Improperly Installed Windows

[skribbz14]

I just recently have been having a series of crashes and problems with booting after doing a fresh install on a new SSD. I believe this is related to me not having the correct drivers, but I am having a hard time figuring out what drivers it would be that I am missing.

I've checked the device manager and the only warning I am seeing is the "ethernet controller", in which I do not use ethernet, so I was writing off as unimportant.

I've also gone through each of my start-up services and disabled the non-Microsoft services one by one. This doesn't really give desired results, because after disabling one service (no matter which one) my computer will boot correctly again. If I enable the service after that it will continue to boot correctly.

If it helps I own a ASRock Z68 Extrem3 Gen3 motherboard and my computer is completely custom that I put together myself.

I'm not sure where to go from here and any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

thanks in advanced!

 

[gregrocker]

I'd start over and follow these same steps for http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/219487-clean-reinstall-factory-oem-windows-7-a.html#post1839164 to get a perfect install, based on what has worked best since Win7 was released in countless thousands of installs helped with here.

 

[skribbz14]

Thanks, I was really not wanting to perform another fresh install, but I understand that it might be unavoidable. I keep all my data on cloud or a separate HDD, so I'll probably try to debug without wiping my Windows first.

Thanks for the link! I will use this process from here on out.

 

[gregrocker]

Be sure to read the part about drivers, which are different than in XP. Users get in trouble when they try to apply the old rules to a driver-complete OS. Rely on the installer and Windows Updates, only importing drivers after all rounds of Important and Optional Updates are done, or if only given the place-holder Standard VGA graphics driver.

 

[skribbz14]

That could've been my problem. I always start off with installing my wifi-connector driver and, on this install in particular, I tried to directly install my mobo's driver to get rid of the SM Bus Controller error.

 

[Mark Phelps]

What has worked for me in new installs is, just after install is finished, sticking in the new motherboard driver CD and installing drivers from that. You know all of those will work because they are provided for that motherboard.

After that, my next step was to go to motherboard website and grab any driver updates -- and install those.

Then, and only then, did I go out to Windows Update and let it search for updates.

 

[skribbz14]

I definitely would have done that, but I lost the cd -_-

I looked pretty hard on the website for what the cd would have done, but only came up with this page:
Z68 Motherboard Series Manufacturing - ASRock Inc.

On there I wasn't for sure if I was supposed to download them all or not. When I tried to install some of them they wouldn't work and I didn't want to blindly install everything causing more problems. I think the only one I actually did install was the INF driver ver:9.2.0.1021 to get rid of the SM Bus Controller warning in my Device Managers.

 

[gregrocker]

I would not install the mobo drivers from disk (which is dated the moment its pressed) or the manufacturer's website because many lard in extra crapware that interferes and causes issues later.

Unlike XP, Win7 is a driver-complete OS which provides most drivers in the installer and then from running all Important and Optional Updates after enabling Automatically deliver drivers via Windows Update (Step 3).

I would only import drivers that are missing after all rounds of Updates are completed. As I said already, users get into trouble when they follow outdated XP methods to import a bunch of drivers which may not be wanted by Win7.

 

[skribbz14]

Alright, so I should completely ignore the mobo's drivers until all the installs are complete? If there are things still left over I guess I should debug from there.


I also just got an update on my situation.

I recently edited my start-up services to try and figure out which driver was the problem by process of elimination, but I couldn't narrow it down any one of my 4 services.

What I have noticed is when my computer won't boot properly after the log-in screen I have to log-in via safe mode, not do anything except hit restart, and then it will boot properly.

Kind of strange, have any of you heard of something like this happening before? Could it be something else?

 

[AddRAM]

I totally agree with Greg on this one. Run windows update. The only driver that I ALWAYS get from the manufacturer are the video drivers, I don`t let windows handle this. If windows doesn`t come up with a driver then you can go digging.

 

[gregrocker]

Work through the Troubleshooting Steps for Windows 7

 

[skribbz14]

Thank you, I'll go through this list as soon as I can.

 

[skribbz14]

This will probably narrow it down for us. I didn't realize that my computer was making these files without seeing a bluescreen. I also don't know how to read these things.