Windows does not boot from cd/dvd

[Matt]

I have a problem and cant find any solution..when I try to start windows (
ultimate) from the original installation dvd ( from which is was installed)
then I get the " press any key to boot from cd/dvd" command. When I do it the
white bar at the bottom of the screen saying "Windows is loading files". Next
is the black screen with the "Microsoft Corporation" and a running green bar
at the bottom of the screen.
And thats it. The screen gets black after that and nothing happens. No hdd
activity of any kind.
I have a Norton Save and Restore cd for my computer which used to work just
fine, but also with this cd I am running into the 100% exact same problem.
Any bootable cd ihave which doesnt boot directly into Windows Vista is
working perfectly. I also can boot from e.g. my old Windows XP cd. And, the
Windows (Vista) installation dvd starts without problems at all in my other
computer...
My Windows installation itself is booting without problems from hdd.


I would appreciate any help, Matt


My computer:
GA-K8NSC-939 mobo with nForce3 250Gb chipset
4 Mb ram
NVIDIA Geforce 7600 GS Graphic board with 512 Mb
250Gb hdd 0 Hitachi
160Gb hdd 1 Hitachi

 

[Matt]

Sorry, it must say, of course, 4 Gb ram, not 4Mb.

Matt

 

[Dominic Gauthier]

Hi Matt,

This may be a know problem about the 4G of ram. I am using a Quad-Core with
4 Gig of ram and wasn't able to install it.

I removed two stick of ram (2 Gig) and then it worked.
The installation files are not supporting good the 4Gig. But with 1Gig or
2Gig you should be ok. After the installation, apply all patches from
Windows Update right away as well as the 4Gig memory patch. You can find it
under my message in the newgroup. Jane (MVP) posted the link to it.

After applying all the patches, shut down your computer and put your two
stick back in the PC. That should work. If you get a blue screen of dead a
the bootup of Windows after that mean you could have a defective RAM or a bad
setup of the RAM in the BIOS.

What is the name of the ram you are using? And the motherboard you are using
as well as the CPU?

Even if your RAM work under Windows XP, its possible that with Vista you get
problem because Vista is loading completly in the memory so if you only have
one bit defective in the memory it could broke all the process of
initialisation of Vista.

Hope it help (check also my message in the newgroup here for the link).

Have a nice christmass,

Dominic

 

[Matt]

Hi Matt,

This may be a know problem about the 4G of ram. I am using a Quad-Core with
4 Gig of ram and wasn't able to install it.

I removed two stick of ram (2 Gig) and then it worked.
The installation files are not supporting good the 4Gig. But with 1Gig or
2Gig you should be ok. After the installation, apply all patches from
Windows Update right away as well as the 4Gig memory patch. You can find it
under my message in the newgroup. Jane (MVP) posted the link to it.

After applying all the patches, shut down your computer and put your two
stick back in the PC. That should work. If you get a blue screen of dead a
the bootup of Windows after that mean you could have a defective RAM or a bad
setup of the RAM in the BIOS.

What is the name of the ram you are using? And the motherboard you are using
as well as the CPU?

Even if your RAM work under Windows XP, its possible that with Vista you get
problem because Vista is loading completly in the memory so if you only have
one bit defective in the memory it could broke all the process of
initialisation of Vista.

Hope it help (check also my message in the newgroup here for the link).

Have a nice christmass,

Dominic

Thank you for your answer. I will definitively try that.

But, My system is running under my configuration with Vista since February,
without problems. Since this time I used the installation DVD as well as my
Norton Save and Restore cd many times, and never had problems to oot the
computer. I originally installed vista while already 4GB have been in the
computer. I had no problems at all. The problem I have now appeared to come
"out of the blue".
I have a GA-K8NSC-939 mobo with nForce3 250Gb chipset, and an AMD Athlon
64X2 3800+ .
Matt

 

[Matt]

Hi Matt,

This may be a know problem about the 4G of ram. I am using a Quad-Core with
4 Gig of ram and wasn't able to install it.

I removed two stick of ram (2 Gig) and then it worked.
The installation files are not supporting good the 4Gig. But with 1Gig or
2Gig you should be ok. After the installation, apply all patches from
Windows Update right away as well as the 4Gig memory patch. You can find it
under my message in the newgroup. Jane (MVP) posted the link to it.

