Booting into DOS? Need help, please.

[Veritas777]

Hi all. I have the weirdest problem with my computer. About a month ago, I tried to turn on my computer. Everything sounded correct (drives spun up, everything beeped, ok so far), but then just stopped. It goes through the normal bios, hold DEL to access advanced boot options stuff, then right before loading windows 2000, it gives me a black screen. And on this black screen, there is a blinking cursor, as in the old dos cursor. I have attempted to enter commands, run stuff, nothing. The only way to fix it it to reboot the computer a bunch of times, and it will sometimes work and sometimes not. My first thoughts were that it was a space issue. I was running an 8 gig c and 120 gig f, and the c was down to less than a gig. So I purchased Acronis MigrateEasy 6.0, and all the accompanying software, and a new 160 gig WD. I transferred all the files, everything works ok. But then, I got the cursor screen again. I thought it could have been a hardware problem, so I took everything back out, checked all connections, drives, ports, etc - to no avail. Does anyone have the slightest clue how to fix this blinking screen?

And now another question:
I carbon copied the old 8 gig to my new 160. But, I formatted it as one huge drive, with only one partition. Due to that, Windows takes a crazy long time to boot when it finally does get past the cursor screen. Can someone tell me if I partitioned it incorrectly, and what I need to do to fix it? I am going nuts with the things falling apart around me. And I am over here using my Redhat based *Nix computer because I got tired of all the problems. Any suggestions?
Truthfully and helplessly yours, Veritas777.

[degsy]

Have you tried booting into Safemode?
Does it work ok.

Are there any problems with Devices in Device Manager.

[Veritas777]

I get the black screen with the cursor before I even get to the boot up of the OS. And all my devices are ok.

[Spider]

I have a couple of questions.

degsy asked what happens when you try to boot to Safe Mode...what's the answer to that question?
If you can't boot the O/S, how do you know devices are ok?

[Veritas777]

K. If I push the power button and restart the system a random number of times it starts completely. So I can get to the OS. But I get the black screen with the blinking cursor right before it begins to load the Windows OS. So yes, I can boot in safe mode if I restart the computer a number of times, just as I can boot into the regular Windows OS if I do the same. And while in Windows, I can check the Drivers and devices and they are all ok. Also, the cursor began at a completely random time, when I had not done any work on the inside of the case.

[Spider]

Open a command prompt and type
debug hit enter
type d ffff:5L8 hit enter
what's the date on the far right?
type q to escape debug

[Veritas777]

Spider: The Date on the right is 10/04/01.
Do you need the numbers too?

[Spider]

Do you need the numbers too?
No, I was using that to date your machine.

Your power supply is most likely dying. Your power supply is probably around a 250 or 300 watt
power supply, you should replace it with something over 300 watts. You can remove the power
supply and take it into a mom n' pop shop (small computer store) and they should be able to test
it for free.

You should also replace your motherboard battery.

[Veritas777]

Spider: I replaced the power supply about 6 months ago with a new Antec 480 Watt. I do not think I have ever replaced the motherboard battery. So I can buy one of those. And what is "LS120" in boot devices in the bios mean? It is one of the options for primary, secondary, and third boot devices.

[Spider]

Spider: I replaced the power supply about 6 months ago with a new Antec 480 Watt.
I do not think I have ever replaced the motherboard battery.
Batteries are about $5.00 so make sure you have the old one in your hand when you go get the new one (to match).
What's bothering me is good power supplies and dead batteries usually have different boot symptoms
than what your explaining. None-the-less swap it out it's old anyway and it's cheap...let's see if we can
boot after that without interruption.
what is "LS120" in boot devices

LS120 is a high capacity floppy drive (120Mb) attached to an IDE channel. They can be external or internal.
Dumb things these days since we have CD burners and DVD burners. Speaking as an system administrator
I love 'em for back up though.

[Veritas777]

Ahhh. I replaced the battery in there (my multimeter said it had .3 volts) with a newer one I had lying around (2.6 volts). I also changed the boot devices to the following order:
HDD-0
HDD-1
LS120.
Is Hdd-0 my C drive? Because I have C and F, and assumed C, the one the OS is on, is numbered first. And as a side note, I never get the black screen twice in a row. As in if I ever get it to boot up all the way, if I restart it or something it will boot up normally. Almost like it has to warm up or something. Any more ideas?
It seems to be occuring with cold startups, when the computer has been off for a while (like a day). If it boots, then it runs perfect for the next couple of hours.

[Spider]

I replaced the battery in there (my multimeter said it had .3 volts) with a newer one I had lying around (2.6 volts)
Going down in voltage is worse. I don't know what battery you have but they come in different voltages.
http://www.baber.com/baber/computer_clock_battery/generic.htm
Almost like it has to warm up or something. Any more ideas?
We're probably barking up the wrong device anyway (the battery). I'd want to test that power supply anyway.
I don't suppose you have a PS tester? A small shop will and they should plug it in to a tester for free.
I do think the prob is elsewhere but you have to test the PS to rule it out. It'd be a shame to battle for hours
and find out the PS is a dud. If you have a lot of devices and your a user who shuts off the machine after use
then it could very well be a burned PS. The longer you use a "going" PS the worse those boots will be.

