From: Alex on 11/29/2002
I'm getting a " searching for boot record " error on floppy, cdrom and hard drive, but at the beginning of the bios booting it does recognise the hard drive and the cdrom, i have done everything from checking the bios and making sure the sequence is right to testing the hard drive on another computer ( this works ), i also have desaible the onboard controller and add on an and IDE controller and still doesn't work, the hard drive is running XP, but if i try to boot from the XP installation cdrom, it works... up to the intallation of XP, recovery and quit options, i have also try to boot from a bootable floppy and doesn't work....., any ideas anyone????
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--- Replies to this Problem ---
From: Mukond on 10/15/2008
This boot thing doesnt mean anything - If you pc is not working it cant be the problem of this boot record thing.You or by default, may have changed the settings for the F2 option, I think in the bios update. The bios looks for other ways of booting up the pc. So it searchs CD-Rom ... Floppy... and so on - If they all are not found then the bios goes and resumes ur normal xp from hard drive. You can turn this off from the bios setup. Some proggramers use this setting to boot up thing from the usb and other stuff. Some time a virus may have installed some sort of boot file and the changed the settings in the bios, so that the virus can run. After fixing the virus the bios keep searching for boot records. Tou would have to turn this off ur self. Hope thsis help
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From: Alex on 12/07/2002
Hi guys...., my problem has ended by adding a new board to my system, but i really would have love to know what hit my bios....., cause i think something eatup my bios...., something out there currupted my bios....., and i think...is not only me, or just simply find out what cause the problem..... , again guys....thank you so much for your support and hope some body else have better luck then me..... in reviving there motherboard.....
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From: Computerpilot on 12/06/2002
I don't know about 'drakeman', but I would think it is safe to say that if you followed all the advice that we both offered, you are looking at a new motherboard.Computerpilot
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From: Tim on 12/05/2002
Searching for Boot Record from Floppy - Not Found
Searching for Boot Record from CD-ROM - Not Found
Searching for Boot Record from IDE-0 - Not Found
Same problem as Brian posted on 11/30/2002New machine, 1.7 celeron, HB-M935V2Motherboard from PCChips, added HD, FL, CD 256M DDR RAM, edited BIOS to vendor spec. Created boot disc from W98 system. System won't come up. Any suggestion would sure be appreciated.
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From: Drakeman on 12/04/2002
Sorry to hear that but I think you found the problem, sounds like the BIOS chip went flakey since it won't program properly. Contact the MB manuf. and see if they will send you a new chip or take back your MB to where you got it and see if they will exchange it. Get a new one for $99 1.2 Ghz chip and all from net shopping places. Takes 1/2 hour to change it out, max.
BIOS chips are specific to the MB and manuf. so you can't simply find one anywhere.
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From: Alex on 12/04/2002
Ok... the lates on the quest to revive my computer, my bios is dead, ... this is how it goes, finally i manage to make a bootable cd emulating the a: drive with the new bios-flash, boot the machine with it and manage to start installing the flash, when it gets to the ends of programming the bios....here is where it gets me, ERROR 20 - FLASH ROM CANNOT BE CORRECTLY PROGRAMMED..... gosh....., the end has arrive.... the ironic part is that right after that is giving me the intructions to boot back the machine, YOU MAY SEE A CMOS CHECKSUM ERROR, DON'T PANIC, THIS IS USUALLY WHAT YOU WILL SEE BEFORE CHANGES MADE, TO SAVE CHANGES AFTER YOU BOOT THE MACHINE, PRESS F2 FOLLOWED BY F5 (ENTER) AND THEN F10 (ENTER) TO MAKE CHANGES......, but at the time i get to boot back the machine....., i get nothing, not even boot up bios information...., detectiong drives......nothing, blanc screen...., so i figure this is the END.... for now, i just unplug the machine, took off the battery on the mother board.....,jumped back to reset/clear bios.... and leave it there to rest...for a while...., hope is not the end....., keep you guys update of possible more problems to this monster.... thanks to all for sugestions
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From: Computerpilot on 12/03/2002
One thing that also should be mentioned to help your quest is that the Windows XP setup is supposed to load the setup items as a virtual drive in your RAM, then access your primary drive to format/install Windows. Therefore, if your setup is failing midway, you are not able to access your hard drive from your BIOS, regardless of your boot sequence settings. There are only four things that I can think of that would cause this:*Bad or incompatible hard drive with the BIOS (possible with older
motherboards and newer hard drives) *Bad or improperly set cable or pins on motherboard are bent or
missing *Improperly jumpered hard drive - should be set to PRIMARY, DO NOT
USE 'CABLE SELECT' with older motherboard! *Bad BIOS or motherboard as 'Drakeman' as suggested Just thought I would add this information to the troubleshooting process. Computerpilot
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From: Drakeman on 12/02/2002
Computerpilot brings up a good point, I have had floppies that boot on one computer and not another.
