Restart = System hang

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I have a Gigabyte GA-7DXR MB that simply refuses to restart. To rule out the OS, I booted to a Win 98 floppy. From the A: prompt, pressed CTL+ALT+DEL to restart the system. The screen goes blank and the HDD LED glows constant - and that is where it sits. Rebooting from Windows 98 and XP yields the same result.

This system is about 2 years old, has done this "trick" since day one, and has no other problems. It is just aggravating in that I can't figure out the problem and the fact installing new software is a pain. Obviously, nothing mission critical. I'm only posting in an attempt to see if I can learn something - and to tax your brains.

Athlon Thunderbird 1.4 CPU
2 Maxtor IDE drives
1 TDK CD/RW (tried disconnecting all but the primary HDD - same result)
MSI AGP 4X Vid
512 MB PC2100/DDR266 Kingston
No over clocking - base BIOS settings
RAID not in use
Promise disabled (tried enabling, no change)
Flashed BIOS to F10
Tried 2 different Power Supplies - same result

That is all the detail I can come up with from memory. If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them. If specific models are needed for vid, HDDs, etc., to diag, I can get those later.

Thanks for the feedback.

Look in the 'Event Viewer' and see if there is anything under the 'System' section.

[wallie_x]

It's been so long ago, but their was something about the 1.4ghz T-Bird. And a certain chipset. Does that mobo have a Via chipset by chance?
Also, are you sure the HD is set to pri/mstr instead of cable sellect?

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The chiset is AMD 761™ north bridge & VIA 686B south bridge.

The HDDs are set using the Master/Slave settings, and I have tried disconnecting the second drive and the CD/RW with no success.

One thing I had not considered was trying a different CPU. I have a 1.0 Duron I think is compatible with that board. That would be something to try.

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Thanks for the ideas. None of the additional things I tried made any difference. The event viewer offered no insight either. The box is working, so I guess I'll just be thankful for that.