GA-H61M-USB3-B3 (Rev 1.0): Self-restarts sometimes after Win7 restart

[Karlston]

The setup...

GA-H61M-USB3-B3 rev 1.0 with latest F5 BIOS. Optimized Defaults loaded after BIOS upgrade.

BIOS Health page shows all voltages, temperatures, and fan speeds to be fine.

WD WD10EARS 1TB SATA HD (green) in SATA2_0 port, Samsung DVDRW in SATA2_2 port. Boot priority is CDROM/Hard Disk/Disabled.
Single 2GB DDR3 SIMM in DDR3_1 slot. Passed 3 passes of Memtest86++ v4.20 without errors.
Intel i3-2100 CPU.

Fresh install of Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 x64 on the above HD, with BIOS SATA AHCI Mode set to "AHCI" *before* the install.

All MB chipset, LAN, video, USB3 drivers installed. Didn't install the Realtek audio drivers, sound works OK with the MS audio drivers. No devices in Device Manager with (!).

The problem...

Sometimes (~50/50) when restarting from within Windows, the PC will restart again just after getting to the "Starting Windows" message, or at the same point it will power off (fans stop) and then power on again.

If it does either of the above, sometimes Windows presents the "Windows Error Recovery" screen with "Launch Startup Repair (Recommended)" or "Start Windows Normally" options, or sometimes it will boot normally to the Windows 7 logon screen. If I select "Start Windows Normally", it launches Windows fine.

It seems to take longer than necessary to start booting from the HD. Looks like some details about the drives appears (AHCI related?), screen clears, then the "Loading Operating System..." line appears, and then underneath that more '.' appear roughly 1 per second, with no hard drive (or DVD) access until the cursor is below (IIRC) the "s" of "System", roughly 20 seconds.

Gut feel is that it's somehow AHCI mode related. Can't prove it, just a feeling. I know there can be problems turning on AHCI *after* an OS install, but is it possible to revert to IDE mode without any issues?

Ironically this build is to replace a friend's problematic old PC. 

[Dark Mantis]

Hi and welcome to the Gigabyte Forum.

The first problem that I notice is that you have a "Green" disk drive as a boot drive. This is not recommended and will give you all sorts of problems as they are designed soley for data storage.  I would advise you to swap it with a Western Digital Black for booting. As a purely interim measure you could try adding a HDD delay in the BIOS.

[Karlston]

Thanks for the welcome and help...

Can you explain why the WD green drives aren't suitable for boot drives? I have 2 other Win7 systems which boot fine from WD 500GB and 1TB Green drives. Is it the Intellipark issue? Performance?

OK, back to the problem, have tried setting the BIOS HDD Delay to 5 seconds, same symptoms when restarting from within Windows.

Then I replaced the MS AHCI driver with the latest one from Intel, same symptoms still.

But, grasping at straws, I pulled the DVD-RW (Samsung SH-223C) SATA cable from the MB. The PC powered up fine, very quick HD boot into Windows. Three Windows restarts have all succeeded with very quick HD booting, and without any pesky self-restarts and sloth-like HD booting. Yay...  

Looks like it was a problem with the Samsung DVDRW, its SATA cable, or the MB SATA port. Will try swapping those one at a time to identify the cause.

EDIT:    I spoke too soon, a 4th windows restart (still without the DVDRW) did the same self-restart twice before booting into Windows.  Will do a Windows 7 reinstall tomorrow, this time with BIOS "SATA AHCI Mode" set to the default "IDE".

[Dark Mantis]

The problem with trying to use the Green drives as boot drives is that they are designed to be low power devices and as such are always trying to "power down". They are only slow drives at the best of times as they don't need the speed of a boot drive as they are only for storage. So basically they are slow to start, slow during use and always looking to go into power saving mode.

[Karlston]

Tried setting SATA AHCI Mode to "IDE" and reinstalled Windows 7, but it still will self-restart occasionally after doing a restart from within Windows. 

Sometimes after a Windows restart the MB will do a cold restart, is that normal practice? By cold restart I mean effectively powering down the motherboard, for example the fans stop completely before starting up again.

Any other suggestions before I return this frustrating board as faulty and get another brand and chipset?  I get the feeling the Intel H61 chipset has some problems, or the H61 chipset is just too damn new for MB motherboard makers to have got the BIOS right yet.

The problem with trying to use the Green drives as boot drives is that they are designed to be low power devices and as such are always trying to "power down". They are only slow drives at the best of times as they don't need the speed of a boot drive as they are only for storage. So basically they are slow to start, slow during use and always looking to go into power saving mode.

Sorry, these drives are plenty fast for me. Boots quickly enough, file opening/saving are quick. Even after hours of inactivity, there are no noticeable delays when recommencing use.

We might have to agree to disagree. 

[Aussie Allan]

 Hiya Karlston..... Aussie Allan here.........Do you want a second opinion ?

   Odds on .......it's the "Greenies"........there as bad in a computer case for :C: drive as Greenies in a Zodiac chasing land rights for gay whale

  Greens have several annoying features, one being ..... as soon as you power them up ..... they go to full RPM and immediately forced to spin down to a lower RPM to save power.......Odds on this is causing what you describe.

  Unless you follow the advise of DM and even temporally put a non-green as :C: drive I doubt you'll get much further in effecting a fix........at the very least you'll be able to call us Wombats and make us think a little harder to finding the problem!

