H
HeeroYuy
DustyB said:
Boot order enable function to a degree, but if you don't press a key when
you see "Press any key to boot from CD," you will get NADA.
Boot order enable function to a degree, but if you don't press a key when
you see "Press any key to boot from CD," you will get NADA.
D
DustyB
Yes. That is true. But only the first time you get to this point. FirstDarrell S said:
time through, it asks you for partition selection, and if created, permits
you to format it. Then it loads Windows on it, and when that's done it
reboots, asking you that same question again.
Since the OS should now be loaded, you DON'T click on any key, and it passes
the CD and goes to the next item in the boot list. If that's empty as well,
goes to the HD and attempts to boot up Windows. And **THAT** is were I get
to before I see:
"A Disk Read Error Occurred
Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart"
And that's where I continue to be today. To summarize again, I've:
* Thoroughly tested the Disc, Memory, Video, and Processor sub-systems.
* Upgraded my Dell Dimension 8100 BIOS to XP2 (A09+1) from A06--which, BTW,
was running my XP box just fine, thank you.
* Used the RC (Recovery Console) to "fix" the boot sector
* Used the RC to "replace" the boot sector
* Used the RC to run read and write files, run CHKDSK, FORMAT, & others
* Used the RC to check & see that every file that s/b there, was
* Replaced the HDD with a brand new, off-the-shelf item
* Replaced the XP Pro boot CD with a brand new, off-the-shelf item
* Tried to load Win2K Pro and WinNT
* Disabled all of the integrated devices, except the mouse & keyboard ports
* Replace the video card with a simple, VGA card that doesn't require
anything
* Arranged the boot order in every combination possible
* Sized and formatted partitions in various allocations
* blanked the disc and tried from there
The only thing I haven't tried yet was to format in FAT; and that'll begin
right after this post goes out...
Later all,
DustyB
D
DustyB
Okay, I just got done making a small partition, 30GB, and formatting it as a
FAT32. I then loaded up XP and rebooted. This time, the message I got was:
"Disk error"
"Press any key to restart"
Does this ring any bells with anybody?
DustyB
FAT32. I then loaded up XP and rebooted. This time, the message I got was:
"Disk error"
"Press any key to restart"
Does this ring any bells with anybody?
DustyB
D
DustyB
It seems the the irresistible force of my troubleshooting did indeed move
the formerly immovable object (my Dell Dimension 8100)!
-o)!
For those new to this thread, I'll summarize; I was doing a routine download
and execution of a proggie to help me track down a slow boot. Then, after
years of working just fine on XP Pro/SP2 I got:
"A desk read error occurred"
"Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart"
I got lots of advice from folks reading here and on other forums. Some from
the terminally clueless. Some pointless. Some just plain wrong. Some
about unrelated issues. And just 2 that helped me narrow down the issue
with some directed advice.
I had explained that I'd installed a new HDD, yet folks would assert that my
drive was going bad. I'd explain that I'd tried other, older and/or
different versions of the OS (Win2KP) and folks would submit that it was the
*&^%$#@! SP2, or XP in general, or Microsoft in particular; with some even
finding time to cast dispersions on the current administration for this
issue (albeit not in this forum). There was absolutely no shortage of folks
with an axe to grind. Others asserted that it was surely an Internet
sourced virus, Trojan, or worm. My words explaining that this was happening
in the boot cycle just didn't seem to have any weight to them. I've been
running NTFS since NT first offered it. Yet folks would insist that only a
FAT/FAT32 formatted drive could work. Others asserted that I had gotten
some well deserved malware because I didn't or wouldn't run Linux or a Mac.
Trust me, the level of stupidity, ignorance, arrogance, and just outright
hatred for any thing MS related out there is frightening!
I had reduced my system to mouse & KB; video card; and a new HDD (tested and
certified on another system). The mouse and KB handlers are in the mobo, so
they're hard to isolate; as is the IDE interface. I was in the process of
getting ready to install an IDE card to eliminate the integrated one, when
it occurred to me to "hand-manage" the heretofore automatic "cable select"
settings on my HDD's. I made drive 0 the hard master, and voila! It came
right up.
Since the cable's are okay, the problem has to be on the mobo, in the device
select/control logic. Although priority one is to get this unit up, so I
can read my mail and get back on-line, I'm going to have to get that mobo
replaced.
Hopefully my experiences will help others "find the light"...
All-in-all, I've found XP to be good, solid, stable, and all-around pretty
easy to use. It's all I recommend to my customers. I'll only work on a W2K
machine if they're going to upgrade to XP while I'm there...
