ASUS K8N w/WinXP Blue Screen Error

to start i have:
Asus K8N Geforce 4 Motherboard
AMD 64 3000+
512MB 3200 DDR Kingston Hyper X RAM
512MB 3200 DDR PNY RAM
BFG Nvidia Geforce 5500 Video Card
IBM Deskstar 30G 7200 RPM IDE Hard Drive
Windows XP Home

I recently been having a lot of errors when i start up my computer, with a black screen saying:"Cannot find OS" type messages. I would flash the bios and they would go away. But after the third time i got this message i havent been able to get my system running again. Now, it goes to the Windows XP loading logo, and then flashes a blue screen error message for 1 sec. and then restarts the computer. It does this over and over, and i cant fix it. Before it does this it asks me to choose, Safe mode, last know setting(that worked), and start normal, etc.. Ive tried each one, and the result is the same.

I dont know if its a Hard Drive error, or a motherboard , or something else.

My manual says to update the bios using a bootable floppy, but when i try that i get another error message: "NTDLR not found, restart and try again"

Notes: My Hard drive is pretty old, bought it in 2001. Bought motherboard from fry's about 4 months ago.

Can anyone help???

 

Try putting in your Operating system CD and boot from that just to see if your system will boot at all..

 

If you have to keep reflashing the bios, see if the battery on the motherboard is loose or dead (shouldn't be dead if the board's only 4 months old, but who knows).

 

Just a mistake i found, its a Geforce 3 series, not 4.
I will try to boot from my system CD.

 

I tried the boot from the windows CD and...it worked! Somewhat :| I did a repair and then it took me to the DOS screen and displayed all the available commands (HELP Screen C:\WINDOWS). So i took some educated guesses. First i tried CHKDSK, and it checked and repaired, said it found 1 error, but didnt saw what. Then i tried FIXBOOT, and it asked me to install a new boot record, and i did. And the EXIT.
It then gave me a choice to startup Safe mode, VGA mode, last known settings, etc.... I chose last known settings. Now the problems:
It loaded My desktop (finally) but it seemed to be in safe mode, only 4 bit and 800x600 resolution. i tried changing the display but it wouldnt let me, i tried accessing the Device manager but it gave me an error. It said i might not have rights to access. And then i tried to load my video drivers from the CD and it wouldnt let me open what was on the CD, but it would let me open my Motherboard utilty CD, Wierd :$ So i tried starting up in VGA mode, and the colors came out right, but it was still at 800 x 600 res.

So thats where im at now, all the programs seem to work fine, i have internet access, but i still cant access the device manager.

Can anyone help?

 

Just reload WinXP... You are missing some files somewhere, but if you reload WinXP it should fix everything for you..

 

By reload do you mean Format the disk and reinstall again? Becuase i want to keep my files.

 

No just reload... It should fix your problems

 

Thanks, will try that today.

 

Boot up in safe mode, remove all reference to your installed video card - drivers/application.
Then do a restart normally, it should then boot up in normal VGA mode and then detect your video card and prompt you for drivers etc, then just reload them off the cd.
Let us know what happens?

 

I cant boot up in any mode now!! Now it continually give me the "Select boot device or press any key to reboot" text over and over. I just learned that my wife's cousin and brother also have the exact same errors. Our computers are not connected in anyway, so... who knows.
The only thing i can think of now, is to install windows on an extra hard drive i have and connect my current Hdd as a slave to copy the files i need over. What do you think?? Any suggestions?

 

Ok, the RAM cleaning didnt work. So what i did next was use a different hard drive and formatted it clean and installed windows XP Pro. Everything went fine, i got windows up and running and it looked good. Then.... i started installing my drivers from the ASUS Motherboard CD that it came with. I installed a couple and then restarted and still good, until i got to the Realtek Audio sound driver. That was the last thing i installed on my computer before i restarted and my OS wouldnt load any more, and it gave me the same error as before. "Cannot load Operating System". I talked to a couple tech guys i know and what they tell me is that its not a motherbaord problem, its most likely not the Hard drive or any hardware, its the bad driver compatibility issue. So they want me to not install that driver and download the latest from the net when i get Windows running again. One other minor possibility they noted was that it might be the power supply, i did notice that it does not blow out much air even on the highest setting. I have an MGE Vortec 500 with adjustable fan setting. I will try the new driver method, and hopefully that works. Will let you know what happens.

 

Ok, redid my windows from scratch, and everything is going fine so far. I installed most of my drivers EXCEPT the REalltek Audio ALC850 drivers. I downloaded the driver from the realtek website and when i tried to install it gave me a message: "This driver has not passed the Windows logo verification" (or something like that)and it said:"If you continue with installation you may have problems immediately or in the near future". So i remember seing this before the first time i installed my drivers 4 months ago, but disregarded it. So im pretty sure it is the audio driver that messed up my system. MY question is now.. what do i do to get sound?? I also installed the Nvidia nForce 3 audio drivers but still no sound. How do i get sound if my driver is not passed windows logo verification??

 

Yeah but the thing is, it also says that you may encounter problems immediatly or in the near future. And i think thats where my problem came from, becuase i clicked continue the last time. And if i click continue and it gives me problems again then what?

 

ALC 850