Hopefully someone here can help since I am at a complete loss....I am currently studing computers at school and [i]still[/i] don't know what the heck is going on with mine right now!![>:/][>:/]

Anyway, this is what is going on.

I deleted all currant partitions on my existing harddrive (30gigs).  I used Delpart to delete the NTFS partitions and then created 3 equal 10gig partitions using FDisk.

I then installed Window 2000 Pro onto the first partition.  The main installion files get installed onto the hard drive but when the computer restarts the hard drive is not recognized.  In BIOS the boot sequence is as follows: 1) Floppy 2) HDD-0 3)CD. WWhat happens is that during the power on self test everything gets recognized but stalls at the message [b]"Verifying DMI Pool Data"[/b].

If I put a floppy in and reboot it will go past this and boot to the floppy.  If I change boot sequence where the CD is read second it will also boot from the CD.  But I can never get past this message when I am trying to boot to the HDD!!

If I go into DOS I can read the "C" drive and the setup fills (from Win2000) are listed on the partition. I have removed the CMOS battery and reinstalled it.  I also replaced the HDD cable.  This is a system I built myself only 6 months ago with a FIC mother board and an AMD CPU.

Any ideas????  Cuase I am completely baffled??[>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/][>:/]


Thanks

Sgtar15

PS. [b] As a follow up question.....what would be the best round to shoot this M&%^$@ F&*%^&%$ thing with?[/b]

Have you reformated the partitions as fat32 after creating them with fdisk.

If the partitions are not formated the computer will not be able use them properly.

I've seen about 20 machines w/ Abit motherboards and close to 40 Dell's that do that.  Dell tech support blamed it on Intel's buggy DMI standard, and their workaround was to hit reset after it locked-up.  The second time through, it usually would continue booting.z

I'm certainly no expert, but I think you should format the drive and don't forget to also use whatever the switch is (/mbr ?) to overwrite the master boot record.

Don't worry about creating partitions yet, if it works you can always go back and do it again or you can buy partition magic and make it easy.

If you find out what the problem is let us know.

Run fdisk and have it display partition data.

Make sure that you have c: as primary and set to active. If that wont work run the command "fdisk /MBR" without the quotes. If that didn’t work, post your fdisk output back here and I will walk you through writing zeros to the drive.

Also – Set "Plug and play BIOS" or "Plug and Play OS" set to OFF in bios.

Karma,

I will try that and then post the reply.  Are you going to bearound for a while?

sgtar15

Here’s a cool free utility:
It’s called Gwscan. It will test the read and write performance of your HDD for each cylinder. IF you have bad sectors (or other problems) it can sometimes repair them.

It’s also good for wiping out corrupted partition data – IE a “non dos partition” in fdisk that you cant delete. It will also kill most boot sector viri and get rid of EXT2 (Linux) HPFS(OS2/Linux swap) partitions.

[url]ftp://ftp.gateway.com/pub/hardware_support/drivers/win3.x_and_dos/mass_storage/hard_drives/7510801.exe[/url]

and yes I'm working for the evening so I'm awake.

Instant Karma & others,

[b]It worked!!!!!![/b]

I ran FDisk /mbr and it now works...thank you very much[:)][:)][:)]!!!  Trouble shooting...gotta love it!

Sgtar15

COOL!
Glad to be able to help [:)]

Nobody answered this so I will -

Step 1. - Take to a safe area, toss it in the air and hear loud crunch. [:)]

Step 2. - Blast repeatedly with rounds of #4 Buckshot & 00 Buckshot. [:D]

Step 3. - Pour lighter fluid all over it and light a match. [}:D]

Kevin,
I beg to differ.  After you pour lighter fluid (or, better yet, gasoline) all over it in step 3, stand about 30 yards off and start shooting it with 5.56 tracers until it catches fire.  This is the approved method. [:D]