Challenge or comments for computer build.

I went to Fry's and I was going to look around to see a few things. I know that newegg was going to be cheaper, but I wanted to see if their "unadvertised" specials would make it worth it. I am glad I did...



Here is what I got and the prices for it:



Abit NF8-V motherboard for $49.99



AMD Sempron 2800+ 754 socket w/ fan and 256 L2 cache for $37.99



ATI Radeon 9200 128MB AGP $39.99 (after rebate)



Raidmax Scorpio 868 case w/ 420wt PSU and 5 fans for $74.99



Total, after tax (and rebate) $232.18



Not too bad, if I may say so.



On the video card: I know I probably could have went with a better one, but it is made by the same company as the PCI one I want to use, so the chances of a conflict would be less.



On the case: It was a little high priced, but after seeing the other prices, I was eager to put this computer together, and not have to wait for the shipping.





I put everything together, just as it is suppose to be, and...there are some problems





I can get the initial single beep for the POST, but I can not get the video to come up. I tried it with the monitor hooked up to the AGP card and the PCI one-still nothing. The light on the monitor{edited} does not even change, indicating to me that there is a problem with the signal. Currently, I am working on getting another monitor to test the computer on, but I can hook up this monitor to another computer, and it comes on. There are indicator lights on the motherboard that tells me that the motherboard is getting power. I can hear the hard drives trying to load up, but still nothing on the monitor. I actually got a picture one time, and it said something about the CMOS not being set-up right. I reset the CMOS, and tried it again, but it has not displayed anything after that. I put one of the hard drives in an external box and hooked it to a working computer and I was able to get a few trojans off, but it should not effect the fact that I can not even get to the BIOS/CMOS start-up screen. I can see all the fans working properly.

It looks like I have to nearly start all over again

I will be working on eliminating the possibilities and checking all the connections. I will remove the PCI card, one stick of 256 RAM, and one hard drive and see if it will come on with that. Any recommendations from the experts on other possibilities or items I should be concentrating on?

It would seem like I have some progress, but have come up to another problem.



I removed one stick of RAM, the secondary hard drive, and the PCI video card. I plug in to monitor, turn it on, and the BIOS screen came up ! I then put the secondary hard drive in my external box to try to read it, but it would not come up, which tells me that it is not working at all(odd it was working a couple of days ago). After I made a few minor changes in the BIOS screen, I saved it and exited, and the computer restarted. The computer stopped, and displayed a "system disk error press CTRL+ALT+DEL to restart." I took out the HD and put this one in my external box, and my computer can read it. I did a scandisk on it, and no errors was found. I put it back in the new case, and the same error occurs. Any ideas or suggestions?



Tomorrow, I will be d/l a boot floppy and see if it will start up with it. I have already tried to boot it with a startup disk, but no luck. I was going to d/l just in case it is different from what I already have. I do have the floppy drive load up when the computer turns on.



I am not coming up with any other ideas, short of a complete re-install. One of the problems with doing that is that I do not have a full copy of Windows. All I have are restore CDs from their respective computers



I have read somewhere about freezing the hard drive, to get some temporary time. I do not have any clicking sounds that others were getting, but at this point, Im willing to try anything.

To Moderators: Im not trying to make an illegal copy.

If I can read the drive in another computer (as an external hard drive), but I can not read it as a primary hard drive; then, would it stand to reason that the drive itself is ok? If this is the case, then could I copy my Windows folder from one hard drive to another, and change out the Key from what it was?

You really only do that if your HDD is clicking and you need to get that last bit of data off it.



As for the windows install. You have to reinstall windows. not just copy the windows folder to it. Any major changes like Motherboard or cpu normaly need a reinstall of windows.

It has been several days, but not much has happened because I had to prepare for Hurrican Rita. Thankfully, nothing happened.



I now have a Windows XP on cd (full version) and I booted the computer up with it. It is showing me a "system disk" error. Likely, I need to change around the boot order to verify that it boots from cd prior to hd.



Is there ANY way I can use this cd to load up windows to the hd as an external? The reason why I ask is because I can read it from my external box.

Update on the build:



I purchased a full, retail version of Windows XP Home (with sp2). I booted the computer up without it just long enough to enter the cd. I had already formatted the hard drive from another computer via an external hd box. Windows setup goes through all the steps, including the installation of several files (as noted on the bottom-right of the screen), and restarts the computer. When the computer comes back up (with the cd still in the drive), it goes right back to the "welcome to setup" screen, where I can chose between: set up Windows XP press <enter>, repair a Windows installation press <R>, quit installation press <F3>.



I go through the setup once again and I am going to list the EXACT steps I am doing and what is on the screen. Will someone please tell me what is wrong so I can get this computer running?



On the "welcome to setup" screen, I press <enter> to set up Windows XP. At the bottom of the sceen, it shows my hd space and location.



Next comes the "Terms of Service" screen. I press F8 to continue.



I now have 3 options for installation: C: Partition <unknown> 4371 MB (4370 MB free), d: Partition <unknown> 33784 MB (33784 MB free), and Unpartitioned space 7 MB. On the screen the C partition is already highlighted and my options are: set up Windows XP on selected item, press <enter>, create a partition in the unpartitioned space press c, and delete the selected partition press d. I press <enter> because the C partition is already highlighted and the other parts I can deal with after the installation is complete. This brings me to a screen that says this partition already has a opertaing system on it(ect...). To continue using this partition, press C or press <esc> to go back to the other screen. I press C.

<update> I tried to place it on the D: partition, but to goes to the next screen anyway showing c:





It now says "this partition is either too full, damaged, not formatted, or formatted with an incompatible file system." Formatting will erase all information on your partition. The 4 choices are: format with NTFS (quick), format with FAT (quick), format with NTFS, format with FAT. I selected the format with NTFS.

<correction> When I use the D partition, it does NOT have the FAT choices.



The next screen shows a progress bar and says formatting the partition 4371 MB on 38162 MB Disk 0 atapi (MBR). The total time is approximatly 5 minutes.



The next screen has another progress bar and says setup is copying files. On the bottom-right corner, files are being displayed, but they are too many and fast for me to list here. This progress bar takes longer, and hangs about 52%. It does not completely stop, and different files are being displayed in the bottom right hand corner. The progress is fast when it gets to 52%, but slows downs considerably after this. The entire progress bar takes about 15 minutes to finish.



The next screen says "Please wait while Windows configures your system".



The next screen says the computer needs to be restarted and setup will continue. The restart is automatic.



When the computer comes back up, I get the EXACT SAME ERROR MESSAGE as before: a disk read error occurred press CTRL+ALT+DEL to restart.

I am about to pull all my hair out. This is very irritating.

This is a CERTFIED Windows XP Home original. I actually spent well over $200 (after tax) for this. I can prove to anyone with a picture of the receipt and the box. Why is this install so difficult? I know the hd works because I can read everything from my external box.



As I await suggestions, I am going to try different options with the installation. Maybe I can install it on the other partition. Maybe I can remove the partitions completely and not have any at all (just one partition). At this point, I am willing to do anything other then purchasing a new hard drive.