An easy ? about rebuilding PC

[Lunch Money]

Just a tip to all forum members--

Don't take computer advice from people who know too much to be dangerous, but don't know enough to be helpful.

But how do you know? This what the forum stars are to be used for?

Devon

Devon, if you think that we're able to keep track of which users out of hundreds are making sensical statements about various areas of expertise, and categorize them and rank them, then you're welcome to give it a go with my full blessing. But it's kind of impossible, and ultimately the stars won't mean anything either. Some of our very oldest and most experienced members still say utter bollocks from time to time.

Greg

[DevonB]

Just a tip to all forum members--

Don't take computer advice from people who know too much to be dangerous, but don't know enough to be helpful.

But how do you know? This what the forum stars are to be used for?

Devon

Devon, if you think that we're able to keep track of which users out of hundreds are making sensical statements about various areas of expertise, and categorize them and rank them, then you're welcome to give it a go with my full blessing. But it's kind of impossible, and ultimately the stars won't mean anything either. Some of our very oldest and most experienced members still say utter bollocks from time to time.

Greg

Ya see the lil guy? It meant I was joking. Now back to suffering with piano sample libraries I half like...

Devon

[Sascha Franck]

and a lot of that "faster system" feeling is a placebo effect.

Hehe, with my 6 year old 98 install (my program list would eventually 4 screens) it certainly isn't.
Needs ages to boot on this rusty 1GHz machine.
Mind you, this install is even running on the 3rd mainboard (so I just didn't listen to the advice given in my former post myself).
No wonder it takes like 3-4 minutes to boot.

But then, in case I will find all necessary software and drivers this evening, today it'll come to an end.
Still looking for an XP equivalent of "qfolders", a great freeware tool adding some extra menu of last used folders to any standard "open/save" dialog (KvR-Ben recommended Dirkey, but it's not halfway as comfortable it seems - so, if anybody knows something better...).

[Lunch Money]

Ya see the lil guy? It meant I was joking. Now back to suffering with piano sample libraries I half like...

Joking? What's that? Does not compute.

Greg

[ambe]

With RAM and same line CPU upgrades (XP to XP, 64 to 64...but as mentioned intel non-ht to ht will probably need a reformat and reload) there is no need to reinstall as these don't need new drivers. If you are replacing the motherboard however I would strongly recommend formatting and reinstalling windows as many of the key drivers that keep your system together can get corrupted.

You will probably have no choice but to reload anyway because 90% of the time, when replacing a motherboard anyway you will have to reinstall xp due to the copy protection. XP uses your harware as a reference to your serial number, if the two don't match windows won't boot.

I have recently just finished doing the same kind of thing as you over the last six months. All my components are now different apart from my drives. I got my new motherboard before the CPU and RAM. Windows woulden't boot when I installed the motherboard (which i was expecting) so i had to format and reload windows. Luckily I have my drive partitioned so I didnt lose any data that I wanted.

[morelia]

Done. New mobo is in. The old E: drive won't show up though. It is like there is no power to it as it won't even eject. All else seems good and I managed to keep the same OS withought reinstalling.

[Lunch Money]

Hrm. That's odd. It might be something as mundane as a faulty wire, though I imagine you've tried different plugs? I've never had a PSU that wasn't up to the task, so I'm not sure what happens when you have too many components and too small a power supply. I imagine the whole thing just won't work, but someone else'll have to confirm that for me.

Greg

[Lunch Money]

Er wait--

Is the old E an optical or hard disc?

And either way, did you switch the "Master/Slave" settings on any drives sharing IDE channels so that they're able to?

(ie. 2 masters or 2 slaves won't do it, and the drives may not be using the 'cable select' option correctly)

Greg

[morelia]

Hrm. That's odd. It might be something as mundane as a faulty wire, though I imagine you've tried different plugs? I've never had a PSU that wasn't up to the task, so I'm not sure what happens when you have too many components and too small a power supply. I imagine the whole thing just won't work, but someone else'll have to confirm that for me.

