Need expert advice immediately

[vishald]

My friend has an Intel Dual core 2.66 pentium D system on Asus RD2VM mother board with DDR 2 Trascend 1Gb ram and 320 gb WD SATA HDD drives. Recently, he started getting BSOD (Blue screen) while loading Windows. Some times windows get loaded but after last restart get blue screen. Tried installing windows xp & 7 on another computer and connecting to his motherboard but in vain. The Windows logo appears, then the Welcome Screen and then Wham! BSOD in a spilt second. The PC restarts so fast that there is no time to read the error. Tried everything we know..... Safe mode, format/ reinstall, 3 different HDDs, Windows XP/ 7 etc. and finally isolated the issue to be with the Mobo. He and I took it to a local repair shop. The guy told us that he can fix the issue however he needs the HDD to install windows and once done, we cannot format/ reinstall OS on the drive or use another HDD for OS, if we do the issue will reoccur. This means that we are stuck with that HDD for the rest of the PCs life. Another solution he gave us is to use an IDE drive for OS and SATA drives for data only. What do the 2 different solutions mean? What exactly is the repair guy going to do so that only that particular HDD work? Is there any other way to resolve this? .......I do not have an IDE HDD. Have also tried PATA emulation mode.

Need some expert advice.

[pimpom]

As with many computer problems, there's more than one possibility. As the first step, I suggest you test the memory with memtest86.

The original memtest86 is for writing to a CD or a floppy disk. It's at Memtest86.com - Memory Diagnostic

memtest86+ is a further development by third parties and can be used from a USB flash drive. It's available at memtest86.org

Note that the two sites are not the same.

[vishald]

I am able to install windows with same RAM on another motherboard

Please suggest

[pimpom]

OK, so the RAM itself is not defective. But I suggest you test it anyway on the motherboard in question. This will tell you if there's a problem with the motherboard's memory interface.

memtest86 is a very small prog and will take only a very few minutes to download and install. Now that a USB flash drive version is available, I prefer that myself. I've tried it and it works very well.

Two other things you can do is to clear the BIOS and to swap the PSU with a known good one.

What I'm suggesting (and no doubt what you've been doing) is to see if the mobo IS the culprit. It's almost impossible to check the mobo directly without a lot of sophisticated gear. So the best course is to go by a process of elimination.

[pimpom]

BTW, is the computer using a graphics card?

[asingh]

Post the last three BSOD dumps. Can look at them.

[pimpom]

I just had a thought. I really should have brought this up before, but it slipped my mind.

Some SATA connectors are very unreliable, especially the 4-pin to 15-pin power cable adaptors. Contacts become loose with time and can cause a lot of problems.

Vishald: If your friend's computer is using such a power supply adaptor, check to see if the 4-pin male-to-female adaptor is loose. Hold the red wire on the male side with one hand, hold the red wire on the female side with the other hand. Push and pull against each other and see if the contact feels loose, that is, if they slide in and out easily. Repeat this with the other wires.

If any or all of them feel loose, that may be the culprit.

[vishald]

@pimpom Tried changing 2 PSU. Same issue. No way that I can install
memtest86 using that motherboard as unable to install Windows. Now I have checked the memory, hdd and processor on another motherboard and installed windows. It works just fine.
Computer is not using any graphics card other than onboard one.

@asigh It gives blue screen error and no gives no time to read it. Comp restarts.

I just can't understand what to do.

Please help!

[asingh]

^^
Each time you get a BSOD, it creates a dump. Enable it under "start up and recovery". It lets you set the path there too..!

[vishald]

@asigh

I have tried that too.

[asingh]

Try different memory on your system.

[pimpom]

Originally Posted by vishald

@pimpom Tried changing 2 PSU. Same issue. No way that I can install
memtest86 using that motherboard as unable to install Windows. Now I have checked the memory, hdd and processor on another motherboard and installed windows. It works just fine.
Computer is not using any graphics card other than onboard one.

OK. It's certainly looks more and more like it's the motherboard. As for memtest86, you don't have to install it on that computer. It doesn't even have to involve its own hard disk at all. Here's what you have to do:

Download memtest86+ (that's the USB flash drive version from the second URL I gave earlier) using another computer.
Unzip the small file.
Plug in a flash drive (pen drive).
Run the installation prog by double-clicking it.
It will format the flash drive as a bootable drive and install memtest86+ on it.
It's a tiny program and will finish the installation in a few seconds.

Now remove the flash drive and plug it into the defective computer. You don't have to connect the HD. In fact, it's best if you leave the HDD disconnected. The test does not involve the HDD.

Then turn the computer on, go to the boot menu and choose the flash drive as the boot device.

The computer will boot and run memtest86 automatically. You don't have to do anything else except watch the screen for the test results. If everything's OK, the lower half of the screen will remain blank. If the RAM is defective, it will be displayed in red on the lower half of the screen.

It will take several minutes to complete the test. Watch the upper right-hand side of the screen. At default settings, it will run 8 different tests and then go back to test #1 in a loop until you stop it.

[vishald]

@pimpom

It ask me to purchase memtest86

I need any free tool. Also if you have this tool then u can email it to me at abc693 @yahoo.com

[pimpom]

Memtest86 and Memtest86+ are completely free. Maybe what you saw was where they are selling a CD and they are asking for the price of preparing the CD, shipping, etc.

Anyway, I've mailed the + version to you with instructions. Here's a copy of the text portion of the mail:

Here's the USB flash drive version of Memtest86+

Unzip the file
Plug in a USB flash drive (pen drive, thumb drive)
Double-click the program's icon
It will format your flash drive as a bootable drive and install memtest86+

Now you're ready to go.
Plug the flash drive to the computer to be tested.
Turn the computer on and go to BIOS setup
Choose the flash drive as the boot device

Memtest86+ will boot the computer and run Memtest86+ automatically
The test screen is mostly white letters on a blue background
It will run 8 different tests on the RAM
Test progress can be seen at the top right-hand side of the screen
It will take several minutes to complete the tests
Any defect of the RAM will be reported in RED on the lower half of the screen.

From "pimpom" in TDF