New Computer Blues

I try to avoid rants with a lot of technical terms, but today it just can't be helped. So if you've never built a computer or aren't familiar with the hassles and terms surrounding such an action, then today's rant might be better skipped.

In celebration of a raise in the last few months and a nice profit sharing check, I decided it was time to upgrade my rig. So I hopped on NewEgg and found some pretty good deals on the hardware I'd been looking at and ordered everything on the spot. The prices weren't the cheapest I've seen on the net, but they weren't far off, and I've done a lot of business with NewEgg over the years. Also, I have had to RMA things to them in the past and had no problems. So I know that they are reliable and easy to work with.

Well, all the stuff finally came in last night. So I spent the latter part of the evening assembling all my hardware. I wanted to stay up and finish, but I had big plans that wouldn't be quick, so I called it a night. Today I woke up and got right to work. Installed Windows XP, downloaded all my service packs and updates, and then started doing some research. I wanted some software to created a hard drive image so that I can rebuild my box quickly in the future. But I didn't want to be out another $60 for Norton Ghost. I ended up finding a little program called Self Image. It could create images from within Windows, and it had an executable that could be loaded onto a BartsPE boot disk. I installed it and started creating my image after I finished loading my standard software and settings.

Next I wanted a way to take snapshots of my registry when I installed programs. I plan on installing software to a separate hard drive, and when I restore my image I don't want to have to reinstall everything. So I found a program called CompareIT. I just export my registry before I install the software, and again afterwards. Run the program and then output the results to a text file. I can then rename that file to .reg and add the registry header in and I have a registry file that I can just click when I need to "reinstall" the software. Not the cleanest method in the world, but it works, its cheap, and I'll be able to use the software for other things as well.

Then I decided it was time to start installing stuff. That's when it all went wrong. It started with my DVD burner. All of a sudden it stopped reading disks. It had been working just fine all morning. I uninsulated it and did a hardware scan and it came back still unusable. Hours later after cable changes, using boot CD's to test the drive, and many other failed tactics, it turned out to be that I had to force PIO mode on my IDE channel instead of letting it auto detect. Then it worked, great!

Tired of working all day long, I wanted to play some. So I decided to install Titan Quest to play with some buddies that were online. I did my registry export, and started the install on my second hard drive. It made it about 75% of the way into the install, then it began spewing "delayed write" errors. I stopped the install, rebooted, and tried again. It resumed at the same file, and immediately started getting the errors again. I didn't want to believe it was my new hard drive, so I checked the disk thinking it was a scratch. The disk had some smudges, but no scratches. I decided I'd try to copy the files off my old computer, but got the same errors. Now things are looking bad. More reboots, and a few tries later I decide as a last resort to reformat my new hard drive again as a desperate attempt of hope.

When I opened up the disk manager, I noticed that my second hard drive said healthy, but no longer showed what its file system was. Both partitions on my other drive displayed NTFS correctly. So here I am hoping that this format works, or I get to use NewEgg's RMA system again. At least I know they are quick with return items.

Is it just me, or does everyone run into crazy wierd problems when building a new PC? This stuff should just hook up and work, I payed good money for it to do so! Well, wish me luck, I started a full format instead of a quick format on my 200Gb drive and don't know when it will end to see if it worked.