 Aussie Allan

[Karlston]

G'day Aussie Allan, howyagoin

I'm sorry, but I have to play Devil's Advocate here... I have 3 other boxen all booting from WD Green drives, 2 with 500GB greens and the other one with a 1TB green, and none of them have ever behaved this way.

Before I go hunting for a non-green SATA HD, can I ask if these symptoms may be caused by a flaky or insufficient PSU? His PSU is the original AOpen 300W that came with his AOpen ES55 case. PSU specs are...

+3.3V/20A, +5V/20A, +12V1/16A, +12V2/16A, +5Vsb/2A, -12/0.8A
+3.3V & +5V combined max 120W
+12V1 & +12V2 combined max 264W

Those specs seemed reasonable for the new hardware, and I didn't order a new PSU when I bought the kit for his new box.

[F5BJR]

*
Many power supply embedded with low cost case are not very good

At first time test with another power supply

Pierre

[Aussie Allan]

 oooooOOOooooo!......More information........What my mate Pierre said is very true, but PSUs head south as soon as you start to us them....it is possible for a 500watt PSU to loose 25-30% of its rating over a 3+ year period....Yes possible it's the power supply...but at the moment as you have effected no physical changes, we're all still in Guess mode........first point!

  Second!.....ATM I stand by what I and DM said you little devils advocate you but I get your point...........in fault analysis you must effect a change and try it out, ... if you stay in pure theory mode........you might wing it, you might not, It's all about choosing the most likely candidate.......effect logical change..........test..........and rule out that component if it proves it's not the problem, this gives you an ever shorter list of bits that could be the problem.

 DM and I think the most likely candidate is the Green!..........you suspect PSU........good!......move forward by shooting and remove one of them and test with some sort of spare......low wattage is not the only reason a PSU can fail on a motherboard......and it might not be the Green, but you have to physically test to rule the bugger in or out

  Now I know that I know your a millionaire with more then 3 computers, you have lots of bits you can swap in and out to test the problem machine properly

  East or west coast !..........5 yrs living in this fridge......man I miss home!......and steak.....and seafood......and customer service.....and..

 Aussie Allan

[Karlston]

Thanks fellows...

I take your point about having done no physical changes. Just wanted to know if this was a PSU symptom or not before I go to the hassle of removing 2 PSU's and fitting one.  Lazy I guess...

Just on that, Windows 7 is rock solid once booted, the only problem is the self-restart or rarer power down & restart after doing a Windows Restart from within Windows. And (thanks Murphy!) it doesn't always happen. Yesterday, when I thought I'd nailed the problem to be the SATA AHCI Mode BIOS setting, I did 6 Windows Restarts over a few hours before the first self-restart happened.

I found an old SATA Seagate 7200.10 320GB drive (non-green?), just have to check it's got no valuable data on it before installing Windows on it. And, of course, I think it's a Linux filesystem, and the only machine that I can check that is the same box that has the PSU I want to try.

Will try those things tomorrow, have had enough for today.

LOL, don't know about that millionaire comment, most of my gear is fairly old.

[Aussie Allan]

 Get some sleep......and hit it fresh!.........Millionaire......just horsing around!, at least when talking to someone from home, the dry sense of humour is not misconstrued ........ Had a whopper of a cat fight with the handbags out with a Brazilian last week over not understanding Australian English/Humour............How do you say "Retarded Wombat"......in Portuguese  anyway?

 Aussie Allan

[Dark Mantis]

Problem is I don't think they have wombats in Brazil Allan!

It is possible that the PSU could be the cause because when the system starts it will use more power than afterwards when it is running normally. As you say it has to be tested to check.

[Karlston]

OK, bad news...

1. Swapped over PSU, problem still happened with WD green drive install.

2. Installed Seagate non-green HD, unplugged data and power cables from WD drive. (Still using 2nd PSU)
Installed Windows 7 and twice during install it self-rebooted after the normal install restarts.

Have unchecked the setting that makes Windows automatically restart after a System Failure". Might get some more clues if I can see a BSOD or whatever it does instead of rebooting.
 
---

Some other ideas...

Will attack this from the Windows end, and try to use another Windows install DVD.

If that fails, will try installing Ubuntu 11.04 and see if the problems remain. If it does then it's gotta be hardware or BIOS, if it works then it's Windows related.

If all that fails, will try to install several glasses of port into myself and forget about this for a while. I'm guessing that the port installation may lead to a sudden, unexpected self-shutdown, but I can really use some sleep after a week of doing little else. LOL...

[Aussie Allan]

 I strongly advise you give me your address and have two glasses on the table!.......at least your starting to narrow it down!

 It's starting to look like the motherboard maybe!.... to be on the safe side, reload the BIOS , even if it's the latest, just another thing we can rule out if nothing else.......how are the temps on the board and CPU looking!?!

 Just had a really good thought, .....are you using the same memory as the first troublesome rig ? ? ? ? ?

 Aussie Allan

[Karlston]

Sigh... it looks like the stick of memory that initially passed 3 passes of MemTest86+ has gone bad.

It now shows 4 errors during the first pass of MemTest86+. Strangely, no errors on 2nd and subsequent passes, though have only done 3 at most. Also strange is it seems to fail a different test each time.

Have tried reseating the stick, and moving it to the second slot without success.

Had noticed that the BIOS set the memory's Command Rate to 1T, though Corsair's web site says it needs 2T. Naturally, changing it to 2T with some confidence of fixing it, didn't work