help with vista

kearnel

kearnel

kearnel

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hi

just purchased quad core 2.4ghz, 2 8800gtx sli, 4 gig of ram (1066), 1 raptor 150gb, 1 hitachi 500gb, physx card, abit in32x mobo, thermaltake 1000w psu, 1 sata cd/dvd writer.

heres my problem, i cant get an os to install, whether its xp or vista, xp loads all the files it needs for the installation, then reboots the comp, and starts again, vista, does the same, i have managed to get vista to install once, and its on the raptor drive, but when i run it, it either gets to crcdisk.sys and reboots or gets to disk.sys and reboots, ive taken out 2 gig of ram, 1 of the 8800's and the physx card to see if i can get it to work, ive unplugged the raptor to see if i can get it to install to the hitachi drive, ive changed the voltage on the ram, ive turned on raid, turned off raid. im now lost and dont know what else to try. anyone got any idea's as help is really appreciated.

thanks
 
Check that your heat sink is mounted properly and you don't have too much tim applied.

Check out these instructions from Arctic Silver (shouldn't matter if you're using AS or not - the instructions are good.)

EDIT: Also - don't try to o/c the system until you've got everything installed - install the OS on hardware default settings. :)
 
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i dont think there is too much on there, and i am using as, the heatsink is mounted correctly, have got the asus arctic square heatsink and fan, but i could try removing it and putting as on again
 
I would try another cd drive if the one you have is sata, try an ide one

Vista is very picky about memory, download memtest and put it on a bootable cdto check your memory, Do you have it at specified voltage?
I had 2 gig of Geil from here last week that crashed all over the place at its rated 2.1v, Even RMAd it but they sent it back

i downed it to 1.9v and away it went with no probs.

No overclocks applied i assume?

Do you have the latest bios?
 
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gizmoy2k said:
Vista is very picky about memory
Click to expand...
It's unlikely to be a software issue, as he can't install XP either.

I would take everything out, leaving bare essentials:

mobo
psu
chip + hsf
gfx card
memory (one stick)
Raptor
optical

try installing with the above setup, if it fails, try the other gfx card, if that fails, try another stick of ram.

make sure that the bios is assigning the correct voltage to the chip + ram. Make sure that the timings on the ram are right.

As gizmoy2k suggests, download the bootable memtest cd and run through it a couple of times.
 
thanks for all the help, i will try and strip the machine of everything but the essentials, i was thinkin it could be the sata dvd drive so i will check that too
 
guys, thank u for all ** help :) it was 1 of the ramsticks, took it out, boots up in seconds, thank u :)

edit: ok i spoke to soon, just plugged dvd writer back in, same problem, unplugged it, still same problem, so maybe it is the thermal paste and heatsink, will check them next
 
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Have you set the bios config to "optimal" or "fail-safe" (or any other equivalent setting)? This gives general values for everything and is a good place to start.

Go into bios and leave it on the hardware monitor page for a while - see what temps your chip is getting there (shouldn't get very high - but just in case).

Will the box stay up in just bios?

If it does, download this, unzip it, burn it to a cd and boot the machine from the cd. Leave it to run through 2 full passes (assuming no errors). Any errors will show up red on the bottom half of the screen. (this cd will also come in very handy when you go to oc the system!) If there are any errors press esc to exit and go back into bios and tweak the cpu and the memory (but not at the same time! change one setting, go back to memtest...)

Memtest will thouroughly test the memory - and as a consequence, it will also test the cpu to an extent as well.
 
it was the fan inside the heatsink all along, coz the heatsink is built around the fan, i couldnt see if it was working until i put my head in the machine, lol, so i put the stock 1 on and its working great, drivers installed, all the ram put back in, just the physx and the 2nd 8800 to go back in now :D

thanks for the advice
 
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