After applying all the patches, shut down your computer and put your two
stick back in the PC. That should work. If you get a blue screen of dead a
the bootup of Windows after that mean you could have a defective RAM or a bad
setup of the RAM in the BIOS.

What is the name of the ram you are using? And the motherboard you are using
as well as the CPU?

Even if your RAM work under Windows XP, its possible that with Vista you get
problem because Vista is loading completly in the memory so if you only have
one bit defective in the memory it could broke all the process of
initialisation of Vista.

Hope it help (check also my message in the newgroup here for the link).

Have a nice christmass,

Dominic



Hi Dominic,

I gave it a try, I removed 2 of the 4 Gb, and even 3 of them. It didnt do
anything. My computer boots just fine from the hdd. but nothing goes when I
try to boot from cd/dvd.
But as I said, originally I installed Vista while I already had 4 Gb in the
computer, and it worked fine since February. Therefore I have actually
expected that in this case the amount of memory wouldnt be a factor.
Anyway, thanks for your support, I appreciate it.
Matt

 

[Dominic Gauthier]

Hi,

Merry Christmass.

When you get the blue screen of death, do you see a message that your system
is dumping memory in the file MEMORY.DMP? If its the case, you can download
from the Microsoft website the debugging tool for Vista 32bits or 64bits. Be
sure to take the good one. Install it then run "WinDbg".

Select the "File" menu, then select "Open Crash Crash Dump". The select the
MEMORY.DMP file in your Windows folder. That should open you a text file with
some debug information in it. Tell me if you see at the end of the file any
name of a file, for example: starport.sys, etc. Tell me the names of the
files and the error it give.

You may also check in the administration tools in the control panel the
Event Viewer for System Event. Check any error there with the error code and
post it here.

Since Vista is handling memory in a different way from other OS (WinXP is
not operating the same way) it could be a specific bits in your memory that
have a problem. I strongly suggest you to try "memtest86", download the .ISO
file and burn it and boot with it to see if you get any error in the memory.

A bad timing setup for the memory could make this too (bad stability if
badly configured in the BIOS). Check all the setup related to the memory. If
you BIOS is set to AUTO mode, i suggest you to check the forums of support
for your motherboard and ask what could be the best setup for the memory to
get stability.

And the last possibility i may think is a defective drivers you may have
updated recently (any kind for anything). Rollback the drivers just in case
and see if it fix the problem.

You may also apply manually the 4Gig Handling patch for Windows Vista. It is
not gived with Windows Update. You need to install it manually. It will help
Vista to handle the 4 Gig. If this patch is not there you was lucky to make
it work for all those weeks without any problems. Trust me.

Vista need perfect memory. If only one thing is wrong, the OS will crash,
freeze or blue screen. Im pretty sure its memory related.

If you test all i said and check everything and the problem persist, you may
check for a BIOS update from your manufacturer. Could you provide me the
name of your memory and model, the motherboard model/brand, and CPU?

have a nice day,

Dominic

 

[Matt]

Hi,

Merry Christmass.

When you get the blue screen of death, do you see a message that your system
is dumping memory in the file MEMORY.DMP? If its the case, you can download
from the Microsoft website the debugging tool for Vista 32bits or 64bits. Be
sure to take the good one. Install it then run "WinDbg".

Select the "File" menu, then select "Open Crash Crash Dump". The select the
MEMORY.DMP file in your Windows folder. That should open you a text file with
some debug information in it. Tell me if you see at the end of the file any
name of a file, for example: starport.sys, etc. Tell me the names of the
files and the error it give.

You may also check in the administration tools in the control panel the
Event Viewer for System Event. Check any error there with the error code and
post it here.

Since Vista is handling memory in a different way from other OS (WinXP is
not operating the same way) it could be a specific bits in your memory that
have a problem. I strongly suggest you to try "memtest86", download the .ISO
file and burn it and boot with it to see if you get any error in the memory.

A bad timing setup for the memory could make this too (bad stability if
badly configured in the BIOS). Check all the setup related to the memory. If
you BIOS is set to AUTO mode, i suggest you to check the forums of support
for your motherboard and ask what could be the best setup for the memory to
get stability.

