Question : Problem: ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe BIOS upgrade problem

Here are my machine specs:

Windows XP SP2
AthlonXP 3200
ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe mobo (with BIOS 1013)
1GB of DDR RAM set at "Aggressive" timing
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
Soundblaster Audigy 2
Plextor DVD-ROM drive

I have 3 hard drives:

1 Western Digital Raptor 34GB for Windows
1 Western Digital Raptor split into 2 partitions - 1 for Games and 1 for Page File.
1x Maxtor 34GB for backup using Acronis True Image.

They are not setup as RAID.


My problem seems to be related to the recent upgrade to BIOS 13 for my board.

When I start from a cold boot I have noticed a very dramatic pause between the Windows XP loading screen and the actual Windows logon screen appearing.

I checked Event Viewer and found the following "Information" message which only occurs at a cold boot:

[COLOR=Red]Event Type:      Information
Event Source:      Application Popup
Event Category:      None
Event ID:      26
Date:            05/12/2004
Time:            08:19:22
User:            N/A
Computer:      FROTHY-FLL2DFPB
Description:
Application popup:  : Machine Check:

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 00 00 38 00 03 00 9c 00   ..8...œ.
0008: 00 00 00 00 1a 00 00 40   .......@
0010: 03 00 00 00 1a 00 00 40   .......@
0018: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0028: 01 00 00 00 01 00 00 00   ........
0030: a0 c6 df 1f a3 da c4 01    Æß.£ÚÄ.
0038: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0040: 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0048: f7 ff 00 00 00 00 00 fe   ÷ÿ.....þ
0050: f7 ff ff ff 0a 00 00 00   ÷ÿÿÿ....
0058: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........[/COLOR]

This is always followed by this:

[COLOR=Red]Event Type:      Information
Event Source:      Application Popup
Event Category:      None
Event ID:      26
Date:            05/12/2004
Time:            08:19:22
User:            N/A
Computer:      FROTHY-FLL2DFPB
Description:
Application popup:  : Machine Check: Regs

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 00 00 08 00 03 00 6c 00   ......l.
0008: 00 00 00 00 1a 00 00 40   .......@
0010: 00 00 00 00 1a 00 00 40   .......@
0018: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0028: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........[/COLOR]

I have searched all over the 'net for a solution to this problem but most people think it is because my motherboard is trying to give my AMD processor some Intel-specific commands?

Alongwith these error messages, I've noticed a distinct drop in performance from my SATA Raptor drives.

This was confirmed this morning when I received, for the first time, the following error messages:

[COLOR=Red]Event Type:      Error
Event Source:      si3112r
Event Category:      None
Event ID:      9
Date:            05/12/2004
Time:            08:20:33
User:            N/A
Computer:      FROTHY-FLL2DFPB
Description:
The device, \Device\Scsi\si3112r1, did not respond within the timeout period.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 00 00 10 00 01 00 68 00   ......h.
0008: 00 00 00 00 09 00 04 c0   .......À
0010: 01 01 00 50 00 00 00 00   ...P....
0018: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0028: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0030: 00 00 00 00 07 00 00 00   ........[/COLOR]

Then I receive this one 4 times:

[COLOR=Red]Event Type:      Warning
Event Source:      Disk
Event Category:      None
Event ID:      51
Date:            05/12/2004
Time:            08:20:33
User:            N/A
Computer:      FROTHY-FLL2DFPB
Description:
An error was detected on device \Device\Harddisk0\D during a paging operation.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 03 00 68 00 01 00 b6 00   ..h...¶.
0008: 00 00 00 00 33 00 04 80   ....3..€
0010: 2d 01 00 00 00 00 00 00   -.......
0018: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0028: 5e 18 00 00 00 00 00 00   ^.......
0030: ff ff ff ff 03 00 00 00   ÿÿÿÿ....
0038: 40 00 00 0e 00 00 00 00   @.......
0040: 97 20 0a 12 42 03 00 40   — ..B..@
0048: 00 10 00 00 0a 00 00 00   ........
0050: 00 00 00 00 d8 62 fe 85   ....Øbþ…
0058: 00 00 00 00 70 5e fe 85   ....p^þ…
0060: 40 3a 65 86 af bc 3c 04   @:e†¯¼<.
0068: 28 00 04 3c bc af 00 00   (..<¼¯..
0070: 08 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0078: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0080: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........
0088: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........[/COLOR]

Other than the poor disk performance and the long pause from a cold boot, my PC works perfectly fine, but I'm a control freak when it comes to my PC so I hate having any sort of error messages!

If anyone could help me out I would be very very grateful.

Answer : Problem: ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe BIOS upgrade problem

Sounds like it's running diagnostics each boot. How about boot to safe mode, restart into normal mode? Have you also run a chdsk or defrag?