System Freeze? 1

[kwrankmore]

When trying to image a machine in our office it continuouly freezes when running the Ghost software from a floppy. I replaced the floppy and was able to image other machines with the disk so that took the Ghost software out of the equation. I was then finally able to image the troubled machine for some reason. The image consisted of win98 and some other apps.

All the other machines with the exact image are running perfectly, so no problems with the image then. When starting the troubled 98 machine it booted up to the win98 screen then returned the hard drive error " Not able to read/write to disk c:\".

We therefore thought that the machines H/D had failed so replaced it, but lone behold the exact same symptoms are occuring again with a new drive. I'm able to boot from a 98 boot disc and run ghost from a floppy. I prepared an image on CD, but as soon as i start going through options in Ghost it freezes. Logic tells me that it should be a hardware error somewhere, but where? Could there be anything in the BIOS that i could look for. If anybody has in thoughts or suggestions it would be much appreciated.

Thanks

kent1

 

[wolluf]

I'd start with the memory -

http://www.memtest86.com

has a good memory test program (also if you've more than one stick in machine, try running Ghost floppy on just one stick - do it for each. If it works for each individually, then maybe memory/mobo combination - I've had similar problem with several mobo's when added more memory - added bit works ok on its own, original bit does too - but problems together. If this the case, if spare meory slots, try changing which ones are in use).

PS. Fans all ok? (ie, not overheating)

 

[kwrankmore]

Hi wolluf

Thanks for your response. I'll give it a try tomorrow at work and tell you how it goes.

Kent

 

[kwrankmore]

Unfortunately still no luck! I'm running a single PC133 SDRAM 128MB DIMM.On the mainboard it has two memory slots so I tried changing slots, replacing with other memory and again changing slots but it's still freezing. The CPU fan seems to work fine. In the BIOS i checked the system health page and the CPU was running at 32F which is to my knowledge, fine. Maybe there isn't enough BUS speed or a faulty CPU? I'm a bit baffled, but will keep trying other options. The only unfortunate thing is that it's taking up time which i dont have! Any other thoughts would be great.

Cheers

kent1

 

[Pattons]

this is just an idea, so take it how you will. Since you received the same message from the old and the new harddrives. If you are able to boot from a Win98 floppy, maybe the MBR? Maybe the IDE controller is going on the fritz(a very technical term, I know). It sounds to me like some sort of I/O problem. I'm only takin' a shot in the dark here since you have replaced the HDD, and tried a few different memory configs, it would seem that there is a MoBo problem somewhere.Anyway, again, just some ideas for you to run through.
Pattons

 

[wolluf]

From your first post, you have actually loaded a ghost image at least twice on this machine (different hard drives) - but both failed to boot.

1. Presumably this PC is similar spec to one image is cloned from? (and all others you've tried it on)

2. Have you has any o/s running on PC - or is this first?

3. Could you load image to HD on another PC - then install HD in this PC and see if it works?

4. Swap CPU with similar machine?

This still sounds like a hardware issue, but not sure which - motherboard is another possibility, but I'm just guessing. I'd probably try to install win98 (rather than load image) to see if that also caused problem (if hardware issue, it should also) - but presumably that's more time you'd rather not waste.

 

[kwrankmore]

Whohoo!

I've finally been able to sort out the problem. I replaced the CPU with another of the exact spec machine and it has now worked. Sneaky CPU is obvioulsy faulty.

Thanks for your help guys.

Have a good week-end!

kent1