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[rastex]

Ok, after struggling for a long-ass time trying to get the motherboard to play nicely with the backplate and finally getting all the power cables and everything connected, I boot up the computer to see...

CMOS Checksum Error: Using Defaults Press F1 to Continue, Del to enter Setup

I'm actually seeing text so I'm assuming the video card is working, and it's counting the amount of RAM properly, so I'm good there as well. All the lights are turning on, so I think I'm cool with the power.

I press F1 and Del, but nothing happens for either of them (so I don't know if it's reading in keyboard input even )

So now my system specs:
Abit KV8-Pro Motherboard
Seagate 160 GB SATA HDD
NEC nd2510A DVDRW
1GB PC3200 Crucial RAM
ATi Radeon x800 Pro

So actually before it says "checksum error" it says some stuff about IDE and not found (slave/master). So I'm thinking it's an IDE thing, I only have 1 IDE device connected and that's the DVD writer, but I don't think it's being set as Master in the jumpers, and it's OEM, and I can't find documentation on what the jumper settings need to be. Everything is brand new so there's no OS or anything on it.

The other weird thing is that before that screen comes up, I get a splash screen for the mobo saying "Press Tab to go to some screen, and Del to go to setup" But again, even if I try pressing those buttons nothing happens

Any ideas???

 

[CueTheMusic]

You should reset the bios. To do this, just move the bios jumper over for a couple of seconds and then move it back, or remove the battery for a couple of seconds, then replace it. Your motherboard manual should explain how to do this.

 

[Phoenix]

Are there any lights coming on for your keyboard or mouse? I've had this happen before and the problem was that the error wass happening before the USB boot driver was initialized. Fortunately I had a USB->PS2 connector and was able to get into the BIOS that way.

A BIOS upgrade fixed the problem for me.

 

[rastex]

Ok, I'll try resetting the BIOS and see if that helps, thanks.

 

[rastex]

nice nice, that worked!

So now it's complaining that there's nothing in the boot device, which is true. Here's my next problem. I can boot from CD-ROM of course, but I don't think my old copy of Windows XP will be able to recognize my SATA HDD. I have a floppy disk for the SATA HDD, but no floppy drive, anyway to get around this? Or can I try the Win64 beta and see if that has the SATA drivers already?

 

[teh_pwn]

I dunno about doing it without a floppy drive.

Surely you have an older computer sitting around with one that you could borrow. If not, buy one. They're like $10.


Once you get one, just hit F2 or F6 (i forget which) at cd bootup of windows the first time to get it to load SATA/RAID drivers. After you hit that key, it won't do anything different for almost a minute. Don't be alarmed by that. After that it prompts for drivers and loads them, it'll rocognize, or at least should. You may have to play with your mobo bios as well to get it to work further. Some use IDE by default...

 

[rastex]

Is it possible to load up the Windows boot cd, then press F2, and then put in a CD that contains the drivers (it also came with my mobo) or does it have to be done from the floppy?

 

[EarthStormFire]

My computer did this, it was because it didn't know what speed my CPU was, so it set it as 1500 Mhz which was wrong, I just went into the bios and told it the correct speed, and then it worked.

 

[rastex]

Thanks for everyone's help, I'm not posting this message using the computer and downloading the Ruby demo

So, I've actually been using a Mac the last year or so and really liked the way it worked, so I'm not too satisfied with the default way XP does things. What are the essential programs I need to do some customization/tweaking (doesn't have to be like a Mac, just needs to be cool )

 

[teh_pwn]

First do a couple of things to tweak XP.

1. Don't update to Service Pack 2. It has too many conflicts.
2. Go to start, run, type in services.msc, find the messaging service and disable it. Some people can spam you through this nonessential part of windows through networks.
3. Turn off auto updates and system restore (it hogs resources at times). To do this, go to start, control panel, System (i'm in traditional windows theme, so it may be different in the xp theme), system restore tab, turn off on all drives. Then the auto updates tab, turn off.

Essential programs?

Mozilla Firefox
Spybot
Adaware
Windows Media Player 9
K-lite codec pack
quicktime

If you don't like the way XP is designed, there's some mods I think that can give you a mac theme. I really don't know about that stuff though.