Well, after almost two months of fiddling with problems in peripheral drivers I have discovered that the pesky, little annoying error messages that keep appearing during boot with subsequent reboot have been causing more harm than I suspected. "Hard error..." "Stop:0x0000218" etc. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/mad.gif

They always went away on re-boot, UNTIL recently. Now I have taken the time to do a little research... seems that the "Stop..." error was supposed to be fixed with SP2. Eh? As for "Hard error..." Memory checks, HDD's check, all drivers and BIOS updates done. Folks, the system runs fine after it warms up... only get these problems on COLD boot. Who's got a guess? http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/confused.gif

Is it possible that an aborted boot attempt corrupted some registry hive?

------------------
Senior citizen's toy
AMD1.4/RAID/Win2Kpro

I would almost be willing to blame it on a power supply problem....but there is something that is happening on a cold boot that doesn't when rebooting, so figure that one out and maybe you'll be able to trace it down....you may have to pull all the hardware, leaving just a video card, the RAM and the HD. IF that gets you in without errors then start adding everything back in one at a time...also you may want to check it with each stick of RAM separately........

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Well, here's one more little tick: After power switched on, no boot. Hit reset... nothing. Hold reset 2 seconds, walla! It boots... (then hangs halfway thru BIOS load). Reset once more and I get to Windows splash screen where I get "Hard error...if this is the first time...use Safe Mode. Otherwise call 911 (a little levity here)" Reset again, this time get all the way to Windows StartUp..."Stop: do not pass go, do not collect 1c (or something to that effect). http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/mad.gif

These error messages do not ALWAYS occur... only at random. And after running for a while don't seem to re-occur (I can warm boot without a hitch... or is it horse?... anyway, I tried to disable ACPI, but system won't boot at all if I do that. This system worked fine for the first 4 months... only since February has this been getting progressively worse. System and CPU temps are low (I've got a big-block Chevy V8 under the hood) and enough power to lay rubber for a mile.

I am getting suspicious of a BIOS upgrade I did about then... but it was so long ago! Of all things could it be my IBM deskstars? I've heard a rumor...

------------------
Senior citizen's toy
AMD1.4/RAID/Win2Kpro

75GXPs?

Maybe....but that isn't really the kind of errors they have, more the "oops....that very imporant file you just saved, well I spilled iron filings allover it and now it is notheing more than bad sectors" kind of errors.

ACPI...after changing it you probably have to reinstall.

RAID....what kind of configuration?



Well, here's one more little tick: After power switched on, no boot. Hit reset... nothing. Hold reset 2 seconds, walla! It boots... (then hangs halfway thru BIOS load). Reset once more and I get to Windows splash screen where I get "Hard error...if this is the first time...use Safe Mode. Otherwise call 911 (a little levity here)" Reset again, this time get all the way to Windows StartUp..."Stop: do not pass go, do not collect 1c (or something to that effect).


That kind of sounds like a power problem.

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Thanks for the input, guys! Motherboard swap did the trick!!

------------------
Senior citizen's toy
AMD1.4/RAID/Win2Kpro