I've got issues

wombat

I've got a wee problem with my PC at the momet insofar as it is constantly crashing for no good reason I can figure out. I'll try and keep it simple and if anyone can give me a pointer I'll be delighted This is all happening on a windows XP box.

I bought a DVD burner (first mistake)

My PC had a DVD player and CD burner. The basic configuration for the IDE stuff was
Primary Master DVD player
Primary Slave
Secondary Master Hard Disk
Secondary Slave CD burner

Figuring I might as well keep it simple to begin with I decided to replace the DVD player with the DVD burner. That worked fine for several days. The story should have ended there but no, I had to be a clever sod.

I decided then that what I wanted was to have the DVD player and DVD burner in the machine at the same time since both were of more use to me than the having the CD burner in there. So I gave that a try but I had trouble getting the machine to recognise the DVD player. It took a few attempts but eventually I figured out (with some help) that I had forgotten to set the switches at the back of the DVDs to master and slave.

By that stage I had plugged in and unplugged a few times and it was still crashing despite it being configured properly (to my knowledge and that of a few of my mates)like so:

Primary Master Hard Disk
Primary Slave
Secondary Master DVD Player
Secondary Slave DVD Burner

Initially it crashed whenever I tried going to the chapter selection of the Evil Dead DVD (in the DVD burner). Whenever it crashed, unless I let the checkdisk run, it would usually crash again when I tried logging in. After a while it would just crash in windows while I was copying around a few files, or just moving the mouse around the screen.

I also tried most combinations of the above like putting the burner on the primary slave and so on. Now I have it back to the setup from a few days back when it worked

Primary Master DVD Burner
Primary Slave
Secondary Master Hard Disk
Secondary Slave CD burner

Once I did that it started crashing while booting up. Sometimes it barely gets to the IDE device detection bit before it dies. I've asked around and I'm not getting anywhere with the advice since it's mostly the same about making sure master and slave settings are right. I've also taken the precaution of making sure all my friends know to kick me in the balls if I ever mention tinkering with my machine ever again.

hostyle

IDE primary / secondary and master / slave setup is _usually_ pretty simple. Have you tried:

Primary Master: HDD (jumper to master)
Primary Slave: DVD ROM (jumper to slave)
Secondary Master: DVD Burner (no jumper)

Make sure all IDE cables are attached fully and correctly. Also make sure you have the jumpers correct on each device, some devices have different jumper settings (so my scenario above may not be correct). Theres normally a jumper diagram on each device.

The crashing is a bit strange though, generally devices just don't work if set up wrong. You sure you didn't add or remove any other devices? Try removing all devices that were removed / added / swapped around in Device Manager and rebooting so that they get re-detected and re-installed.

You wouldn't happen to have accidently loosened any other component? Graphics card or RAM?

wombat

I've not tried any configuration without the jumper in place so I might give that a whirl. Also I might give the cable select options a try.

I don't think I managed to knock anything else out, I didn't look too closely but I gave the RAM and graphics card an experimental poke to make sure they weren't moving around.

As for the crashing, the last few times I tried, I couldn't even boot up properly and I was even luckier if it would stay running long enough for my desktop to load up, much less for me to look through device manager (note to self, check contacts and IDE cable for the hard disk again). Windows XP home edition apparantly has a bit of a thing that forces you to re-register once you make three hardware changes - I'm on XP pro and I'm not sure if that suffers the same trouble but it's a little odd that it starts crashing so much when I have the thing set up "properly" after several changes.

moridin

How about the Power in your machine, is the PSU rated highly enough?

wombat

Should be, though with the history this machine has it wouldn't shock me to learn that the PSU suddenly decided to lower the output for no good reason.

It's also possible I just completly fcuked windows itself through the injudicious use of daemon tools to mount a virtual drive I forgot to unmount before doing all this messing about. I only unmounted the thing yesterday and it occurs to me that windows may well be having a fit.

secret_squirrel

Originally posted by hostyle
IDE primary / secondary and master / slave setup is _usually_ pretty simple. Have you tried:

Primary Master: HDD (jumper to master)
Primary Slave: DVD ROM (jumper to slave)
Secondary Master: DVD Burner (no jumper)

Why would you have this set up??? Afaik putting cd/dvd roms on the same channel as a hard drive is a huge no no. All it does is drag your HD's performance down.

The idea set up (imo) is

Pri Master - HD (jumper to master or csel)
Pri Slave - Nothing.

Sec Master - DVD burner (jumper to master) (Since you want all the attention given to the burner when its burning)
Sec Slave - DVD ROM (jumper to slave)

Incidentally I've had problems like yours when I've had csel (cable select) on the jumpers.

Also dont forget that with ATA100 cables and above it matters that the slave connector goes to the slave drive and ditto for the masters, otherwise you get that funny error message during POST.

wombat

Just so I'm clear here:

On any given IDE cable, if I have only one device attached it should be plugged into the end of the cable and the jumper should be set to master.

