Must pull cmos battery for 7 64bit to start up but not XP

Desiirea1 · 01 Oct 2010

Have working XP on one hard drive. Wished to do a clean install on a 2nd hard drive. After 4 days of trying to install Windows 7 (both 64 and 32 bit upgrade versions)
Reduced the system down to:
Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe motherboard,
2G ram stick
DVD drive
500G HD
processor/fan
non USB keyboard/mouse

Flashed the bios, reinstalled chipboard drivers on the xp, 8 hours or testing the ram stick memory-no errors, and any other thing I could think of during all the attempts (there were too many.) Always the system would freeze and BSOD at Windows starting screen with the splash icon (Was trying to boot the install straight from store bought disks) with various bsods.

On a whim took out the cmos battery and moved the pin over and back. Install starts.. goes through to complete installation and does the normal reboot. BSoD again at windows starting. Do the cmos battery and restart the install from scratch but this time turn the computer off during any restarts and redo battery/pin. Windows 7 64 finally installs with no errors.

Now windows 7 is running beautifully with no problems except when the computer needs to be turned on. Unless the cmos battery is pulled for a few seconds (realised do not need to even move the pin) it will go into a reboot loop during the windows starting screen. I do not have this problem when I load up windows XP (each on it's own drive).

Suggestions?

P.S. Battery voltage checked. It's over 3.1
Edit note: Resetting the bios in the bios window to defaults by pushing F5 and then saving does not do the trick (I do not touch the bios between boots ups either). The battery must be pulled every time.

Night Hawk · 01 Oct 2010

Welcome to the Seven Forums! Desiirea1

I ran the M2N-E board on the last build for seeing XP, Vista, both 7 7000 beta builds, later both 32bit and 64bit RCs, and even had the 32bit retail on a short period of time after 7's launch all across 3 or 4 OSed drives ar one point and never ran into that one!

That had started off with an XP/Vista dual boot across two drives that were later split to each have a beta build installed on a second primary. The additional drives came later.

The 7 installs whether a second OS type or going on as stand alone installs would alway load right up once on suggesting the board may be where the problem is being seen. And the voltage for the Lithium battery should be 3.3v not less suggestin you have a weak battery to start with or the board goes through them faster for some reason.

I had that happen on one old case where everything including cpu temps were way off until a new battery was installed! Once I was into the next build no problems while the time came lately to go with a different make! Asus while offering the extras was suffering from bad boards!

Have a fresh battery onhand? Sometimes the batteries that come with the board simply give out a bit faster then your typical Duracell for example.

Dwarf · 01 Oct 2010

Hi desiirea1 and welcome to Windows 7 Forums

What happens if you physically disconnect the XP drive?

Desiirea1 · 01 Oct 2010

Nighthawk. Thankyou. For some reason I thought anything over 3 was acceptable for a battery. Will get it replaced in the morning, just to make sure. I am running each OS as a stand alone.

Dwarf: I physically removed everything from my system except what I listed above eventually. (my complete system is listed in my system specs if those are needed). This included removing the hard drive with XP on it. The only hard drive I had connected was the formatted drive to clean install windows 7 on (no partitions)

Night Hawk · 01 Oct 2010

With only that drive plugged in and knowing the installation went well a glitchy cmos due to a weak battery or board with a problem are two things to consider. On that old caase I tore it apart for a year and went with a fresh battery a year later and everything ran like new.

It always helps to have a spare battery or two onhand however when buying a new boardsince the original batteries can go on you faster then seen with a few of the name brands. Those also help with older cases being refurbished as well as being spares.

gregrocker · 01 Oct 2010

You are booting XP separately via BIOS? What happens when you try booting either with both plugged?

Can you post back a screenshot of your full Disk Mgmt drive map with listings, using SNipping Tool in Start menu?

Do you have the latest BIOS version installed?

Desiirea1 · 09 Oct 2010

I currently only have the drive with windows 7 plugged in (in an attempt to isolate the problem) If I plug in the drive with xp by itself, boot up fine. If I have both plugged in and choose to boot up the HD with XP on it first, it boots up fine (I never have a problem when XP is the currently running OS). Any configuration i try to do 7 on though as the OS it does not work without pulling the CMOS battery.

I purchased a new CMOS battery and it made no difference.

Now, I have no idea if this has anything to do with the problem. But I checked everything in the bios without pulling the battery and then right after pulling the battery. There is only one difference. The CPU voltage is .12 higher. Have no idea why this would be... or if/why this would make a difference in getting windows 7 to run. (On a side note I DO NOT like this as it's causing the CPU temps to be beyond acceptable range when above 25%)

Must pull cmos battery for 7 64bit to start up but not XP-drive-management.png

James Colbert · 09 Oct 2010

Hi desiirea1. You mention BSODs. Did you happen to catch the stop errors?

James

Desiirea1 · 09 Oct 2010

several different ones but the most common were 1E's (followed by all 0's) and sometimes C7

Night Hawk · 09 Oct 2010

Try to catch those and write them down for examination. The drive you have 7 installed could be the most likely problem however. I had one WD Green Power drive with the RC on that where 7 ran well but too many programs suffered.

Once getting a pair of 1tb GP drives and seeing some installs on them all programs seemed to run fine! The new build that went together this spring saw all new drives for the fresh start and not one problem since! The first install was on a Sata III 1tb Black edition until a memory swap called for a fresh install again only on one of the new Sata II drives in use.

Hard drive suspect! You shouldn't have to reset the bios defaults which also restores the auto voltage controls for the cpu and memory just to boot into any OS! The BSODs are likely hardware pointing at the drive itself.