Fresh XP Home restore will hang at restart, and nslookup doesn't work
Gentlemen,
I have completed a complete restore/ reinstallation of XP Home onto a Dell Dimension 8250. The OS came from a Dell reinstall the operating system disk. I have applied the machine specific drivers from the original manuf supplied cd, and two things are happening:
1) The machine will hang forever when doing a restart, but will shut down reasonably promptly just fine.
2) Higher level tcp/ip functions, eg: nslookup and trying to resolve a website, fail. But I can ping the default gateway by ip address, and can ping the DNS by IP address.
Things I've done so far:
a) Using a different machine, I downloaded all drivers and applications from the Dell support website which relate to this machine, burned them onto a CD, and installed all of them that would take. Some of the updates required hardware that wasn't there. Note that some of the updates that I saw were specifically for was for the USB device and the chipset.
b) In the Hardware Manager, there are two yellow question marks under Other devices, which identify themselves as: Universal Serial Bus (USB) Controller.
c) During the restore the OS process, after reformatting the hard drive and after starting the installation of the OS, the machine halted several times, eg: 3 or 4. The display was dark, and the caps lock button would take 3 presses to toggle it from on to off. Note that this happened during the OS installation, and depended on the fact that the install checkpoints itself in case just such a thing happens. This halting isn't a common thing that happens on other machines, but I attributed this to a (n energy star?) timer elapsing to reduce power because I walked away and did something else and checked on this later. (could just be vindictive too ...)
d) I've read through some of the other posts which sound like they relate, but I think I've gotten them all covered, but human nature being what it is - I wouldn't necessarily be here asking for help if I did indeed cover all.
The thought just occurred to install SP2 from CD. I'll report results when complete.
Comments, suggs, guidance ...
I have completed a complete restore/ reinstallation of XP Home onto a Dell Dimension 8250. The OS came from a Dell reinstall the operating system disk. I have applied the machine specific drivers from the original manuf supplied cd, and two things are happening:
1) The machine will hang forever when doing a restart, but will shut down reasonably promptly just fine.
2) Higher level tcp/ip functions, eg: nslookup and trying to resolve a website, fail. But I can ping the default gateway by ip address, and can ping the DNS by IP address.
Things I've done so far:
a) Using a different machine, I downloaded all drivers and applications from the Dell support website which relate to this machine, burned them onto a CD, and installed all of them that would take. Some of the updates required hardware that wasn't there. Note that some of the updates that I saw were specifically for was for the USB device and the chipset.
b) In the Hardware Manager, there are two yellow question marks under Other devices, which identify themselves as: Universal Serial Bus (USB) Controller.
c) During the restore the OS process, after reformatting the hard drive and after starting the installation of the OS, the machine halted several times, eg: 3 or 4. The display was dark, and the caps lock button would take 3 presses to toggle it from on to off. Note that this happened during the OS installation, and depended on the fact that the install checkpoints itself in case just such a thing happens. This halting isn't a common thing that happens on other machines, but I attributed this to a (n energy star?) timer elapsing to reduce power because I walked away and did something else and checked on this later. (could just be vindictive too ...)
d) I've read through some of the other posts which sound like they relate, but I think I've gotten them all covered, but human nature being what it is - I wouldn't necessarily be here asking for help if I did indeed cover all.
The thought just occurred to install SP2 from CD. I'll report results when complete.
Comments, suggs, guidance ...
Nirmal Sharma
Is it working in Safe Mode ?
ASKER
Ok, the installation of SP 2 has completed.
In safe mode, the problem of restart not working is persisting. Clicking on Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Restart will reliably hang, leaving just a standard "OS shutting down" message.
Any suggs on how to study at what point the OS is hanging while it is goinug down in "restart" mode but will not hang while going down in "shutdown" mode?