If I have two devices on the IDE cable I should have the master (with jumper set appropriately) at the middle point in the cable (the V where the cable enters and exits the ide plug) and the slave at the end?

wombat

Originally posted by secret_squirrel
Why would you have this set up??? Afaik putting cd/dvd roms on the same channel as a hard drive is a huge no no. All it does is drag your HD's performance down.

Just for the record, damned thing was sold to me with:
the hard disk in the secondary master slot
the CD burner in the secondary slave
the DVD rom in the primary master.

At least one of the configurations I tried involved having the config you described but there was no joy. I'm definitely thinking it's a windows problem caused by stupid virtual drives on daemon tools now.

hostyle

Originally posted by secret_squirrel
Afaik putting cd/dvd roms on the same channel as a hard drive is a huge no no. All it does is drag your HD's performance down.

Got linkage for that? I've nver noticed any problems or difference.

Sir Random

Try uninstalling both DVD drives through device manager, then reboot and let windows re-detect them.

Mutant_Fruit

All optical drives such as DVD writers and cd readers all use UDMA33 at most, as thats all the bandwidth they need.

Hard disk drives typically use UDMA 133 or UDMA100 mode (generally 133) and they generally max that out when transferring large files, or even just reading the drive while a game is loading a new map etc.

If you attach an optical drive on the same cable as a HD, you will reduce both devices to the speed of the slowest drive, which basically means UDMA33 for both the optical drive and hard disk drive.

This results in much lower performance, which will be especially noticeable if you work on large files, and loading times will increase for most apps, basically general performance will drop noticeably.

Uninstall the Secindary IDE drive controllers, and the drives themselves, and then reboot. THat might help.

EDIT: I mean uninstall them in software, not physically detach them.

secret_squirrel

Originally posted by hostyle
Got linkage for that? I've nver noticed any problems or difference.

Its fairly common knowledge...... (and Mutant agrees so it must be true )

hostyle

I still think its an tech myth, but I'll try it out later on (ie put both hard-drives on Primary channel instead of both being master on seperate channels). Before I do so whats the best way to guage HDD / optical drive performance in such an experiment?

PS. wombat: sorry for deviating from the topic.

Mutant_Fruit

DMA Mode 0
16.7 MB/Sec


DMA Mode 1
25.0 MB/Sec

DMA Mode 2
33.3 MB/Sec


DMA Mode 3
44.4 MB/Sec


DMA Mode 4
66.7 MB/Sec


DMA Mode 5
100.0 MB/Sec

CD drives/DVD Drives can only go at a max of mode 2. Therefore anything on the same cable as them goes at a max of mode 2. Therefore you are cutting harddrive bandwidth by 66%!

hostyle

You mean Master and Slave have no other meaning except first on the cable and second on the cable? I thought they effected speed too (ie. Master will be faster)? I'm just guessing though.

Also if that was the case wouldn't copying files from one HDD to another be the same speed as copying files from a CD-ROM to a HDD? Cause they're not.

I'd like to test it for myself, cayse I'm one of those peopel who doesn't believe things til I've seen it with own eyes sometimes Any recommendations on software that will give me accurate file copying speed tests? And how do I tell what mode my devices are using (device manager just tells me that all HDDs and DVD are using Ultra DMA)?

Sir Random

Each channel has it's own DMA mode.
You can view what modes are being used in Device Manager by clicking on:
IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers,
then r-click on
Primary/Secondary IDE channel,
select 'properties', then 'advanced settings'

hostyle

Originally posted by Sir Random
Each channel has it's own DMA mode.
You can view what modes are being used in Device Manager by clicking on:
IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers,
then r-click on
Primary/Secondary IDE channel,
select 'properties', then 'advanced settings'

Thanks, but ...

Originally posted by hostyle
(device manager just tells me that all HDDs and DVD are using Ultra DMA)?

they're all "Ultra DMA mode" - thats all device manager tells me.

secret_squirrel

Originally posted by hostyle
You mean Master and Slave have no other meaning except first on the cable and second on the cable? I thought they effected speed too (ie. Master will be faster)? I'm just guessing though.

afaik master devices get the cpu's attention first therefore they will always be faster than the slave on the same channel when both are working.

Also if that was the case wouldn't copying files from one HDD to another be the same speed as copying files from a CD-ROM to a HDD? Cause they're not.
[/B]

Nope because a even a slaved HD will read data an order of magnitude (or there abouts) faster than any optical drive ya care to mention eg 10-30ms compared to 100-300ms (those are off the top of my head). Im sure you dont really want to get bogged down in seek times, read times, write times etc do ya?

Any recommendations on software that will give me accurate file copying speed tests? And how do I tell what mode my devices are using (device manager just tells me that all HDDs and DVD are using Ultra DMA)? [/B]

Norton utilities used to do just that but that was years ago.
How about Sisoft Sandra (never used it tho)
Try checking in your BIOS - mine tells me what mode each IDE device is running under.
It also shows in the Bordered text display that shows up every time you boot.

hostyle

Two things:

- I found a few utilities at http://www.benchmarkhq.ru/english.html?/be_hdd.html that give me speeds and DMA modes for each device, and other relevant information.