About the only drag at the moment is that I couldn't locate the file I'd
downloaded some years back from "Tomsterdam's" excellent site for that
freebie OE backup utility. I had backed my OE up with that, and now find
that he's taken it down for some work so I can't replace my missing
file...drat!
Also, for some of you software wizards out there. So much of what OE does
is held in the registry. A tool that permits one to extract that info
(accounts, rules, etc.) and apply it to a new installation would be most
useful. It's gonna be a drag having to recreate some 200 accounts, rules,
and so on... But, at least my box is back and I can browse on my own
machine from now on...
Signing off'a this one,
DustyB
....
the formerly immovable object (my Dell Dimension 8100)!
-o)!For those new to this thread, I'll summarize; I was doing a routine download
and execution of a proggie to help me track down a slow boot. Then, after
years of working just fine on XP Pro/SP2 I got:
"A desk read error occurred"
"Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart"
I got lots of advice from folks reading here and on other forums. Some from
the terminally clueless. Some pointless. Some just plain wrong. Some
about unrelated issues. And just 2 that helped me narrow down the issue
with some directed advice.
I had explained that I'd installed a new HDD, yet folks would assert that my
drive was going bad. I'd explain that I'd tried other, older and/or
different versions of the OS (Win2KP) and folks would submit that it was the
*&^%$#@! SP2, or XP in general, or Microsoft in particular; with some even
finding time to cast dispersions on the current administration for this
issue (albeit not in this forum). There was absolutely no shortage of folks
with an axe to grind. Others asserted that it was surely an Internet
sourced virus, Trojan, or worm. My words explaining that this was happening
in the boot cycle just didn't seem to have any weight to them. I've been
running NTFS since NT first offered it. Yet folks would insist that only a
FAT/FAT32 formatted drive could work. Others asserted that I had gotten
some well deserved malware because I didn't or wouldn't run Linux or a Mac.
Trust me, the level of stupidity, ignorance, arrogance, and just outright
hatred for any thing MS related out there is frightening!
I had reduced my system to mouse & KB; video card; and a new HDD (tested and
certified on another system). The mouse and KB handlers are in the mobo, so
they're hard to isolate; as is the IDE interface. I was in the process of
getting ready to install an IDE card to eliminate the integrated one, when
it occurred to me to "hand-manage" the heretofore automatic "cable select"
settings on my HDD's. I made drive 0 the hard master, and voila! It came
right up.
Since the cable's are okay, the problem has to be on the mobo, in the device
select/control logic. Although priority one is to get this unit up, so I
can read my mail and get back on-line, I'm going to have to get that mobo
replaced.
Hopefully my experiences will help others "find the light"...
All-in-all, I've found XP to be good, solid, stable, and all-around pretty
easy to use. It's all I recommend to my customers. I'll only work on a W2K
machine if they're going to upgrade to XP while I'm there...
About the only drag at the moment is that I couldn't locate the file I'd
downloaded some years back from "Tomsterdam's" excellent site for that
freebie OE backup utility. I had backed my OE up with that, and now find
that he's taken it down for some work so I can't replace my missing
file...drat!
Also, for some of you software wizards out there. So much of what OE does
is held in the registry. A tool that permits one to extract that info
(accounts, rules, etc.) and apply it to a new installation would be most
useful. It's gonna be a drag having to recreate some 200 accounts, rules,
and so on... But, at least my box is back and I can browse on my own
machine from now on...
Signing off'a this one,
DustyB
....
D
Dai Ichi
This has been the most informative post on this subject. I personally
solved the problem myself within the last three days. Three days ago,
I bit the bullet and upgraded my Windows 2000 system to Windows XP SP2
.... and although the installation went smoothly (well, sort of
smoothly--I'll explain later), when finished, I rebooted and voila
"Disk Read Error." Pushed ctrl-alt-del and got the same thing.
I then went to the newsgroups and to my surprise, nobody had anything
useful to say about it.
I then discovered a really weird thing that finished my installation:
if instead of hitting ctrl-alt-delete, I hit the reset button and
voila! It boots up fine. I repeated this several times to be sure of
its consistency. So I concluded that it had something to do with the
timing of the drive to the drive controller. Since I rarely boot the
machine (it stays on all the time), it wasn't a big deal to hit the
reset button--so I didn't look into it any further.
Well, the funny thing is, after installing all the applications on XP
SP2--I found that it boots up fine all the time now. Weirdness. At
any rate, I can believe the analysis that Dustyb says--and if the "Disk
Read Error" were repeatable now, I'd do it too.