And the last possibility i may think is a defective drivers you may have
updated recently (any kind for anything). Rollback the drivers just in case
and see if it fix the problem.

You may also apply manually the 4Gig Handling patch for Windows Vista. It is
not gived with Windows Update. You need to install it manually. It will help
Vista to handle the 4 Gig. If this patch is not there you was lucky to make
it work for all those weeks without any problems. Trust me.

Vista need perfect memory. If only one thing is wrong, the OS will crash,
freeze or blue screen. Im pretty sure its memory related.

If you test all i said and check everything and the problem persist, you may
check for a BIOS update from your manufacturer. Could you provide me the
name of your memory and model, the motherboard model/brand, and CPU?

have a nice day,

Dominic

Merry Christmas to you too,

Dominic, I dont get the blue screen of death at all. Windows does not dump
the memory. The system hangs whit a black screen after the "microsoft
Corporation" with the running green bar at the bottom disappeared. Mouse and
keyboard are on at this moment, but no reaction ( cntrl/alt/del doesnt work).
I already rolled back all drivers I could think of that I might have updated
lately. The BIOS for motherboard and also for the DVD drive are updated.
I am using 4 single memory sticks, each 1Gb PC3200 from Connect-Computers.
My mobo is a GA-K8NSC-939. I am using an AMD Athlon 64X2 3800+ .

The 4Gb update from MS tells me, that it does not apply to my computer.

Anyway, I still do not believe, that the memory is involved in any way. My
Vista is very fast and stable. The Memory tests coming with Windows as well
as those from Norton don’t show any errors.


Memtest86 doesn’t give me any way to interpret the test results.
My stomach tells me that there is a system file corrupted, not anything with
the memory.


Thanks for your help again,
Matt

 

[Matt]

Hi,

Merry Christmass.

When you get the blue screen of death, do you see a message that your system
is dumping memory in the file MEMORY.DMP? If its the case, you can download
from the Microsoft website the debugging tool for Vista 32bits or 64bits. Be
sure to take the good one. Install it then run "WinDbg".

Select the "File" menu, then select "Open Crash Crash Dump". The select the
MEMORY.DMP file in your Windows folder. That should open you a text file with
some debug information in it. Tell me if you see at the end of the file any
name of a file, for example: starport.sys, etc. Tell me the names of the
files and the error it give.

You may also check in the administration tools in the control panel the
Event Viewer for System Event. Check any error there with the error code and
post it here.

Since Vista is handling memory in a different way from other OS (WinXP is
not operating the same way) it could be a specific bits in your memory that
have a problem. I strongly suggest you to try "memtest86", download the .ISO
file and burn it and boot with it to see if you get any error in the memory.

A bad timing setup for the memory could make this too (bad stability if
badly configured in the BIOS). Check all the setup related to the memory. If
you BIOS is set to AUTO mode, i suggest you to check the forums of support
for your motherboard and ask what could be the best setup for the memory to
get stability.

And the last possibility i may think is a defective drivers you may have
updated recently (any kind for anything). Rollback the drivers just in case
and see if it fix the problem.

You may also apply manually the 4Gig Handling patch for Windows Vista. It is
not gived with Windows Update. You need to install it manually. It will help
Vista to handle the 4 Gig. If this patch is not there you was lucky to make
it work for all those weeks without any problems. Trust me.

Vista need perfect memory. If only one thing is wrong, the OS will crash,
freeze or blue screen. Im pretty sure its memory related.

If you test all i said and check everything and the problem persist, you may
check for a BIOS update from your manufacturer. Could you provide me the
name of your memory and model, the motherboard model/brand, and CPU?

have a nice day,

Dominic

Dominic,
what I did is the following... I backed up my entire computer to an external
USB hdd. I formated the c drive. I mad e a clean installation of windows
vista. I restored my data from the backup. Outcome: everything is working
fine again.

That leaves me with some conclusions. First there was nothing wrong with the
memory, since I didnt change anything, and I installed vista without problems
on my maschine, using 4 gb ram.

Obviously was there a system file in vista missing, corrupted or altered in
any way. The Clean installation replaced it, and therefore is the system
working again.
Sure I dont know which one it was.


After all I wold like MS to come up with some solution how to replace the
essential system files in vista while the system is running.



Happy New Year to you, Dominic and all the others here