Stumped, PC Cold Boots will not Warm Boot

[JCacci]

k', it's a CPQ w/XP SP2, The PC all of a sudden will not boot warm but will boot cold. When a restart is performed it's as if the HD is not even recognized. In trying to remember when this all began, it seems to occur after installing a SATA card and SATA HD as well as Ghost 10. CMOS is not accessible on the Presario 5000 series as there's no response to the F10, as well as ALL other numerous key combos. I did disconnect drives to get the system to acknowledge a change, and even after F1 to save changes, the system would not boot. BTW, the PS did fry as well and replaced, so this may have damaged circuitry, not sure. Any ideas are welcome.

JC

[ski]

The fried PS may have damaged the MB.

[JCacci]

I was able to access the CMOS. Shuffled boot order upto and including disabling the Floppy and CD as boot devices. PC still will not warm boot when restarting XP.

[mjc]

Try changing the CMOS battery and then, if it is an option, disable 'quick boot' or enable 'full memory test' or whatever the option is to lengthen the POST/boot process. Also make sure that the drive is properly detected by the BIOS...you may need to manually 'set' it instead of relying on the 'auto' setting.

It sounds like the drive isn't ready when the POST completes. On a cold boot a longer memory test is done by default, but still not a complete one, unless set to do it. On a warm boot the test is often skipped, entirely, unless the 'full' option is enabled. By enabling the 'full' test, you are providing more time for the drive to come to speed/stabilize.