And yes, I think XP SP2 kicks 2000's butt.
Regarding the "sort of smoothly" installation? Well, playing it safe,
I ghost my drive to a new drive to ensure I can go back if the
installation goes awry. The first time I tried to install XP, it
flagged my DVD drive as "I:". When it got to the copying portion of
the installation, the DVD drive became "H:" and in order to complete
the load, I would have been forced to type the correct path in the
"please locate the file" dialog. It turns out the problem was that I
have 2 SCSI DVD/CD drives and one IDE DVD drive (which I boot
from)--but at a certain point after configuring the boot CD drive as
I:, it recognizes the SCSI drives and shuffles the drive letters
around. The solution was simply to unplug the SCSI drives until the
installation was complete, and THEN plug them in. Took me another
installation try before I realized what was happening. At any rate, I
hope that tidbit helps someone down the line.
solved the problem myself within the last three days. Three days ago,
I bit the bullet and upgraded my Windows 2000 system to Windows XP SP2
.... and although the installation went smoothly (well, sort of
smoothly--I'll explain later), when finished, I rebooted and voila
"Disk Read Error." Pushed ctrl-alt-del and got the same thing.
I then went to the newsgroups and to my surprise, nobody had anything
useful to say about it.
I then discovered a really weird thing that finished my installation:
if instead of hitting ctrl-alt-delete, I hit the reset button and
voila! It boots up fine. I repeated this several times to be sure of
its consistency. So I concluded that it had something to do with the
timing of the drive to the drive controller. Since I rarely boot the
machine (it stays on all the time), it wasn't a big deal to hit the
reset button--so I didn't look into it any further.
Well, the funny thing is, after installing all the applications on XP
SP2--I found that it boots up fine all the time now. Weirdness. At
any rate, I can believe the analysis that Dustyb says--and if the "Disk
Read Error" were repeatable now, I'd do it too.
And yes, I think XP SP2 kicks 2000's butt.
Regarding the "sort of smoothly" installation? Well, playing it safe,
I ghost my drive to a new drive to ensure I can go back if the
installation goes awry. The first time I tried to install XP, it
flagged my DVD drive as "I:". When it got to the copying portion of
the installation, the DVD drive became "H:" and in order to complete
the load, I would have been forced to type the correct path in the
"please locate the file" dialog. It turns out the problem was that I
have 2 SCSI DVD/CD drives and one IDE DVD drive (which I boot
from)--but at a certain point after configuring the boot CD drive as
I:, it recognizes the SCSI drives and shuffles the drive letters
around. The solution was simply to unplug the SCSI drives until the
installation was complete, and THEN plug them in. Took me another
installation try before I realized what was happening. At any rate, I
hope that tidbit helps someone down the line.
W
wayfarrer
DustyB,
Glad to hear you got the problem resolved!
Regarding the transfer issue, look into what Windows XP already offers you:
HOW TO: Use Files and Settings Transfer Wizard in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;293118
Here's a supplemental link to read first:
Files and Settings Transfer Wizard
http://winsupportcenter.com/win5/a/fast.htm
Glad to hear you got the problem resolved!
Regarding the transfer issue, look into what Windows XP already offers you:
HOW TO: Use Files and Settings Transfer Wizard in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;293118
Here's a supplemental link to read first:
Files and Settings Transfer Wizard
http://winsupportcenter.com/win5/a/fast.htm
D
DustyB
Hello "wayfarrer" and all;
-o)!
box "B" via the LAN. But unless there's something I'm not getting from it,
it won't do disk "A" to disk "B" transfers...
DustyB
You have no idea...wayfarrer said:
-o)!Yeah. I'm sure that works...if I were transferring files from box "A" to
box "B" via the LAN. But unless there's something I'm not getting from it,
it won't do disk "A" to disk "B" transfers...
DustyB
W
wayfarrer
I assume you're saying you have the old and new HDDs installed on the same box.
If so, are they setup as dual-boot? If so, boot to the old HDD, snap a picture,
burn it to a CD disc, etc....well, you can figure out the rest.
If no dual boot....swap 'um and go from there.
To successfully make the transfers that you're asking for, you'll have to
extract from an active drive, since some of these settings are from the
registry. Refer to the supplemental link that I cited previously. It contains
info about OE transfers and includes links to other backup/restore routines.
If so, are they setup as dual-boot? If so, boot to the old HDD, snap a picture,
burn it to a CD disc, etc....well, you can figure out the rest.