- Secondly, I am an idiot. At some point in the past I did indeed put both my hard-drives on the primary channel, so everything I said above was inaccurate. My apologies.

I will still run a test just to investigate if what you guys said was true. I'm sure it is, but just for my own information.

Sir Random

Originally posted by hostyle
Thanks, but ...
quote:

---

Originally posted by hostyle
(device manager just tells me that all HDDs and DVD are using Ultra DMA)?

---

they're all "Ultra DMA mode" - thats all device manager tells me.

I saw your post, that's why I showed you exactly where to find the info under Device Manager.
You were probably looking under 'DVD/CD-ROM Drives' or 'Disk drives' which only tells you that you're using UltraDMA mode.

Look again under:
IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers,
then r-click on
Primary/Secondary IDE channel,
select 'properties', then 'advanced settings'

hostyle

http://www.humanenvelope.com/DMA.jpg

-- edit
used URL instead of large image

tribble

Right - this could be a number of things.

1. Incorrect drive configuration. Try Pri. Master = HD, Sec. Master DVD-RW, Sec. Slave = DVD-ROM.

2. If this still crashes then set then unplug the DVD-RW and set the DVD-ROM to Master (and put it at the end of the cable, althought this shouldn't matter.
If this solves it then it's probably a power issue (although possibly a NT/2000/XP software issue as they don't like too much new hardware/changes).

3. If this still crashes then try the original configuration (hard disk Sec. Slave etc...) - just so we can disprove the NT/2000/XP hardware changes issue in step 2.

4. If this still crashes then setup the system as in point 1 and reinstall windows (doesn't need to be a clean install but it may help).

5. If this STILL doesn't work then IT'S ALMOST CERTAINLY A POWER ISSUE.
Borrow a different PSU

I had two of the SAME PSU's from two of the SAME cases one of which liked my Pioneer DVD-ROM and the other of which crashed the machine. Weird thing was that the crashy PSU worked fine a 24/7 server under high load...

tribble

wombat

I've tried pretty much everything listed by everyone so far here with no joy whatsoever, so last night I formatted and reinstalled (it turned out that I had all my crap backed up anyway - or everything except my savegames for GTA Vice city which I was well into.. anyway)

I used the following configuration:
Primary Master Hard Disk
Primary Slave nothing
Secondary Master DVD Burner
Secondary Slave DVD Player

Oh, and it's a 300 watt power supply but I doubt that's the problem, read on gentle reader.

It formatted fine, no crashing or acting up, I installed Windows98 (with the intention of upgrading to XP once that worked) and once it got to the point where it was setting up the system (after setting the time and start menus and whatnot) it crashed.
I rebooted, it got to the point where it was detecting plug and play devices and it crashed.
Rebooted, crashed at the same point again.
Rinse, wash, repeat.

Eventually I just unplugged the DVD burner, set the player to master and tried again. It detected everything fine but still decided to crash when it got to the point where it was setting up the plug and play devices.

So, tonight on suggestion from a guy I work with, I'm going to go into the bios and start turning off the serial and/or parallel ports and any on board crap I don't use to see if that helps. Beyond that I'm considering formatting again and trying to install with only the DVD player installed (but that's a sort of wishful thinking level of a last resort) Anyone know anything else I can try beyond buying an upgrade kit from komplett, dousing my existing hardware in lighter fluid and dancing around its charred remains in the back yard?

wombat

Originally posted by tribble
Right - this could be a number of things.

I'll just print this out and compare it to my list of what I've tried at home just to make sure. I've not swapped PSUs around lately but I'm giving serious thought to picking up a new case in peats over the weekend with a 450/500 watt power supply (xaser I think?) because I want to do a bit of lighting work sometime soon.

Sir Random

Originally posted by hostyle
http://www.humanenvelope.com/DMA.jpg

-- edit
used URL instead of large image

Is that Win98?
XP should look like this:
http://www.handspun.utvinternet.com/daniel/dmamode5.jpg
http://www.handspun.utvinternet.com/daniel/dmamode.jpg

Sir Random

Originally posted by wombat
Anyone know anything else I can try beyond buying an upgrade kit from komplett, dousing my existing hardware in lighter fluid and dancing around its charred remains in the back yard?

If the DVD drive is crashing your windows install, then it must be a hardware problem. Have you tried a different cable?

hostyle

Originally posted by Sir Random
Is that Win98?
XP should look like this:

W2k. I refuse to run any OS that looks like it was designed by Fisher Price :P

Amyway thats all beside the point. I've found out what they run at, etc.

wombat

Originally posted by Sir Random
If the DVD drive is crashing your windows install, then it must be a hardware problem. Have you tried a different cable?

No, I'm going to go pick up some new IDE cables over the weekend if possible. I've been meaning to get some rounded ones for ages. Of course I still have to do the bios tinkering too. Hopefully I should get to the bottom of it this weekend.