Greg

I didn't really change much. I kept all the drives 2X DVD and 2X HDD. When the new mobo was in all I had to do was connect power to them and hook up the big flat cable. Everything works fine except fpor drive E: which is a DVD ROM. I thought it might be power but I have pushed that little plug in as hard as I dare.

[Lunch Money]

As per my other post, I'm suspecting it's a master/slave issue, though if it's getting juice it should still eject...

That's the niggle in my theory.

Did you try a different plug, though? Or use one from a drive that you know for sure is getting power? Also, even though the eject button niggle is still bugging me, if you haven't changed the settings on your drives, they're likely not mastered/slaved properly.

Greg

[morelia]

OK I'll look into that some more. I didn't unplug or change anything on the back of the drives at all. Just the mobo end. Although I did unplug the lead that runs from the DVD Rom to the audio card. Could that be it?

[Lunch Money]

Nope, that won't be it. That's just for playing back or recording audio using the drive as though it were a CD player hooked up into your soundcard's inputs. Well, that's not entirely accurate... but it's not part of the equation.

Here's what I would do, in this order (er, turning off your computer first, of course!):

1. Take off the case again, and take any necessary precautions (open beverages nearby... make sure you ground yourself before poking around [though I admit, I just say that as a disclaimer and rarely ground myself.. it's going to bite me in the ass some day])

2. Pick a drive that you KNOW is getting power. Switch its power plug into the optical drive. Turn on your power. Don't bother even waiting for it to post or boot up or anything, press away on the eject button. If it's not ejecting, your drive is likely damaged and will need replacing.

-- at this stage, you will know whether or not your plug is faulty, in which case you'll just need to use a different plug, and if you're out of plugs you can usually get a cheap Y-adapter to branch off one of the working plugs --

3. Regardless of the outcome of step 2, you're going to need to change your jumper settings. If you look at your drive, there will either be a sticker or an engraved/etched diagram that should indicate Slave, Master, and Cable Select (they may use abbreviations like SL / MA / CS). By looking at it, you'll see that they correspond to little pins on the back of the drive, usually identical to the kind of pins that your ATA cable plugs into, except that there will be 6 of them in an isolated spot. There will be a plastic thingy (that's the technical term) covering 2 of them. If you look back at your diagram, you'll be able to tell what mode your drive is selected for. Then you need to make the switch so that one drive on the channel is Master, and the other is Slave. Usually (always??) your boot drive is on IDE channel 0 (ie. the main one) and must be set for Master. On your second channel, it doesn't matter which is the master and which is the slave. It used to affect bandwidth, but not so much any more.

4. Before bundling her all up, power on and let it boot. Take note of anything during startup, and see what happens once it's booted.

5. If everything's fine, boot'er up. Otherwise, I'm pretty much tapped out of ideas.

Greg

[Lunch Money]

This is an older drive, so the options for CS SL MA are just etched into a diagram that lines up with the various things on the back of the drive. Since my jumper covers the last pair of pins, it corresponds to the "MA" which is the LAST option on the etching.

Your drive's handbook will have a better diagram, or perhaps a sticker on the drive itself. If you can't find them ANYWHERE, you should be able to get them at the manufacturer's website.

Make sure ALL of your drives are jumpered correctly. The procedure is the same for hard drives as it is for optical drives.

Greg

[griels]

If you do it this way, your eyeballs won't fall out, you won't get the plague, and nobody will drop a bomb on your head. Try it. If it works, you just saved yourself several hours. The old drivers hanging out don't grow mold, and won't infect your nails from typing on your keyboard.

That's the most sensible thing you've ever posted to KVR

That said, my old XP install is pretty messed up, I may need to reinstall when I boot my new motherboard for the first time today (old one died).

If I'm doing this, is there really much use in reformatting? Think I have some important data on the system drive. Could I not just rename the old "Windows" directory?

[Lunch Money]

What kind of data?

If you want to do it the brute-force way, you could make a new partition (temporarily or permanent, whatever you decide), copy the whole shebang over to it, then re-install on the primary partition, just to make sure you don't lose anything.

Greg