Verifying DMI pool...sucess! Hang

[Angothoron]

Details

1 PATA Hard Drive: Western Digital
1 SATA Hard Drive: Western Digital

Gigabyte Motherboard (AMD2 Socket)
SATA DVD Drive.

Problem:

When I boot up the computer, it takes forever to detect IDE devices. Then when it finally does, it sucessfully detects the DVD drive. But gives an

IDE Channel 2:
instead of
IDE Channel 2: None

Which to me indicates that it is not correctly detecting the SATA hard drive which has the OS on it (XP) It then moves to the device list stage, and tries to Update the DMI, and apparently succeeds.

Verifying DMI Pool Data ....................
K8 NPT Data Change...Update new data to DMI! Update Sucess.

It then gives me a Disk Boot Failure.

Measures taken:

Removed DVD Connections, and left only the SATA drive in. Which sucessfully booted Once, then the problem returned.

Booted up with a Ubuntu CD in the DVD tray which is sucessful and used it to test the memory which checked out. Ran Ubuntu for a while off the DVD with no problems.

Changed the boot disk out for a known good one (PATA), connected to the computer which then stops hanging after the DMI issue but goes into a boot loop. When used with a different Motherboard the HDD works fine.

Personal Conclusions:

I do not have a lot of experience in this particular field, but from this I am willing to guess that the issue is on the Motherboard, however I do not have another SATA hard drive to eliminate that possibility.

[The New Normal]

I'd hunt around in the BIOS for SATA/PATA settings. Not saying this is your problem, but that's what I'd try.

[hotmatrixx]

Sorry. web timed out on me, had to recover all this fromm my keylogger.. hopefully I recomplie it in the right order...

the boot loop is caused (usually) by windows booting onto a motherboard other than the one it was installed on. so your mobo is probably fine.

slow detection times in HDD are caused, 99% of the time, by...
Power surges.
I bet you don't have spike protection on your PC , Modem, and ethernet lines, do you? monitor, router,
you can check this by booting from that HDD, hitting F8 repeatedly.

(some mobo use F8 for their boot menu so if you get a device menu, exit out and continue, hitting F8 again)
you should get a list starting with "safe mode." go down to "disable system restart on system failure."
it should boot through and end up in a blue screen of death. this is fine. it means your mobo is good, and windows is booting off the HDD, but the device crivers a very wrond good bootable etc. (HDD is in wrong PC )

back up that bad hdd before it fails completely. A disk imaging program would be the best.Daniweb is pushing Acronis TrueImage. It is probably good if Dani puts her name behind it, but I have never used it. So I cannot offer an opinion. or just use XCOPY command. but DO NOT use normal windows copy, it will stop on the first error and it is all over. you will have to start again. it is rubbish for this important stuff.

To Back up:
you need to plug it into another pc with
a) a working OS
b) a hdd with enough room to get everything on the bad hdd
c) that bad hdd.

how to XCOPY:

xcopy "(oldriveletter):\" "(newdriveletter)\(folder to save to)" /e /c /i /f /y /r /o

put this one line above into a txt. document
then rename the .txt file as xcopy.bat and confirm yes.

the switches are important. they tell it to continue after errors, force copy, display full path, etc.

replace
(oldriveletter)
(newdriveletter)
(folder to save to)

with the apropriate values. (I hope you underatand me here? say if you don't)

click on it to run it..
it should open up a little black window and show the copy progress...

if not, then I didn't explain it well enough for you.

should take a little time... count in minutes. if it is done in 2 sec, something is wrong.

This is more cautionary than anything, but I would hate to see you lose your data...

Going to bed. let me know how you get on...

just as a point of curiosity:
does it give the same errors with the other HDD in?
could you put in a fresh HDD and put a fresh install of Windows on it to see if it works?

the answers to these questions will help point to whether it IS the HDD failing...

[Angothoron]

The second HDD has a fresh install of Windows and when I put it in, it goes into the boot loop. Exactly as you say should happen.

When I try forcing the SATA drive to boot through either the CMOS settings, or the boot manager, the system freezes. Though occasionally it detects the hard drive and sucessfully boots.

[Angothoron]

Solved:

I replaced the battery for the CMOS with another one I had lying around, and then disconnected it from AC power for about an hour. After that all the issues disappeared.

Thanks for the assistance everyone.

[hotmatrixx]

Cool. looks like "The New Normal" was closer than me this time. how about you mark it as solved, and it will come off the ...to solve list in the forum? cheers :-)