One computer can't read the other's floppy.
You could try formatting a new boot floppy on your old PC using the new drive, then plug the new drive into the new computer and see if it boots then, you know the floppy works with that drive since it was written with that drive.
Do a complete format, not the "quick" one.
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From: Drakeman on 12/02/2002
Sounds like you may have a corrupt BIOS then. Any chance you can return the MB or get them to send you a new BIOS chip?
Only other thing I can think of is you have a bad CPU that does really strange things, but I doubt it.
You could make a bootable CD (you did say the CD boots) with DOS on it and the flash program and try to flash that way.
The only other thing would be to do that network boot so you could run the flash program.
The following is a very ADVANCED thing to try, don't do it if you don't know what you are doing.
People have been able to boot a older PC and remove the BIOS chip while the computer is on then place the corrupt BIOS chip in with power on (now you know why I said it's very advanced) and then run the flash floppy to write the chip.
What you are doing is using a old PC as a flash programmer. It needs to have the same type of chip and all, so like I said you need to really know what you are doing.
We tried everything, I think it's time to return the MB, computer, or get them to send you a new chip. Those chips are not easy to remove without damaging the socket, so they probably won't sell you one.
You may want to try a search on google to see if another company sells the chips.
If most of the parts are standard, you could always transfer them to a new MB, those are pretty cheap bare.
I think I am out of suggestions. No more magic, sorry.
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From: Alex on 12/02/2002
Hi Drakeman, still haveing same problem.... have try my hard drive, floppy with same cables on another computer and they work, i have also try slowing down the speed on the cpu, but no can do..., my bios doesn't have that option, i have also turn off everything on it and leave only the options just enough to run the hard drive and floppy, and still... keep getting the same error, i got the new flash for the bios...., but it only make a bootable floppy...., again MY FLOPPY doesn't work, so i can't flash it, i'm running out of options..., ooohh, my system is one of those Packard Bell, runing a AMD-K6 -2/400, on a FR520 (miami) motherboard, with 512 cache, 512 MEM, with a American Megatrends, AMIBIOS ver. V00.01.27, you seen...the strange thing is that this machine was fully functional...., working fine... can think if anything else.....HELP!!!!!!!
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From: Computerpilot on 12/02/2002
(there are two posts with similar problems, I will try to address both posts)There are very few things that can cause this type of problem. Therefore, I am sure you should be able to find a solution quickly. First off, you need to be sure that your hard drive is functional (with or without partition). If you have another computer, you need to install the hard drive on the other computer and format it in Windows (make sure to use a compatible file format for your OS). Secondly, I would check your cables to be sure that you are correctly plugging them in (I do not mean to insult your intelligence). Remember, if your system boots and the hard drive or floppy drive lights stay on the whole time, you do not have your cables connected properly. In addition, make sure both are getting power. Is it possible that you have too many devices attached to one plug? Also, some of the plugs may be inoperative. Is it possible that you are plugging the floppy power cable incorrectly? They vary from one floppy drive to another and not all floppy drives have an easy fit connector for power. Instead of moving a "known good" floppy drive and cables to the new computer, I would take the new computer floppy drive and cables to your old computer to be sure that they are working properly. Inspect how the cables are plugged in to be sure that everything looks right. To be honest, I always guess when I plug in my cables. I leave the case open, boot the computer, and if it does not work, I move the cables around to make it work properly. I guess I would also create a new boot disk to be sure that you can rule out the possibity of a damaged MBR or autoexec. It is possible that some floppy drives will pick up something another will not. I hope this gives you a few other options to look into. Keep up the good work. I guess I would start with a 'cleared' CMOS to be sure that your recent setting changes do not disturb your troubleshooting process. Computerpilot
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From: Drakeman on 12/01/2002
It doesn't spin with a floppy inserted but yet the light comes on?
