P35-DS4 Extremely Long Power On (1/2 hour)

[drickerby]

I built a system near two years ago around a P35-DS4. I have always fought with overheating issues with it, but it has been stable for at least 8 months now.

Recently it has started to hang at the POST screen. I thought it was just freezing there, but yesterday when trying to fix, I gave up in frustration and went to take a nap with it frozen at the POST screen.  I awoke to the magical windows boot tones some 30-45 minutes later. I have now confirmed that this slooooooow response takes place at the POST screen whether I am trying to get into the BIOS settings menu or booting to Windows.

I will tell you that this is a windows XP SP 3 machine, but I don't think that matters - as once it gets to the Windows boot screen, everything is fine and speedy. I have reflashed the Bios, but the problem remains.

Obviously I have a hardware problem that has developed (I made no software changes prior to this issue arising). I suspect that it is due to the heat issue, as it is August in New England, and the computer has been running on some hot days (although I keep speedfan running and watch the temp, and it never got above mid 50s C). Unfortunately, I cannot just leave this CPU running because of the heat issue (after a day or two it will always creep up to 60C at which time it crashes hard).

My question to you fine folks is whether anyone has any suggestions as to what kind of failure would cause a computer to take 30 minutes to power on, but then run just fine?

Thanks so much in advance for your wisdom!!

[onemilimeter]

My question to you fine folks is whether anyone has any suggestions as to what kind of failure would cause a computer to take 30 minutes to power on, but then run just fine?

I have had this experience in the past too. I got two computers in my lab and both of them were on 24/7. I tried not to power off them because they would take ages to power on (15 minutes to hours or more). Last month, one of them refused to power on for several days and eventually we found out the main culprit was the PSU. After changing a new power supply, everything goes well until now and it can be powered up instantly. Another one, however, still has the same problem because we've no budget to replace its PSU.

P/S: After reading your problem again I think my problem is slightly different because I didn't see the POST screen at all.

[Dark Mantis]

The chances are it is a BIOS issue. It is probably looking for something eg floppy drive, non existant drive etc that isn't there and when it times out it then moves on to boot as normal. You need to go through your BIOS and disable anything that you don't use. Don't leave things on "auto" like the discover drives etc.

[onemilimeter]

Agree with DM... You may go to Gigabyte website and see if there is a newer BIOS.