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sytaylor
May 28th, 2003, 17:38
this is really strange, ever since i go tmy new hard drive and installed windows on it, its seemed to have a problem where it doesnt like doing mroe that one thing at once..

strange for this system...

OS: WinXP Professional 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build #2600) CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2200+ (T-Bred) , 1.80 GHz Video: Plug and Play on nVidia GeForce4 Ti 4400 (1280x960x32bpp 85Hz) Sound: C-Media Wave Device Memory: Used: 191/512MB Uptime: 20m 50s 78ms HD: Free: [C:New Sys Dri] 8.19/10.70 GB [D:Storage] 80.74/81.09 GB [E:Programs] 18.43/20.00 GB [G:STORAGE] 3.32/74.53 GB [H:] 1.18/18.55 GB [I:] 0.62/9.39 GB

:geek:

The drive in question is a 120gb western digital JB, im convinced its that, but it could also be my old drive (the i drive) which has been unreadable the last few times ive booted with the exception of this one (and things are a lot better but not perfect).
Trotterwatch
May 28th, 2003, 17:44
Ensure you have DMA enabled on the drive. Can't give a better answer as I'm in work at the moment.
sytaylor
May 28th, 2003, 17:57
you mean DMA can be disabled?!

i thought it came as standard with drives? :cry:
Trotterwatch
May 28th, 2003, 18:00
Well drives can be put into PIO mode as well as DMA. PIO (forgot what it stands for now) must use the CPU before it accesses memory, whereas DMA stands for Direct Memory Access, and can access memory bypassing the CPU

But needless to say yes DMA can be disabled, and it can cause quite a performance loss when it is, as everything is routed through the CPU.

... y'know if I've got something wrong there it will be pointed out and although I will feel stupid, I will learn! :P
sytaylor
May 28th, 2003, 18:01
thats set in the bios right? hmm ill have to check that in a bit, but i doubt thats the case
Trotterwatch
May 28th, 2003, 18:05
Can be set in the Bios, as well as within Windows :)

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/tech/storage/IDE-DMA.mspx
sytaylor
May 28th, 2003, 19:15
i think we're gettin somewhere, in my device manager one of them was set to pio only...

now its running in mutli word DMA mode 2.. which sounds wrong considering the others are running in dma 5...

help again!

(edit.. rather than another post)

ok, reebooted, its running in DMA mode (albeit dma2) and im still getting pauses across all apps and in windows itself every 30 seconds or so :getlost:
Trotterwatch
May 28th, 2003, 19:28
AFAIK Windows will always pick the best DMA mode possible, though obviously it can make mistakes (I would assume).

What DMA mode you can use depends on the drive, cable and bios settings also. If you have a Via chipset or suchlike then installing the latest Via Hyperion (formerly called 4-1) drivers can help.
sytaylor
May 28th, 2003, 19:30
i think its go to the site and trawl the faq's time...
Trotterwatch
May 28th, 2003, 19:31
ok, reebooted, its running in DMA mode (albeit dma2) and im still getting pauses across all apps and in windows itself every 30 seconds or so

Use Task Manager to see what processes are taking up most CPU time, suspects could be things such as Virus checkers running at aggressive settings.

Try looking at eventvwr.msc (accessible easily via the run command), are there any services that seem to be hanging and entering the start state almost immediately.

A reformat is a last resort, I wouldn't go that far just yet to be honest.
RJARRRPCGP
May 28th, 2003, 19:31
That don't look good. Looks like you should back up the installation archives for the anti-virus and drivers to the second hard disk drive, delete all partitions on the first hard disk drive, repartition the first hard disk drive, reformat the first hard disk drive and re-install Windows XP on the first (primary master) hard disk drive then copy files back to the first hard disk drive from your second hard disk drive. Then of course, re-install the Via
Hyperion 4 in 1 drivers (if IO chipset is Via).
sytaylor
May 28th, 2003, 22:21
the diagnostic tools from westerndigital.com found nothing wrong with the drive.. next thing its tech support *JOY*
The Khan Artist
May 28th, 2003, 22:38
I had a problem like that once, which was fixed by making it a single drive on the IDE channel. For some reason it did not like working if there was another drive on the channel. Never figured out the cause.
sytaylor
May 29th, 2003, 19:03
Originally posted by The Khan Artist
I had a problem like that once, which was fixed by making it a single drive on the IDE channel. For some reason it did not like working if there was another drive on the channel. Never figured out the cause.

thanks kahn, ill keep that in mind :)
RJARRRPCGP
May 29th, 2003, 20:30
Originally posted by The Khan Artist
I had a problem like that once, which was fixed by making it a single drive on the IDE channel. For some reason it did not like working if there was another drive on the channel. Never figured out the cause.

Yes, I'm aware that can occur too.

For a precaution, I *always* have only
one hard disk drive attached to IDE connector 1.
sytaylor
June 1st, 2003, 14:30
nope thats not it either.. reformat, and if that doesnt work its gotta go back :getlost:
ickle_moi
April 21st, 2004, 01:57
try upgrading the via drivers if it is a via chipset (or other drivers for your board)
and check that the drive is in udma mode 5 or 6 (5 being 100mbps and 6 being 133 i think)
my 4x cd writer uses multi word dma 2 (whatever that is)

*edit* opps didnt realise this was nearly a year old