Oh oh... it's baaack...!

[TheNiceGuy]

Well, 2 weeks ago I licked this NTRDL error , among others, with help of a couple of Antec posters.

Just happened again! Can't get in without using a boot disk. What is up!?!?!?


P.S.- I haven't done any driver changes or updates since 2 weeks ago. Only been installing programs/downloading.

 

[FastEddie]

If I remember correctly, you aren't using the nv sw ide controllers, but the native ms ones. Have you tried running diagnostics on your drives, to see if the one could be boarderline?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Thank you for the quick reply! I really apreciate it!

Well, the first time I had the NTRDL error (back in February) it came out of nowhere. I'd been up and running for about 6 weeks. I have no partitions on either disk. The only possible causes I can think of are: installing 2 'all in one' codec packs, and then trying to uninstall them. After install, some of my other programs (SoundForge, nTune, etc) required reinstall before I could use them again, due to missing files; I turned off Silicon SATA controler in BIOS to get rid of the RAID options at startup; I had to system restore after Windows update due to disk instability about 2 weeks before that initial error. That's really all I can think of, besides having 2 sets of drivers installed accidentaly a long time ago, as I mentioned above.

This time (yesterday), I can't think of anything that could have caused it. Only been installing things like iTunes and downloading some bittorrent files as per normal. As per my link above, I am running ZA 5 firewall and KAV 5 and AdAware (scan regularly). I also ran a Seatools diagnostic on both drives and they came out OK. The only thing I can think is that it's more A8N shenanigans, or my Windows Media Center disks have some kind of damage. I have a copy of XP Pro on another machine that works well, so I could try that, but I really don't want to if I can help it for various reasons .

How about this solution which another poster mentioned?-

Insert and boot from your WindowsXP CD.
At the first R=Repair option, press the R key
Press the number that corresponds to the correct location for the installation of Windows you want to repair.
Typically this will be #1
Enter in the administrator password when requested
Enter in the following commands (X: is replaced by the actual drive letter that is assigned to the CD ROM drive.
COPY X:\i386\NTLDR C\:
COPY X:\i386\NTDETECT.COM C:
Take out the CD ROM and type exit

Any ideas?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

I just want to check if there are any risks to the above approach. Last time I tried to fix this (a different way) I ended up having to reformat.

 

[blinky2004]

Had similar problems with the A8N-SLI

It seems when it crashes it corrupts the disk and or partition table. Unsually even after repairing the disk the registry is so badly trashed that a clean re-install is required. Not sure if this is a board or chipset 'feature'.

Got a DFI Ultra which I'll stick in a few days and I'll Ebay the A8N-SLI (wasn't going to SLI anyway).

 

[luky]

when you get into repair console of WinXp try to write fixboot (or write help to see other commands - interesting for you can be as well fixmbr)

 

[blinky2004]

Normally I've found when i've had this with this board, the XP CD won't boot - gives an NTFS.sys BSOD. It requires a doctored set of Win2k boot disks to get to a recovery console (doctored to stop ntfs.sys loading). CHKDSK needs to be run so that the system can mount the partitions.

I've seen it with P-ATA and S-ATA drives

 

[TheNiceGuy]

The initial reformat I did was probably my fault (first time to use recovery disks with Windows). I didn't try the above method, but will soon. I just wanted to double check that this is safe, and mainly why this problem resurfaced after a total reformat. The D (data) drive was not touched during this process. The C (system) drive has all the Windows files on is, as far as I know. I don't recall any ntoskrnl errors.
I am not using any RAID or NCQ, and just have the 2 drives. I also disabled Silicone image contrlloer and did not install Nvidia firewall this time.

 

[TStep]

I have gotten this several times in the past. Ususally when pushing the memory too hard. I have no idea why this works, but all I do is disconnect the slave harddrive and reboot without it. Let windows cycle through, shut off, reconnect the slave drive, reboot, and all seems well. Crude solution, but it has not failed me yet.

 

[TheNiceGuy]

well, the 'boot disk' solution stopped working a few days ago altogether. Then it started to work last night out of the blue. But it also gave me disk corruption errors for a program I was trying to use, and shutdown, then booted with CHKDSK. It boots as before now. I will try the 'disconnect D drive' solution, then the 'i386' solution above. Very mysterious errors, coming and going.

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Just an update-
your idea to disconnect the second HD worked wonders- instantly fixed, no need to use a boot disk. Fine as long as I don't use a data drive. Obviously, this isn't a real solution. Any ideas?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

BUMP

still get error message when I try to hook up the D drive again.

 

[steamnputer]

2 questions how old is this drive, its not on the sata port is it?

and are you overclocking at all yet?

steamnputer

 

[TheNiceGuy]

OK- just tried again yesterday, and it took the second drive this time. Running ok all night and today with multi restartups- no problems. Nowe I am waiting the couple of weeks until i get the errors again.

Steam- they are new as of January and tested with Seatools. No OCing. They are hooked up ok, master as #1 and slave as #2.

 

[TheNiceGuy]

k, its back again. This time it crashed with 1 disk only. After about a dozen attempts, it finally booted. Don't know if it helped, but I unplugged the 2 unused (for external HD drives) cables directly from the MB. Is it possible that unused cables hooked up give false readings, and therefore the crashes?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Been running well since last post, with 2 HD drives. May have been false readings from unused extenal drive cables???

 

[TheNiceGuy]

bumparoo

 

[TheNiceGuy]

kabumparooroo

 

[Bushman5]

thats one fuc*** up problem u have their bro. that could be a number of problems and since it fixes and happens again over time its hard to fix, in my opinion its a failing hard drive, if i where u id rma both of those hard drives and explain whats going on to the tech people, id also never buy segate again bleh hate them.

I had a similar problem awhile back, i got ntrdl errors and when i fixed them the system was extremly unstable, i tried eveyrthing it seemed my western digital raptor was the problem in the end. A nice 80 GB maxtor fixed my problem.

Also i noticed u had the pc working stable after u removed 1 drive, thats the smart thing to do thats how i got my pc stable. but some thing is fuc**** up those hard drives. Take the most messed up HD to a friends pc and let him run it for 2 weeks ( this is if u dont wanan rma it ) see if it runs properly, if both hard drives run properly on his hd then its your mobo thats slowly going bad.

 

[Bushman5]

also u never said if they are sata or ide

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Thx for th ereply BM. They are SATA as per my sig. New models, made like a month beofre I bought them. I don't have NCQ enabled. Problem happened again today, got working again by disconnecting D:.

 

[Capitalist]

OK, I have seen the same error, but have you set your boot device/order to boot from the correct drive? I thought I would throw out the easy fix because I know that sometimes the small things get overlooked. Make sure the Boot Device in your BIOS is set to you Primary HDD then disable Boot Device 2 and 3 (and 4 if you have it), you can always enable a specific boot device if you need to use it. Right after your BIOS posts, press whatever key is needed to change the BOOT ORDER (I can't remember if the A8N-SLI has this, if not skip it) and set your BOOT ORDER to your primary HDD first.

 

[TheNiceGuy]

cheers - i have had that angle covered form day 1. Its a weird error, isnt it?