Crash on boot in Win 98 at wallpaper display

[MRBOps]

I’m wondering if someone can help me with a persistent problem.

When I boot up from a cold start, about 75% of the time my system will either crash or lock up at the end of the boot cycle, just as the wallpaper is displayed. Sometimes this will occur as many as 4 times before I finally get a start up, and sometimes only once. About 25% of the time I get a good start up from cold with no problems.

It also happens occasionally (about 10% of the time) if I do a shutdown and restart. It is almost guaranteed if I change my video color depth before a restart.

I’ve used the Startup tab in MSCONFIG to disable everything except System Tray on start up. This had no effect.

I’ve changed out the processor (not because of this); no effect.

Upgraded from Direct X 7 to Direct X 8. No effect.

The bootlog looks the same in either case with one exception. When it crashes the last line is missing. This is that line:
[000CBAFB] Enumerated TapeDetection (TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0000)
Please note that I have never had a tape drive on this system.

I’m thinking it’s the video card (It’s a PCI card, and the motherboard is set up for PCI or AGP. The problem occurs just as Windows is displayed. It almost always occurs when I change video settings), but this is just a guess. I don’t have another card to swap out with it.

The only other cards are an ISA SCSI card (board has 1 ISA slot), a Creative Ensoniq sound card, and a USRobotics Winmodem (56K). I have not yet tried pulling these cards out.

Any input you can provide on this is appreciated. If it is likely the video card, please let me know any suggestions on a replacement. I don’t do games, but I do use the system for digital photography and video editing.

System information:
Motherboard: Tyan S2390, 200 MHz FSB, Via KT-133 chipset
Processor: AMD Athlon 1GHz (It is adequately cooled. I never see more than 130°F processor temp, and that is rare.) Previous processor was 800 MHz Duron, same problem.
Video: 3dfx Voodoo 3000 PCI, 16 MB
Memory: 384 MB, PC133, 2 DIMMS - 256 + 128 MB (Was also a problem when I had just 256 MB)
Operating System: Windows 98 SE

 

[Jordan58]

Try scanning viruses. Or go to start->run and type in drwatson see if that finds anything. Do a scan disk for errors. Do you ever defrag your computer? Try it nothing to lose. Or go into system setup. (when booting up hit the F2 or delete key, usually one of those will bring you there depends on system) find somthing thats says play around with quickboot, if its enabled..disable it...if its disabled...enable it. Try it. No gaurantees that this will work, but I used to have the same problems you did, this worked for me.

 

[Guest_imported]

Listen, a Virus is NOT THE PROBLEM! lol, Simple as you said. Do it the old Fashioned Tech way, TAKE ALL THE other cards OUT! try it, and if it does the SAME thing, do this.. Put ALL your CARS BACK in, get RID of the VOODOO, AMD chipset and VOODOO do NOT like each oher! Go into Bios, TURN your GRAPHICS OFF! your memory on your VOODOO is reporting back to Bios the WRONG things... Run your COLORS at 16 bit.

if you still have problems, FOLLOW this BY THE WORD!!!!!!!!!! otherwise dont bother!

1. Click START
2. Click RUN
3. Type in ( SFC ) then hit " OK "
YOU MUST FOLLOW DIRECTIONS! YOU WANNA BE TECHS out there! Dont think this Fixes everything, this is ( SFC ) SYSTEM FILE CHECKER.. it checks all your Windows System Files!
JohnSr@Shackelford.com

 

[smitee]

MRBOps


If you installed Microsoft Backup, removing it via
Add/Remove Programs in the Control Panel should also eliminate the tape detection pause and may reduce problems at Startup..

These keys are added to the registry when MBackup is installed.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Enum\TAPECONTROLLER]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Enum\TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Enum\TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0000]
"Driver"="TapeDetection\\0001"
"ConfigFlags"=hex:00,00,00,00
"Class"="TapeDetection"
"DeviceDesc"="TapeDetection"
"HardwareID"="TapeDetection"
"Mfg"="Generic"
"Capabilities"=hex:14,00,00,00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Enum\TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0001]
"Driver"="TapeDetection\\0000"
"ConfigFlags"=hex:00,00,00,00
"Class"="TapeDetection"
"DeviceDesc"="TapeDetection"
"HardwareID"="TapeDetection"
"Mfg"="Generic"
"Capabilities"=hex:14,00,00,00

smitee

 

[MRBOps]

I'd like to thank everyone for your help. Several of your suggestions helped to reduce the problem. Unfortunately, it was not completely eliminated. I think the base problem is an unstable motherboard or a driver or software problem. Here's what happened:

1. I disabled quick boot. This caused the system to identify a memory error on startup. I had seen this before but ignored it because Norton System Works test said my memory was OK. In this case I removed my 256 meg chip and replaced it with the 70 nsec, 128 Meg one from my old computer. This eliminated the memory error, and reduced the failed boot ups from 50% to 25% of the time.

The manual for my Tyan S2390 motherboard does "warn" that not all memory chips will work, even if they work in other boards, because the Tyan is a more "high performance" board. I'm supposed to purchase chips from one of the very limited and expensive list of "tested" suppliers on their web site. This sounds like an excuse straight out of Dilbert for a poorly designed motherboard. Next time I'll buy an ASUS.

2. I removed all the cards except the video card. This helped for a little while but over the course of 3 days, the boot failure rate returned to about 25%. Apparently it is an "adaptive" failure.

3. I changed the video card from the Voodoo 3000 PCI to an ATI Rage Pro AGP. The boot failure rate remained at 25%.

4. I reformatted my secondary hard drive. Installed Windows 98 on it, along with the drivers for only my video card and monitor, and installed 1 piece of software (Paint Shop Pro). I then reconfigured my Bios to boot from this drive. The problem went completely away, and is still gone (as long as I continue to boot from this drive). The computer also boots more quickly and has a much shorter boot log because of all the missing software and driver overheads that do not have to load.

At present I'm trying to decide whether to:
a. On my secondary drive, one at a time, load all of my drivers and software, going through several boot cycles, over several days, for each to see when the problem reappears. OR
b. Learn to live with it.

Any further suggestions are appreciated.

 

[schase]

I had the same problem for awhile, determined my anti-virus software was part of the problem. It was wigging out during startup.

Then when I upgraded the virus software - combined with ie 6.0 I hav'nt had the problem again. I also never run a screen saver or have any wallpaper. They never seem to do much but provide something pretty to look at inbetween the blue screens of death

Stuart