If no dual boot....swap 'um and go from there.
To successfully make the transfers that you're asking for, you'll have to
extract from an active drive, since some of these settings are from the
registry. Refer to the supplemental link that I cited previously. It contains
info about OE transfers and includes links to other backup/restore routines.
D
DustyB
G'day all;
drive--as the "E:" drive in this newly rebuilt system. I used it as a
repository for source files, backups, copies of things I want to be certain
to preserve and so on. The C: drive is new and clean.
But you've given me a good idea. When all of this is finally done and
finished, I think I'm going to setup the current "E:" drive as the default
boot drive, and load XP on it as well. Then I'll set it back to being my
"E:" drive (which I use compressed as a backup repository) again. Then,
should this ever happen again, I'll have a ready to use drive that I can
simply pop-in and go...
Just before the mobo blew up, I made a couple of backups: a full backup via
the built-in BU routine, a backup of OE using "Tomsterdam's" 'Freebie OE
BU", and a direct bit-for-bit copy of the "Documents and Settings" folder.
I burned the fullBU onto CD as well.
The problem is, I deleted a lot of things that I'd installed over the
previous years. So just blindly reinstalling the desktop will yield a
truck-load of broken links. Besides, I started this process because
something had snuck in and was stretching my boot sequence. And I can't
think of a good reason to intentionally reinstall the possibility of
"finding" that little "feature" straight off a BU again...-o)!
It was during the pursuit of that little monster that the built-in IDE
control logic on my mobo went south--that was what ended up giving me the
"Drive read error". I suspect some timing aspect changed as some component
in the drive logic on the mobo "aged". In the process of troubleshooting
*that*, I took ever more drastic actions on my HDD until finally it was
wiped and formatted. So getting anything off of it is impossible. Since I
don't backup program files (and sadly neglected to keep installation modules
of some of the various tools I've acquired over the years), I have a lot of
links and data chunks that go to software that probably no longer
exists--not to mention a wealth of registry entries. And I'm loath to put
that back onto my system.
I got my eMail across, but am still knee-deep in recreating new accounts and
rules. What a tedious and shitty job! I wish MS would make some way to
hard save that kind of info...
my various web sites have been copied, and by this PM my desktop s/b done as
well. Like I said, a tedious and crappy job...<big sigh!>
L8r all,
DustyB
....
No. But that's an interesting thought. What I have is my old "E:"wayfarrer said:
drive--as the "E:" drive in this newly rebuilt system. I used it as a
repository for source files, backups, copies of things I want to be certain
to preserve and so on. The C: drive is new and clean.
But you've given me a good idea. When all of this is finally done and
finished, I think I'm going to setup the current "E:" drive as the default
boot drive, and load XP on it as well. Then I'll set it back to being my
"E:" drive (which I use compressed as a backup repository) again. Then,
should this ever happen again, I'll have a ready to use drive that I can
simply pop-in and go...
Just before the mobo blew up, I made a couple of backups: a full backup via
the built-in BU routine, a backup of OE using "Tomsterdam's" 'Freebie OE
BU", and a direct bit-for-bit copy of the "Documents and Settings" folder.
I burned the fullBU onto CD as well.
The problem is, I deleted a lot of things that I'd installed over the
previous years. So just blindly reinstalling the desktop will yield a
truck-load of broken links. Besides, I started this process because
something had snuck in and was stretching my boot sequence. And I can't
think of a good reason to intentionally reinstall the possibility of
"finding" that little "feature" straight off a BU again...
-o)!It was during the pursuit of that little monster that the built-in IDE
control logic on my mobo went south--that was what ended up giving me the
"Drive read error". I suspect some timing aspect changed as some component
in the drive logic on the mobo "aged". In the process of troubleshooting
*that*, I took ever more drastic actions on my HDD until finally it was
wiped and formatted. So getting anything off of it is impossible. Since I
don't backup program files (and sadly neglected to keep installation modules
of some of the various tools I've acquired over the years), I have a lot of
links and data chunks that go to software that probably no longer
exists--not to mention a wealth of registry entries. And I'm loath to put
that back onto my system.
I got my eMail across, but am still knee-deep in recreating new accounts and
rules. What a tedious and shitty job! I wish MS would make some way to
hard save that kind of info...
Yeah. I know. OE is pretty well done, my documents have been copied over,
my various web sites have been copied, and by this PM my desktop s/b done as
well. Like I said, a tedious and crappy job...<big sigh!>
L8r all,
DustyB
....