In safe mode, the problem with resolving names to IP addresses also persists. Running nslookup produces a message: "DNS request timed out. timeout was 2 seconds. *** Can't find server name for address x.x.x.x: Timed out". Perhaps this is due to SP2 and the network config wizard needs to be rerun. Done. Checked properties for Tcp/Ip, and the settings are proper. In the Network Connections window, the Local Area Connection has a status of Connected, Firewalled. Pinging 127.0.0.1 succeeds. Pinging the ip address of the local NIC succeeds. Pinging the default gateway succeeds. Pinging the outward facing NIC on the network firewall succeeds. Pinging the .1 box on that network succeeds. Pinging the DNS succeeds. Using ipconfig /all to check the IP addresses of the DNS, just to double check:
The first tuple was wrong! Fixed that. Resolving names using nslookup now works! It's amazing what a little break, like sleep, will do for solving a problem ...
Proceeding with windows update, now that I can. There are alot of updates (21 updates, 61MB). Even though I have a fairly fast line to the Internet, this is going to take a while, eg: about an hour.
After the updates complete, I'll retry the Restart vs Shutdown test and report results.
In safe mode, the problem of restart not working is persisting. Clicking on Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Restart will reliably hang, leaving just a standard "OS shutting down" message.
Any suggs on how to study at what point the OS is hanging while it is goinug down in "restart" mode but will not hang while going down in "shutdown" mode?
In safe mode, the problem with resolving names to IP addresses also persists. Running nslookup produces a message: "DNS request timed out. timeout was 2 seconds. *** Can't find server name for address x.x.x.x: Timed out". Perhaps this is due to SP2 and the network config wizard needs to be rerun. Done. Checked properties for Tcp/Ip, and the settings are proper. In the Network Connections window, the Local Area Connection has a status of Connected, Firewalled. Pinging 127.0.0.1 succeeds. Pinging the ip address of the local NIC succeeds. Pinging the default gateway succeeds. Pinging the outward facing NIC on the network firewall succeeds. Pinging the .1 box on that network succeeds. Pinging the DNS succeeds. Using ipconfig /all to check the IP addresses of the DNS, just to double check:
The first tuple was wrong! Fixed that. Resolving names using nslookup now works! It's amazing what a little break, like sleep, will do for solving a problem ...
Proceeding with windows update, now that I can. There are alot of updates (21 updates, 61MB). Even though I have a fairly fast line to the Internet, this is going to take a while, eg: about an hour.
After the updates complete, I'll retry the Restart vs Shutdown test and report results.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
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ASKER
The first wave of windowsupdate-s have finished. There was an innocent little box on the lower right corner of the screen saying all done and want to restart. I clicked Restart. The machine goes down, and now the standard OS message "Windows is shutting down" is displayed on screen. There is no disk activity. Pressing the caps lock key will toggle the corresponding light on and off. About 10 seconds later, now it won't. The machine is hung. Forcing a shutdown by power off. Power back on. OS splash screen is displayed. Windows is starting up. Login screen. Log in to an administrative account. Loading your personal settings. Account is up. Initialization completes promptly.
Will the machine shutdown nicely? Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Shutdown. "Windows is shutting down". 7 seconds later, monitor turns off, and machine is down. So at least this behavior has not changed.
Will the machine restart nicely? Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Restart. "Windows is shutting down". After about 15 seconds, all of the Lock keys become unresponsive, and the light for the numlock key sticks on. Forcing shutdown by power off. So, unfortunately, this behaviour has not changed.
Continuing the windows update procedure, and listening for suggs on how to better measure where and what XP is hanging on while restarting, but not shutting down ...
Will the machine shutdown nicely? Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Shutdown. "Windows is shutting down". 7 seconds later, monitor turns off, and machine is down. So at least this behavior has not changed.
Will the machine restart nicely? Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Restart. "Windows is shutting down". After about 15 seconds, all of the Lock keys become unresponsive, and the light for the numlock key sticks on. Forcing shutdown by power off. So, unfortunately, this behaviour has not changed.
Continuing the windows update procedure, and listening for suggs on how to better measure where and what XP is hanging on while restarting, but not shutting down ...
ASKER
Just got your suggs. Will read through them. Thanks!!
