excedingly long boot time??? not HDD

[bigmuddy11]

Please help me, My new computer has been playing up for a long time now, it literally takes about 5 minutes to start up during the windows boot screen, It is a pen 4 3.2 hgtz with 1024 ram , components include dvd burner(dual layer) floppy (for the look!!!) I hard drive ( 200 gig W.D.) 256mb radeon graphics card plus 2x multi coloured fans that is all.
i have now gone and tried a brand new 80 gig hdd in it to see if it would be any different hopeing for an easy fix but it took the same amount of time to start up, i did put uv sleeving on the wiring removing all pins in the molex plugs and replacing them all in the correct order I also added the multi coloured fans onto a couple unused molex connectors
the hdd and dvd burner are on different power rails? ( circuits?) it has a cheap brand ( i have been told so any way) of psu, it states it is a 550W
my questions are:
1: could i have possibly put one set of wires incorrectly and caused a slow down or would that cause a melt down instead
2: would putting the fans o have caused this?
3: if neither of these could be the cause then what possibly could be,
this is really upsetting as i should be able to enjoy a nice fast computer but i have also noticed there is a slowness about it's running as well as starting up.
I really would appreciate any help, Thanks.

[Funkstar]

with the 80gig drive in there, did you do a fresh windows install or just mirror the install? windows could be heavily screwed causing slow boots.

Faulty wiring wouldn't cause a slow down, either it wouldn't work or you would have released the magic blue smoke so it would never work again (blue smoke comes from burning electronics). Your case fans wouldn't have caused this either.

Is the cpu being cooled properly? i think the P4 would slow down dramatically if it over heated.

can't think of anything else right now. Someone else might though

[bigmuddy11]

Fresh install, was actually installing windows for a relative,swapped my hdd for her new one as she has a pen 3 800 with 256 ram, i am too impatient for that!!! Was hoping it wouldn't happen so i would just get a new hdd for myself...

definately no smoke or sparks at all, i have a sunbeam clear acrylic case so can see everything it has 5 case fans, 1 front, one top, 2 at side level with graphics and just under line of cpu, one at back. aso cpu fan and psu fan.
very slow to start even if turned off all night,
front and side fans sucking in air and top and rear fans blowing air out for best airflow.
I formatted several times even tried deriks nuke and boot before putting in a new hdd, pity about all that time wasted.
it started basically from the first week that i bought it and i don't remember if it happened after i did something or if it just started. sorry.

[XA04]

Tried defragging the hard drive?

Try giving BootVis.exe a try, http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=664

[charleski]

What programs do you have installed? Antivirus programs are a particular culprit, but anything that loads on startup can be a cause.

Start->Run->type msconfig and click the startup tab, that'll give you a list of all the programs that load on boot.

[MSIC]

Hmm tricky.
Could be the P4 throttling if it isnt cooled properly, although i would still be surprised if a 30 second boot turns into 5 minutes because of that. Still, remove the HSF and re-seat it carefully.
Ensure that in device manager (under IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers) that your hard drives are working in DMA mode (and NOT PIO).
For that matter, something may be set wrongly in the BIOS - make sure you have 32 bit 'something or other' set to 'on' in the drives section.
What else?
Cant think. Let us know about the above.
PS defragging is useful, but i've never personally observed more than perhaps 10% - 20% improvement in reality between very fragmented and defregged, so i'm sure it cant be that.

[bigmuddy11]

ok just checked the DMA mode and it is set to that
system gets defraged every week due to number of large files coming and going plus 4 kids using computer
sorry boot time when using a stop watch is actually closer to 3 minutes it just feels lilke 5 and little bar goes across screen approximately 50 times, all others i have seen wit xp pro even with 256 ram goes across no more than 15

this happened with fresh install on brand new disc with absolutely no other programs no tweaks in fact went slow on last restart before the very first show of the desktop....
could it possibly be motherboard or psu?
have tried reseating ram,
have changed config of ram there are 4 dimm slots 1&3 are blue 2&4 are purple,
originally i used 1 & 2 now tried 1 & 3 to have the matching colours
very confused and losing hope, hubby not so happy with my $1600 AUD purchase now !!!

[BigBry]

Yep, bootvis as above. Use both the track and trace and optimization modes. The track and trace log will show you where the delays are and with a bit of detective work you should get it resolved.

A couple of things to check. Any errors in Device Manager? Do you have any add-on cards that duplicate what your motherboard provides and may be clashing ie sound card. If so try disabling the on-board one through the bios.

[bigmuddy11]

thanks will try disabling onboard sound would doing video also be a good idea as i have radeon 9550 graphics card, i will also try bootvis and will post results if i can, thanks any help is really appreciated and extra knowledge is always a good thing.

[Koolpc]

I would say it is the Hard Drive mate. I have had this problem before. Try a different Hard Drive even it is a new one it could still be faulty.

[MSIC]

If so try disabling the on-board one through the bios.

Agreed as a good start. For that matter, remove any unnecessary PCI cards such as sound cards, networks cards or whatver then try booting. If load times improve, it's something to do with one of them (driver or hardware fault), if not then it's more likely to be CPU related (that would be my next guess anyway). Again, remove the CPU Heatsink/Fan wipe away the gunk, and replace with new gunk (you can buy this for a couple of quid) before re-seating.