CPU is next on the list of culprits.

[Spider]

Is Hdd-0 my C drive?
Sorry, I missed that question...yes that is your C: drive.

[Veritas777]

Thanks, Spider. Should I make a run to Fry's, and just buy a new one? And what am I looking to spend? My current one is a 480 W Antec, and those look to be $100 ish, correct? And is there something else I should buy while I am out there, or is there no way of knowing right now?

[Veritas777]

Ignore my earlier post. Is there a program or way to check all the processes that start as Windows does that will tell me if there are conflicts or errors in the startup?
And I bought a new 500 watt PS, and it still happened (I let it cool off overnight, installed the New PS today, then it still cursored. I then rebooted, went to bios, changed "Halt on error" to "halt on no error" and it started up immediately. I think it just had time to warm up, though, so I really do not know what I am doing.

[Spider]

To bad I saw this too late, I was going to say "no don't buy a power supply". Especially Frys, they won't even
test your old one unless you leave it and fill out a repair order and they'll give you a bill. I like Frys for selection
but returning stuff is a real problem with them.

For booting diagnosis, when you push the F8 key at one second intervals when the computer is starting
select Enable Boot Logging. It will log the driver loadings and report the results to a log file
which is saved in c:\winnt\Ntbtlog.txt

There is also the system logging to look at in Event Viewer. In Run... type eventvwr, click once on
System log (highlight it) and the results will be on the right side.

[Spider]

Download this free CPU tester. CPU Stability Test (http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_description/0,fid,7146,00.asp).
Unzip the files in the downloaded file (stabilitytest.exe) and run Test.exe. In the menu Testing the Start.
It will run through multi tests.

To test the graphics drivers and video card go to
Start
Run...
type dxdiag click OK
There are a bunch of tabs at the top, run through each one and there are tests you can run in there. dxdiag tests your DirectX
more than anything else, but the video card IS involved with that so it is a pretty good indicator for testing graphics.

[Veritas777]

Spider: I used the event viewer, and it showed a bunch of errors. I exported the application log, and the system log as txt files. I am also currently running the CPU stability test, and I will post the results later. The following are the errors and warnings that occured, in the application and system logs, respectively. Note that there are insane amounts of each in each log. I just copy/pasted the data from the txt file to this.
Actually, it does not fit. It is 51,000 characters long for the two files. Is there a way I can upload them and link them? Or should I paste them in pieces?

[Veritas777]

Oh, man Spider. It just died today - completely, and totally, died. Turned it on, nothing happened. Fans spun up, lights came on, but only on the tower. No power went to the monitor, the optical mouse did not turn on, nothing. I am just done with the whole thing, and hope to turn it over to my Computer Support people at work. I just finished switching the power supplies, changing HDD power, ide layouts, everything. I am on my laptop right now, because I cannot get it to start up at all. I don't know what happened, but I will try to post back if I ever get it working again. Thank you for your attempts at assistance, and I will post what was wrong with it if I ever find out.
Yours truly, Chris Clark.:upset:

[Spider]

Your very welcome.

It would be easy to point at AMD or the motherboard or the RAM as guilty but sometimes some hardware
is just tripping all over itself right-out-of-the-box. I'm sure this is what you have.

That CPU test btw, it just loops till you stop it from the menu. The idea of looping is the longer you
run it the sounder your report is. I usually turn the test on and go to lunch...when I return from
lunch and stop the CPU test I want to see failures=0.

If IT boys tell you the CPU is pooched then I would also think about stepping up to a newer CPU release
and mobo. It's a good thing to think about when your machine has a heart attack. A couple of more bucks
and a lot more chuckles.

[Veritas777]

Spider: I let the CPU stability test run for like 7 hours yesterday. Ended up with 0 errors. And I think the only problem could be the Mobo, so I guess I will tell the Computer Tech guys to replace the Mobo. I am pretty sure the rest if golden:
New DVD-RW drive
Cd-RW drive
2 hdds, 1 120 gig and 1 160 gig.
Radeon 9800 128 mb vid card
Processor is only like 1.3 ghz, though, so I guess it is time to upgrade. Are the new 3.4 P4s worth it? Because they are quite expensive with Mobo, as in 300-400 per.

[Spider]

I'd want to try a good name brand RAM module in there before swapping out mobos.

Expensive is all relative. Different people have different versions of what "expensive" is.

US dollars:

Pentium 4/ 2.4B GHz 533MHz FSB $135.00
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=19-116-140&depa=1

Pentium 4/ 2.4C GHz 800MHz FSB $153.00
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=19-116-158&depa=1

Pentium 4/ 3.0E GHz 800MHz FSB $178.00
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=19-116-175&depa=1


Canadian dollars:
PENTIUM 4 3.2GHZ E 800FSB $313.97 (250.081 USD)
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=12562&vpn=BX80546PG3200E&manufacture=Intel