ASKER
Booting into Safe Mode. Following your procedure. Found an error in my work before saving the changes! Ran "Minimal" file. "Information in C:\...\Minimal.reg has been successfully entered into the registry."
Shutting down (not restarting, yet!). Powering up. Windows splash screen. Login to an administrative account. Initialization completes. Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Restart. "Windows is shutting down ..."
System becomes hung at about the same length of time and location.
Next?
Shutting down (not restarting, yet!). Powering up. Windows splash screen. Login to an administrative account. Initialization completes. Start -> Turn Off Computer -> Restart. "Windows is shutting down ..."
System becomes hung at about the same length of time and location.
Next?
ASKER
Completed the .net update. Shutting down to apply. Power up. Booting. Up. Logged in to an administrative account. Rerunning windows update. Strange, what appears to be the same update to .net V1.1 sp1 is presented as being needed and available. I'll take it.
ASKER
Up. Reran windowsupdate, and there are now no more updates. Done.
ASKER
Btw: I ran hardware diagnostics on the computer, and all checked out fine.
Found this on the Dell support forum that sounds like it directly relates:
Q: On a Dim 8250, the computer hangs up when i try to restart it? Have already reinstalled XP and service packs.
A: Did you, at some time, upgrade the BIOS to version A04 using the hard disk version of the BIOS? Since is one of the symptoms of a faulty BIOS upgrade that affected the 8250 about a year ago. Although Dell replaced the faulty hard drive version of A04 on its support site, it can only be fixed by reflashing the BIOS using the floppy disk version of the BIOS upgrade or, if you don't have a floppy disk drive, by using a more complicated procedure. You might try using the Advanced Forum Search to see the extensive dicussions about this problem that have occurred on these forums in the past.
Although I did reflash the Bios, it was done using the within-the-OS version of the tool, rather than reflash from floppy.
Here's the link to the original source:
http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=sw_winxp&message.id=130604&query.id=126455#M130604
Done. Replaced version A04 with version A04 ...
Rebooting. Up. Restart, ---> Guess what: It restarted!!! Aw Right!!
Apparently, the preferred and less troublesome method of reflashing the Bios is to use a floppy, not the OS version of the tool.
... my work is done here.
Found this on the Dell support forum that sounds like it directly relates:
Q: On a Dim 8250, the computer hangs up when i try to restart it? Have already reinstalled XP and service packs.
A: Did you, at some time, upgrade the BIOS to version A04 using the hard disk version of the BIOS? Since is one of the symptoms of a faulty BIOS upgrade that affected the 8250 about a year ago. Although Dell replaced the faulty hard drive version of A04 on its support site, it can only be fixed by reflashing the BIOS using the floppy disk version of the BIOS upgrade or, if you don't have a floppy disk drive, by using a more complicated procedure. You might try using the Advanced Forum Search to see the extensive dicussions about this problem that have occurred on these forums in the past.
Although I did reflash the Bios, it was done using the within-the-OS version of the tool, rather than reflash from floppy.
Here's the link to the original source:
http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=sw_winxp&message.id=130604&query.id=126455#M130604
Done. Replaced version A04 with version A04 ...
Rebooting. Up. Restart, ---> Guess what: It restarted!!! Aw Right!!
Apparently, the preferred and less troublesome method of reflashing the Bios is to use a floppy, not the OS version of the tool.
... my work is done here.
ASKER
Goofy question, though: What effect did the above registry change have on things?
And now that things are working well, should I restore the Services registry settings?
And now that things are working well, should I restore the Services registry settings?
Thanks! did you solve the problem ?
ASKER
Yes. There was apparently a problem with the Bios which was solved by reflashing it from a floppy. Although I had reflashed the Bios to the same rev using the within-the-OS version of the reflash utility, reflashing using a floppy seems to have special powers. After this reflash, the machine restarted fine, and it still shut down fine. When I delivered the computer, I mentioned this little "challenge" to my customer and she said something to the effect: "Oh, yeah, it did used to do that. You fixed it? Great!"