[bigmuddy11]

ok was unsure which was onboard video but disabled onboard sound and will try a restart now, also made a restore point before doing anything in case i stuffed up...

[bigmuddy11]

Damn hope it's not the graphics, and only installed sound this week, will try re"gunking" cpu as last resort if i can find big enough cahoonas...
got a tube of arctic silver here somewhere..

[MSIC]

Regarding on-board video, in the BIOS as long as you set the primary video device to AGP not PCI (assuming it's an AGP Radeon you have) then leaving the on-board setting to 'auto' should be fine, although off/disabled would be preferrable.
PS cant find your motherboard on the gigabyte website - is it definitely called 865pe-a7?
Edit : Is it this one?
http://www.gigabyte.com.au/Products/...A-8I865PEM-775

[shaithis]

Right-click My Computer and choose Manage and then expand the Event Viewer, click on System.

Do you have any ATAPI or DISK errors?

[bigmuddy11]

Regarding on-board video, in the BIOS as long as you set the primary video device to AGP not PCI (assuming it's an AGP Radeon you have) then leaving the on-board setting to 'auto' should be fine, although off/disabled would be preferrable.
PS cant find your motherboard on the gigabyte website - is it definitely called 865pe-a7?
Edit : Is it this one?
http://www.gigabyte.com.au/Products/...A-8I865PEM-775

yep looking at it now, here is a link to a write up about it

http://www.bytesector.com/data/bs-article.asp?ID=387
here's the basics

written by Chris Wood on Thursday, December 23, 2004 Page 1 of 8

EliteGroup Computer Systems has been pushing forward into the LGA775 socket market with their i915 chipset based motherboards. Their PF4 Extreme motherboard is a hit and so far, their pride and joy in the LGA775 market. Like most motherboard manufacturers though, they needed a hybrid motherboard that bridged the gap between the technology of yesterday and today. The result? The 865PE-A7 motherboard. With the exception of the LGA775 socket, this is a true i865PE based motherboard, sporting none of the features we have come to ogle such as PCI-E or DDR2. Essentially, this motherboard is the exact same as their 865PE-A motherboard, but it uses the new Intel socket. Sporting Dual Channel DDR memory, an AGP 8X slot, 5 PCI slots, dual SATA connectors, a 10/100 integrated network card and 6-channel audio, this board seems like a blast from the past. So why purchase a motherboard that doesn’t support the latest and greatest?

Table of Contents
Page 1: Introduction and Specifications
Page 2: Up, Close and Personal with the 865PE-A7
Page 3: Up, Close and Personal with the 865PE-A7 (cont’d)
Page 4: A quick explanation of the 865PE Chipset
Page 5: Test System Specifications / Benchmarks Explained
Page 6: SiSoft Sandra 2004 SP2 Results
Page 7: PCMark 2004 / 3DMark 2003 / HDTach 3 Results
Page 8: SuperPi / PiFast Results and Conclusion

Specifications of the ECS 865PE-A7
Here are the manufacturers specifications on the 865PE-A7;

Special Features

FSB 800
HT CPU Support
Dual DDR-400
Serial ATA
AGP 8X
6 Channel Audio
USB 2.0
10/100 LAN
Color Map
Processor

LGA775 socket for latest Intel Pentium 4 / Celeron processor
FSB 800/533 MHz
Support Hyper-Threading Technology
Chipset

Intel® 865PE & ICH5
North Bridge : Intel® 865PE
South Bridge : Intel® ICH5
Main Memory

Dual-channel DDR memory architecture
4 x184-pin DDR DIMM socket support up to 4 GB
Support DDR400/333/266 2.5V DDR SDRAM
Expansion Slots

1 x AGP 8X/4X slot
5 x PCI slots
Storage

Support by Intel® ICH5
4 x Ultra DMA100/66 devices
2 x Serial ATA devices
Audio

Realtek ALC655 6-Channel audio CODEC
Compliant with AC'97 2.3 specification
LAN

Realtek RTL8100C 10/100 Mbps Fast Ethernet Controller
Rear Panel I/O

1 x PS/2 keyboard & PS/2 mouse connectors
4 x USB ports
1 x RJ45 LAN connector
1 x Parallel port (LPT1)
1 x Serial port (COM1)
1 x Audio port (Line-in, Line-out, Mic-in)
Internal I/O Connectors & Headers

1 x 20-pin ATX Power Supply Connector & 4-pin 12V Connector
1 x FDD connector supports two 360K~2.88MB FDDs
2 x IDE connectors
2 x Serial ATA connectors
2 x USB 2.0 headers support additional 4 USB Ports
1 x SPDIF out header
1 x Speaker header
1 x Front panel switch/LED header
1 x Front panel audio header
CD in/ AUX in headers
CPUFAN/PWRFAN/SYSFAN connectors
System BIOS

Award BIOS with 2Mb Flash ROM
Supports Plug and Play 1.0B, APM 1.2, Multi Boot, DMI
Full Support for ACPI revision 1.0 specification
Form Factor

ATX Size 305mm*244mm