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sigkappu

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Error Loading OS Believed to be due to Hardware Problem

Had a machine that we believed to have a bad hard drive.  Purchase a 120 GB Western Digital Hard Drive and put it into the machine. We used the software provided with the drive to format the drive.  When we tried to install Windows 2000, we get the message Error Loading OS after the install when we are trying to boot to it.  We also tried using fdisk/mbr to try and take care of any possible drive errors.  We also flashed the BIOS. We took this hard drive out and put it into another machine to see if hard drive was bad.  On the second machine, we were able to format and install Windows 2000.  Windows install was sucessful and windows worked perfectly.  When we moved the hard drive back to the original machine and tried to boot, we again recieved the message "Error loading OS".  Any ideas what could be wrong with this machine?  Thanks for you help.
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wesly_chen
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Hi,

   First, check your original machine's motherboard model to see if it support the maximum hard disk capacity more than 120GB.
You can see the HDD capacity match or not during the boot up or go to BIOS setting to check it.

   Second, put another hard disk into the original machine and install OS on it to see if it can boot up ok or not. If not, then something
wrong with the hard disk cable or motherboard.

Wesly
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Some brands of systems have a hidden partition on the disk, and must access it to install any OS on it; or have a bios which does that.
So, is it a known brand? Compaq and Medion  are known for this
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sigkappu

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I have also replaced the cable, it is a friends cpu, and he had some one build it for him.  The drive shows up in the bios, and as the correct size.  The notherboars is a Giga-byte GA-8IDXH.
then, i suppose you could have : bad ram, or bad motherboard, so test the Ram first :

memtest86+ get it here : http://www.memtest.org/

you can also try a PCI hard disk controller :

http://www.dealtime.co.uk/xPC-Promise_Promise_Ultra_ATA_100_TX2_PCI_Hard_Disk_Controller
Hi,
   You might want to upgrade the BIOS. Check the following URL:
http://www.giga-byte.com/Motherboard/Support/BIOS/BIOS_GA-7VRXP.htm

   Second, there is built-in Promise RAID controller, you can download the RAID driver here too:
http://www.giga-byte.com/Motherboard/Support/Driver/Driver_GA-7VRXP.htm

Wesly
memory test passed, newest bios updates installed.
Hi,

   From the Giga-byte website, motherboard GA-8IDXH only certified Windows XP.
http://www.giga-byte.com/Motherboard/Products/Certification_GA-8IDXH.htm
So you might want to try Windows XP.....

Wesly

Tried XP with the same result, that was what was originally on the PC.
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nobus
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Tried other IDE port some time ago...Still recieve "Error Loading OS" during boot cycle
Replaced Motherboard...all seems to work ok now.