Compaq Presario SR5450f Annoying Win7 issue (And fix)

[BC_Programmer]

I was in the process of writing a post to get more input on this issue but then in the process of providing information by eliminating possibilities, I managed to solve it. Figure I'd post it anyway as it may be useful for somebody experiencing the same issues.

I recently got a Compaq SR5450f System for free and set to work cleaning it up, getting rid of the massive dust bunnies living inside, and making it look good as new.

One annoyance was that HP no longer provides any software or driver downloads for "legacy" systems as far as I could find.

The system had 4GB of DDR2, N2180 CPU, 9800GT Graphics card, 750GB Hard Drive.

HDD was the first to go. Seatools claimed it was fine, but I had a 1TB new in box that I threw that in instead.

I found that during Windows setup, it would hang. Eventually, after many attempts at practicing typing through the appropriate prompts as fast as possible, I managed to get through the setup process. Once Windows 7 was installed, it continued to hang (I'm not sure what I expected...). I found that if i disabled the Graphics Card in device manager, it wouldn't. That eliminated my concern that it was an electrical problem with the motherboard as was the case for another system I had previously. Linux Mint 19 running from a USB Drive also didn't hang, and was able to use the full resolution of the graphics card which was even more puzzling to me.

Since I knew the Graphics card itself was good (it was working in another system) I updated the drivers in Windows. No change- still hung.

I swapped out the 250W Power supply with a 400W unit. Still no change.

Alright, maybe there is a problem with the CPU? swapped in my Quad Core Q8200. (I planned to put it in anyway). Still the same.

Alright, perhaps it is the memory? it had two sticks of Corsair XMS2 Memory. I ran memtest and allowed it to run for 6 hours or so- several passes at least. No errors.

Then I realized I had forgotten all about chipset drivers. Once I finally found those, I installed them, and got an Inaccessible Boot Device Blue screen at Boot. OK, nevermind... Not quite what I was hoping for. Had to use Last Known good configuration to get out of a boot loop.

At some point during this I threw in a new CMOS battery since the one in the system was completely dead.  Had no effect.

I was running out of ideas at this point, so decided to see about updating the BIOS. Since it still had the original revision from 2007 and the latest was 2010.

Once I managed to get that to run through (It failed in safe mode claiming I had the wrong motherboard, so I disabled my graphics card so that I could run in normal mode and it flashed the BIOS without incident). I was pleased to find- though a bit surprised- that this resolved the problem! It's no longer hanging. Victory.

I guess every once in a while a BIOS update can solve show-stopping issues!

[DaveLembke]

Awesome that you found the issue.

I had a strange issue recently with a board that had an Intel G31 chipset that claimed to support the 6000 series Quadcore, however the system would black screen on me when attempting to boot on the Q6600. It ran perfectly fine on the wimpy Pentium E2160 1.8Ghz.

When digging further into it I realized that the motherboard has on the silk screen "65 Watt CPU Maximum" that I didnt initially see when installing the CPU.... who reads silk screen print  . And the Q6600 is a 105 Watt TDP Quadcore according to Intel. So I was likely loading down too heavily the VRM's or the BIOS lacked support for it even though the chipset supported it. I ended up putting in a Pentium E5400 2.7Ghz Dual-Core which runs laps around that Pentium E2160 1.8Ghz Dual-Lag Processor. But the Core 2 Quad would have been far better if the motherboard didnt have the 65 watt Processor Maximum.

[BC_Programmer]

Yep, I was about to pretty much give up on it and just use Linux. Now I can use a dual boot. Specifically what I'll use it for is another question- but if nothing else it's good to have various setups for software testing.

The system was actually my Brother's PC from before I built him a new PC a while ago. When he moved in with his girlfriend he basically didn't want to bring his old PC, so I took it.

Somewhat annoyingly, the issue I encountered is quite specific to Windows 7- The system came originally with Vista and was upgraded to Windows 8.1, skipping 7 altogether which is why he hadn't seen issues except for a failing Hard Drive which I helped him replace.

It's also a good excuse for some pointless hardware busywork. Found a cheap high-end X-Fi on eBay with that silly breakout box. Figure I'll pop that into my 2008 build, and put it's PCI Audio card into the Compaq. It's "pointless" because I seldom use these systems. On the other hand- if my main PC blows up or has a problem at least I know I'll have some nice setups to fallback on.

[BC_Programmer]

Here's a fun update! Apparently this thing has decided to be rather fiesty. These prefab systems tend to bring their own brand of trouble!

Went to power it on the other day and Windows 7 was getting blue screens trying to boot, or hanging- similar to before. No Safe mode boot either. This time Linux Mint 19 was also hanging hard frequently too.

Eventually tossed on Memtest to rule out the memory. Imagine my surprise to receive errors (or in one case when I checked on it after starting the test a screen of corrupted garbage!).

These are two Corsair XMS2 DDR2 PC-6400 Sticks, and they are identical to the sticks I have in my old build. I tested them individually and both encountered errors in the Block Move tests. I threw in a 1GB Stick and the memtest was able to run through several passes without issue.

So it was pointing at the Memory. But I wasn't convinced. I tried cleaning the slots as well as the pins of the memory sticks just to make sure that wasn't causing some problems, which rather expectedly didn't fix the issue.

I ran memtest on my old build's 8GB to be sure it had good sticks, then popped one out and put in one of the sticks that was failing in the Compaq and ran the test again. It encountered no errors. The stick I had removed however had the same issues in the Compaq with the same test.

At this point, I suspected the power supply. So I swapped out the 400W unit it had with a 500W Unit. No change. Same memory errors.

I went a step further- I put in the 1GB and one of the 2GB sticks that gives memory errors- and memtest encountered no issues with the 5GB, with either of the 2GB sticks; but together, they would have issues in memtest.

My two theories are that either it using Dual Channel causes problems, or that the 800Mhz speed is problematic. Why the issue suddenly developed is another question, but my prime suspect would be the new BIOS version. Unfortunately the BIOS (neither this nor the old) had Memory control options like one would find on a retail motherboard, so I cannot force it down to 667Mhz to test if that helps. I went ahead and got some 4GB of cheap DDR2 667 Memory ($18 CAD) to try to test my RAM speed theory.