longfangs

Right, I'm too angry to find out if this has been asked before. Sorry.

Specs:
Motherboard(new): AsRock ConRoe945G-DVI

Hard Drive: Seagate 250gb

Dvd: Philips (not sure what model)

Ram: 1gb Patriot 533mhz

Problem: Every time we start the system, we get "Error: Dynamic Drive Overlay not loaded". It asks to insert either a boot diskette or boot cd. We put the cd (all we have) in, and the system just sits there. We left it on for a half hour, and nothing happened. We've done everthing we can think of; reformatted the drive, reinstalled windows, changing the BIOS LBA setup. All of it. Help, please, before I decide to take a hammer to the system

blackduck30

have a look here at the seagate site and see if this helps

Click Here

.

longfangs

Update:

I tried turning off the DDO option for the hard drive, and reinstalled windows. After the install, I let it restart to finish windows setup, but it just sat at the "press any key to boot from cd....." screen for a while, then I turned it off. There's a few things I'm going to do tomorrow, but, if there are any more ideas, please throw them out there. I'm going to sleep now.

linderman

first off all you have no need for DDO (yuck) with any motherboard after 2002.
I would zero fill the drive (wipe and erase all data) then do a fresh install of windows.

You will lose all data on the drive; but with a DDO failure thats the end result anyway! http://dban.sourceforge.net/

boot N nuke zero fill is free but slow the process takes about 45 mintes per 20 gigs but this will eliminate the DDO, dont put it back on when reinstalling windows, if your windows CD doesnt have Service Pack one or higher then simply slipstream your disk!

here is the how to for slipstreaming as I am "assuming" your need for DDO was the fact the OS couldnt see the 250 gig drive ??????????
http://www.techsupportforum.com/hard...ng-win-cd.html

longfangs

Update No. 2:

I've tried deleting the DDO off the hard drive, and resetting the MBR. While this seems to have fixed the DDO error problem, it brings up another. Now, whenever I try to finish installing Windows, the system sits at either the "please press any key to boot from cd...." or a blank screen with a blinking cursor.

After the DDO/MBR wipe, I let it boot to the hard drive, and it gave me a "NTLDR is missing" error. I'm assuming it's caused by not having an OS on the drive, but with my luck, it's not.

I've tried the Boot n Nuke, put the iso on a cd, but it doesn't seem to want to work. It sounds like the system is trying to run it, but it just sits at the blank screen with the cursor. I'll try to find a floppy disk to stick the program on, and see if that works, but I get the feeling this isn't the problem anymore.

linderman

I have seen your problem MANY times before the boot & nuke cures it along with a frsh install of windoz

longfangs

This is Longfangs' g/f posting.

We seem to be having trouble burning DBAN and having the computer recognize it as a boot disk. I read the readme and I'm pretty sure it's the software we're using to burn it (which is just the windows burning thing).

I'm going to search for a program that can burn ISOs correctly, but I'd really appreciate some recommendations in that department. =)

Thanks for the help thus far. ;)

longfangs

Update #3

We got DBAN running on the computer; however, the time remaining says 100+ hours and it keeps increasing. Now, I'm wondering if this is just an overly exaggerated length of time, or if there's something wrong... It just started going down again, then jumped to 270 hours...

Excuse the double post. It wouldn't allow me to edit the previous post.

linderman

I would say ignore the time >>>> I would expect it to take about 13 hours


by the way : if you google for Burn4free or burnatonce


they are both freeware burning programs that will accomadate ISO burning sooner or later you will need that again; guaranteed!


hopefully by morning Boot & nuke will be done


http://www.shareup.com/Burn4Free-download-7418.html

http://www.softpedia.com/progDownloa...load-6501.html

longfangs

...We're coming up on about 24 hrs, and it's only at 17.63%....le sigh. Is there a faster way?

linderman

you could try the zero fill utility the hard drive makers have for their drives ?????


i will see what I can find

linderman

an option would be to abort the boot n nuke and try the

Seagate Disk Wizard Starter Edition

once you boot and launch the disk wizard; you will find a zero fill or drive eraser program. Make sure you dont use the big drive enabler or any of that big drive prepartion stuff that is DDO >>>> avoid that
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/sup...ads/discwizard


PS ***** I dont know that it's faster; but I would expect so as its not DOD approved nor do they refer to it as a "secure" process. The secure part of the process is what takes sooooo long.

hwm54112

See hard-drive-diagnostic-utilities for manufacturer's utilities.

If you're having a problem burning the iso, try the UBCD at bottom under "No Floppy". There are step by step instructions for several cd burners

linderman

info (there is a DDO removal section in there)

http://www.seagate.com/support/kb/di...wse_maint.html

longfangs

We got it! The drive's fixed, it sped up after around 40%....now we just need to find the drivers for the usb ports for the motherboard. It doesn't seem to want to recognize anything that gets plugged in. One problem after another Thanks for the help with the drive guys

linderman

if you have service pack 2 installed for windows xp you dont need motherboard drivers for your USB hub???? are there any yeallow exclamation marks in the device manager ?



you could take the easy lane and get a USB controller card; I have had to do that before with an uncooperative board, after spending two days trying to get out of USB 1.0 speeds, I threw in the towel. got a card installed and sent that machine out the door! yuck