Very strange.
Try to find that setting in BIOS that sets the CPU speed to a low value. "Turbo" or something like that, they had it on old machines I don't know if the newer ones have that option. I am just thinking that the CPU is too fast for the controller card. It's a long shot.
Have you contacted the motherboard manufacturer? What do they say?
Do you have plug in all boards removed? Turn on only Video in the BIOS, just what you need to boot and see what that does, no serial, no nothing, minimum.
You can boot from USB with something like a ZIP drive or CDROM on some systems.
You could try a network boot with a NIC card, it would probably be too much trouble, just another idea to get it to boot and then you could try flashing your BIOS with a update.
One other thing, any chance it's set in BIOS to boot from floppy drive "B" ? How about the floppy is connected to the wrong connector on the floppy cable, try the whole cable and floppy in the other computer to verify.
Is your CMOS battery at 3V ?
Who makes the motherboard? If you don't mind, give me a little more detail on the system. Is there any chance it's got a custom "for them only" floppy cable?
More ideas, keep trying, call this a educational experience. Some day someone else will have problems like this and you can help.
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From: Alex on 12/01/2002
Hi Drakeman, and thanks for u'r sugestions....., but i think my floppy is not spinning, i see the light come on but i don't hear any sound.....like that usual sound u hear of a floppy spinning, so, now comes on how can i even try to use it, with mandrake or red hot.....if is not even turning...., like Brian says, never seen this before, at some point i think is a corrupted bios....but how can upgrate? if not letting me use the floppy disk drive..... but let me tell u one thing..., this was a working machine....., it was working fine.... till this....??????
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From: Drakeman on 11/30/2002
This is strange. Let's go over what happens when a computer boots up. (simple version)
BIOS sets up all the hardware it can, then will try to read the first sector from floppy, 512 bytes into RAM and then jumps to the start of that 512 bytes and just runs code from there.
If BIOS had a problem with reading from the floppy controller, I would think it would scream, and maybe that is it. Does your floppy run? Do you hear it turn at the point where it prints this on the screen?
Any hardware IRQ or port assignment overlaps may cause this. How about turning off Plug and Play (PnP) and assign manually as a test.
Once your sector is in memory, then it runs some code that loads more code into memory, a sort of second boot process.
Could it be this second process?
I think you could tell by the way it reads the disk, the sound it makes, because it loads more sectors at that point. See if you can hear what your other computers sound like compared with this one.
Could there be a incompatiblilty with the software vs. CPU type?
Download and make a Red Hat or Mandrake Linux boot floppy and see what that does as a test. They print a lot more information about the boot process and may tell you something.
Try one of those single floppy RAM test disks found on the net and see if it could be RAM.
If BIOS has a way to turn down the CPU speed at boot, try that.
That's my 2 cents.
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From: Brian on 11/30/2002
I'm having a similar problem, but with a new system. I just put together a "Game Box" for a Christmas present for my kids--ECS K7S5A board, Athlon 1800, 512 meg SDRAM. It goes through POST ok, but when I try to boot to a floppy I get "Searching for Boot Record from Floppy. .Not Found" This is a new build, and the HD isn't formatted yet. I don't have a bootable CD, so I don't know if that would work--will try burning one later. I thought I might have a bad floppy drive, but I substituted a working drive and cable from another system, with no luck. Checked the boot floppy disks--they will boot another computer fine. All parts are new except for the mouse, keyboard and monitor. I've tried every bios change I can think of. (didn't try blanking the bios, but I don't see why that would change anything, since this is a new board which didn't work with factory settings.) Could a bad memory stick cause this? This is driving me nuts. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
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From: Alex on 11/30/2002
i have done cmos clear, remove the battery, change the cable, boot to factory level and still nothing????!!!!... thanks Dave, what else?...anybody?
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From: Dave on 11/29/2002
translate address for large hard drives may or may not be set? this dont effect boot from floppy though
DMA is off? IRQ conflict?
clear BIOS, remove battery for 1/2 hour or find clear jumper on MB, set all back to factory, try again?
bad cable?
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