I recently bought a SATA (Maxtor 200 GB) drive and Promise SATA card to
upgrade my computer. Did a clean install! All went well until Windows
started updating (turned on automatic updates) The first update was fine
with no problems but the second round of updates caused the computer to go
into a never ending cycle of rebooting after I clicked OK to restart the
system. Wiped the system clean and started over with the exact same
results. I can plug in the old drive that still has the old installation on
it and the computer runs fine. This is a Maxtor IDE drive with the same OS
installation which has not given any problems. Wanted more space and a
faster drive so I bought the SATA equipment. Any help would be appreciated!

Specs:
Windows XP Professional SP2 (OEM)
Gigabyte GA-7NF-RZ motherboard
1.0 GB of DDR 3200 RAM
AMD Sempron 3000 CPU
Maxtor SATA 200 GB HDD
FDD
LG CDRW at 52X
LG DVD-RW at 16X

TIA

"10_4" <not_one@any.org> wrote:

Windows XP has a default setting to "restart on failure" and it
appears that something is triggering a system failure class error
condition when you use that new hard drive.

Can you boot into Safe Mode with the SATA drive? To start Windows XP
in Safe Mode turn on the computer and start tapping the F8 key rapidly
just as soon as the first information of any kind shows on the screen.
Keep tapping rapidly until the Windows XP Startup Menu appears and
choose Safe Mode from the menu.

(note: The actual time to press the F8 key is in the interval between
the completion of the BIOS Power On Self Test and the appearance of
the Windows XP Startup Splash Screen. However modern computers boot
so fast at this stage that it is best to just start tapping F8 during
the POST and keep it up. If the Windows XP Startup Splash Screen
shows then you have missed the "trigger" period for accessing the
Startup Menu.).

If you can get the machine running in Safe Mode then open Control
Panel - System - Advanced and click on the Settings button in the
Startup and Recovery (bottom) section. In the Startup and Recovery
window click on the checkbox for "Automatically restart" to clear it
then click on Apply and OK as needed to exit.

You could also check the Event Viewer for any records of your previous
failed bootups while you are running in Safe Mode. Right-click on My
Computer, select Manage, expand the Event Viewer category and browse
through each of the 3 subcategories to find red-flagged error records
whose date and time stamps correspond to your failed bootups.
Double-click on an error record to see the details of that error.

And finally if you are running okay in Safe Mode you could use System
Restore to set the computer back to the most recent restore point that
is prior to the intallation of the "killer" update. That would fix
the problem, at least temporarily, but we really should get at the
underlying cause so as to fix it properly.

And if you cannot get into Safe Mode with the SATA drive then your
next option would be to reinstall XP on it and to be sure to turn off
the automatic restarts before going to Windows Update.

Good luck

Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

In memory of a dear friend Alex Nichol MVP
http://aumha.org/alex.htm

"Ron Martell" <ron.martell@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:c508k1hor0mjqr2737pv4cutq482d6066d@4ax.com...
Thanks Ron,

I failed to mention I had already tried booting into Safe Mode and that
would not work either. Could not get passed the rebooting. There is an
option in the menu where Safe Mode is to disable "Automatically Restart" and
I tried that as well. Finally, I re-installed and when it Auto Updated the
second round the rebooting started again. Could not get into Safe Mode that
time either????? I have turned off Auto Updates but it keeps nagging me to
turn it on. If I understand it correctly MS is requiring XP users to turn
on AU within a certain period of time or the system is disabled. My
software is legal so I am not worried about anything on that end but I need
to nip this rebooting thing in the bud!

Thanks,
Roger

"Ron Martell" <ron.martell@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:c508k1hor0mjqr2737pv4cutq482d6066d@4ax.com...
As another note I have disabled Auto Restart and will turn on AU to see
where this takes me.

Ron, I appreciate your help!

Roger