Windows XP Boot Problems

[emceewonton]

I'm a newbie computer builder. I just built my first one and everything is fine except when I restart my system. It is running XP, Abit MOtherboard, on an AMD Sempron chip. After the bios comes on the system tells me that there is "Error Reading OS" and won't let me into windows. To get around this I put in my XP disc then it boots up and logs me in. What am I doing wrong. Or what do I need to do to avoid sticking the disk in every time I restart. I didn't know if it was a motherboard issue or what. I completely formatted the hard drive and reinstalled XP. Thanks.

[emceewonton]

okay so i went into the award bios and changed the boot order so that it boots from hdd2. I took two hard drives from my previous comp to this new build. this seems to solve the problem of me having to pop in the windows xp sp1 disk or reinstalling it every time i restart.

i have encountered a couple of other problems.
1. the floppy disk is connected but is not working. i have tried to update the driver. it says it's working properly.
2. i have an AMD Sempron 2500+ but the system recognizes it as an Athlon 1600+.
3. There is no standby mode. Just restart and turn off.

Any assistance would be much appreciated. Thanks guys and girls.

[Fruss Tray Ted]

Welcome to http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif!!

Start from the beginning. We'll need complete system specs.

Board model
Processor
RAM how much and what type
how many harddrives and how they are connected (ide or RAID etc)
peripherals like dvd and cd-rom

Floppy drives should not need any special drivers

You should be able to enable that in BIOS and away you go. BUT! You obviously do not have the timings set right if your processor is listed as a 1600. Your manual will explain if there's jumpers thaty need to be set or sometimes it is jumperless and done from within the setup BIOS page.

[david eaton]

I took two hard drives from my previous comp to this new build.

If you are trying to boot from an old Windows installation, after changing the hardware ( motherboard) then you will get these errors. The only way of overcoming then is to do a clean install, on an empty drive. Windows is looking for hardware that does not exist anymore, and finding new items for which it has no drivers!

[emceewonton]

I installed a fresh copy of XP on both hard drives. I tell the bios to boot from the second and this solves the windows loading problem. I still can't get my floppy drive to work. I checked all the connections and verified that they worked within the microsoft utilities. The hard drives, optical, and floppy are IDE connected. I checked the bios and made sure all drives and periphs were assigned correctly.

My biggest issues are:
1. floppy drive doesn't work.
2. system has no standby mode.
3. system doesn't recognize AMD Sempron chip, instead it thinks it's an Athlon. I was told to update the bios but wanted your input and i need the floppy to work in order to boot the .exe file.
4. what temp is normal for cpu and system. with an extra fan my system temp is above 50 and cpu is above 32. without the extra fan it decreases to sys temp 40s and cpu 20s. i thought the fan would help the system out but am worried that it might overheat it. thanks guys

specs:
CPU: AMD SEMPRON 2500+ SOCKET A
MOTHERBOARD: ABIT VA-20
RAM: 512 MB DDR 3200 – PNY
OS: WINDOWS XP SP 1
HARD DRIVE: MASTER, WD400BB
SLAVE, MAXTOR 6Y120PO
OPTICAL: PLEXTOR DVDR PX=712A

[Paleo Pete]

1. Is the floppy LED staying on all the time? If so, flip the cable, probably at the floppy end, it should have a red or blue stripe on one side. That stripe goes to pin one on both motherboard and floppy drive connectors. Then try a different cable, if it's still no go, you have a bad drive. And make sure the power cable is plugged in securely.

2. Standby has always been flaky at best, you're probably better off not trying to use it. If you do wish to use it, check your BIOS settings in the Power Management section. Again I recommend not using standby or hibernate, both have always been flaky.

3. Check BIOS as noted above, if a BIOS upgrade is necessary go back to 1. and get it working.

4. Those temps are reversed, the CPU should always be warmer than the system temp. 50 is a bit on the high side if it's the CPU but not hot enough to cause trouble, just enough to tell you to watch it closely or check the thermal compound. 60 I think is usually the dafault setting for thermal shut down, 50 is ok, just a little warm. 50C is 122 F, both my systems idle around 115-120F, so that's not too bad at all.

[emceewonton]

thanks a lot pete. i cleared the cmos and redid the jumpers. it now reads it as a sempron 2500+ at the correct ghz. the standby i can live without. i stuck an extra intake fan to cool the system so the temperatures shouldn't be an issue. i don't do anything more intensive than surf the web. :D the floppy, i'll mess with it later. just got back from work. need to watch 24 :). thanks for your help. this first comp was pretty fun to build. thanks.