Failing Dell 64 bit RAID drivers

[NormanLaw]

Hi all
I have been trying, for the last 2 days, to install Win 7 (64 bit) to my Dell XPS 720. I performed the pre-install check and it reported no problems. As I was going from Vista 32 bit to Win7 64 bit I knew I would have to perform a clean install.


I have installed about 6 times over the last couple of days and the system seems fine for maybe 20 minutes at which point one of two things happens.


either


1. it reboots after a brief blue screen message regarding BAD_POOL_HEADER (too quick to read)


2. it hangs and performs a dump with a BSOD regarding NVSTOR.SYS


I'm assuming that the problem is with the NVSTOR.SYS driver(s) for the motherboard NVIDIA RAID arrays. I have 4 disks in 2 RAID 0 arrays of a 1TB each.


Dell does not list the PC as Win 7 compatible and there are no Win7 64 bit RAID drivers listed although it does list Vista 64 bit drivers as a download. I have tried these but Win7 doesn't seem to want to update the driver saying I already have the latest drivers installed (from the Windows 7 DVD).


Anyone else had this problem and been able to cure it. I'm writing this from the PC with the 32 bit version installed and working fine. I need 64 bit to address the 8gb of memory for some very intensive video and photoshop work I do.

 

[nredding]

I believe you can force Windows to install the drivers you choose even if it thinks the currently installed drivers are more recent. Try that.

 

[wallyinnc]

Norman, can you post the dump file here (zip it tight)?
We have members that are very good at analyzing it (not this one unfortunately)
Tks, and good job filling in your system specs

 

[NormanLaw]

Norman, can you post the dump file here (zip it tight)?
We have members that are very good at analyzing it (not this one unfortunately)
Tks, and good job filling in your system specs

Thanks, problem is that I'm now running the 32 bit version and the 64 bit dump files have gone to the bit bucket in the sky.

One thing I did try was to load the Vista 64 bit driver at the custom - advanced - load drivers page for the partition I was selecting for the install location. The drivers were found (on a USB memory stick) and loaded, at which point the partition disappeared.

To get working, and 'til I get a solution I've loaded the 32 bit version but even this isn't totally stable. Had a couple of re-boots but it comes back OK afterwards. Seriously thinking of going back to Vista until I can figure this out. If I try 64 bit again I'll post a dump when it fails.

 

[NormanLaw]

I may have found the problem.

Before I purchased 7 I bought replacement RAM to max out the capacity. I had to remove the 4 X 1gb DDR2 and replace them with 4 X 2gb DDR2 modules. I did this a couple of weeks ago and Vista 32 bit has been running quite happily, obviously not using the whole 8gb.

I have just downloaded and run the Dell diagnostics which is telling me that the WCMATS test failed with memory compare errors. I'm guessing that the faulty chips are not being used in the 32 bit OS but are causing my BSOD problems with 64 bit.

I'll remove 3 of the modules and perform the test again tomorrow and keep adding the modules and re-testing until I find the faulty one(s). keeping my fingers crossed I can scratch the 32 bit version and re-install the 64 bit tomorrow. I haven't re-installed too much of my software yet.

 

[wallyinnc]

Thanks Norman, sounds like a good plan. You might be surprised that only removing and putting them back solves the problem (contact issues). You are observing the matched pair configuration, right? It should not be the cause for your problem but could affect performance in the end

 

[NormanLaw]

Thanks wallyinnc

I have just finished the testing. The last module I put in (it would be the last wouldn't it) caused a MATS Test error "Memory compare error". This is slightly different to the test I ran yesterday with all 4 modules in, which was a WCMATS Error "Memory compare error". I have no idea what those tests are but it seems I have a faulty module.

It will be going back to Crucial under their lifetime warranty. In the meantime the PC is working fine with 3 modules installed and is showing as 6.00 gb installed (3.00 gb usable). I didn't think this MB required memory to be installed in matched pairs.

I'll be scratching the 32 bit version of Windows 7 and installing the 64 bit version again a little later. I'll keep you posted.

 

[wallyinnc]

Thanks Norman for the feedback. Let us know

 

[NormanLaw]

All OK now.

OK that seems to have fixed it (famous last words?) Currently running on 6 GB and awaiting agreed replacement 2 GB DIMM.

Installed 64 bit without a hitch. Installed anti-virus and performed a disk image backup and created a system recovery disk. Also installed preferred browser and MS Office Professional, all without issue. It had always blue-screened well before this point in the past. Even the activation has gone OK (even though 32 bit had been previously activated).

A happy bunny now.

Thanks for your interest.

 

[icebreaker]

I am also considering upgrading from vista 32 to windows 7 64 bit. However, I was thrown off by what to do about the raid drivers. -- Did the 64bit upgrade disk work automatically in accessing the raid, or did you have to do something first? If so, how did you go about preloading 64 bit drivers with the 32 bit VISTA ??

I was originally thinking I could install w7 64bit on a completely separate disk, but my additional non-raid disks were not listed as bootable.

 

[NormanLaw]

It was some time ago now but, from memory:-

You will need to do a custom install and on that screen there is an option to load other drivers. These can be loaded from a CD or a memory stick so before you start the install you need to download the raid drivers (64 bit versions) and put them on a CD or memory stick.

You can't do an upgrade from 32 bit to 64 bit so make sure you have all the drivers you may need before you start.

 

[icebreaker]

thanks

 

[Submarine]

I am running a XPS 720 with the nVidia 680i chipset and Vista x86 on Raid 0. Installed a SSD and W7 64 bit with my Raid drives disconnected. Worked fine. Then reconnected my Raid drives. Most things are working fairly OK (so far - last time I tried the new SSD died after a month). I get an occasional error in the Event Log, "nvstor Event ID 129, Reset to device, \Device\RaidPort1, was issued" and keyword "0x80000000000000". I suspect this point to a problem with the Raid driver or the SATA controller nvstor. I did not load any drivers during the installation, but let Windows manage.

You seem to have similar setups. What are your experiences? Any advice?