post that the system is rock stable once in Windows.I suppose you could try raising it a little, but like I say, I would be surprised if that is the issue.

 

[hijack]Shambla, what course/year are you in at York? I ask because I know a couple of guys in their 2nd year of CS, and you seem the right age/type [/hijack]

I think the installing on a PATA drive is a good idea, a machine that black-screens without any sign of windows being there suggests to me that there might be something wrong with it booting off the SATA, though in my experience you usually get an INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE BSOD instead.

 

I'm in my first year, having taken a gap year, studying economics/econometrics (that's economics with lots of stats and maths in case anyone was wondering).

 

Ah well, worth a try

 

Right, this is what I have been up to...

Successfully Flashed the Bios to the latest version

Still the same problem

CPU Voltage was set at 1.525 but running at 1.47 so I upped it to 1.575 and it now runs at 1.52 - 1.53

Still the same problem

This is where I am getting up to:


Then the screen goes black and nothing...











Oooooh! Progress! I have just got it to boot into DOS so it looks like all the components apart from possibly the hard disks are ok, but wait...

I am currently running WD's Diagnostics at the mo:

Quick Test Result Disk 1: No Errors

Extended Test Disk 1: In progress...

Quick Test Result Disk 2: Still to run

Extended Test Disk 2: Still to Run

Looks like we are getting somewhere if both disks test ok I'll be able to erase them and start again from scrath...