Vista CPU usage @ 100%

This is not a notebook, but I thought someone here may be able to help. Thanks!

I've searched for three days for an answer to this problem.

Results:

A lot of people have or had this problem, but no one seems to know the answer to fixing it. I've searched endless threads on endless forums and found zero answers to the problem. Most people responded by saying they have the same problem and it eventually just went away, came back or they switched to XP/ Linux OS.

Frustrating!

The system was non functional from day one. Brand new system. Only internet access was to mfg. websites. i.e. Nero, Windows update, Dell. I doubt I have a virus and KIS 2009 was installed after MS updates and prior to connecting to above websites. I have since reformatted C:, reinstalled the OS from the hidden Dell recovery partition, removed the Nero stuff, KIS 2009, DVD drive, and floppy drive. I have not accessed the internet since other than MS update.

Prior to installing this stuff the system was still dead dog slow. I was very careful installing and removing the drives as to not short anything out, no wires are loose, memory is secure and in place. CPU fan is working, case fan is working, DVD rom is working. HDD? I haven't tested it. Maybe it was bunk from the factory. I'm not sure how to test it. My Dell warranty expired two days ago.

I have not messed w' this system since I bought it a year ago because it was so slow. I figured it was the memory and would wait to mess with it until I got more memory. I don't need the system, have others, but intended to get it functional and give it to my kid as a gift. He needs a system.

Problem: every aspect of operation is extremely slow, almost non-operational.

processes running in tskmgr are consuming 100% of the CPU, 100% of the time. The memory is between 47 and 70% used up. tskmger.exe, System, and one or two other MS processes are listed as consuming the CPU, mainly tskmgr and system! The only non MS services are google desktop, Google search, and Dell suport center? It takes 5 minutes or more to startup or shutdown, open control panel, event viewer, etc. Lots of (not responding)! There are alot of errors, warnings, etc. in the event viewer for Windows. System boot, system shutdown, etc. All errors apparently relate to the OS. Also, when I shut the system down, the power button on the case stays lit as if it's in sleep or hibernation. I've set Windows to shut down, not sleep or hibernate. It won't restart unless I hold the power button down for a few seconds to shut it off, then repress the power button to start it up. Windows update takes forever, 8 hours or more and the internet connection seems dead dog slow as well. Other systems on same cable work fine!

System:

Dell vostro 200, Windows Vista Home Basic, celeron 430 1.8 GHz, G33/G31 express chipset family, 1 GB DDR2 memory, integrated sound, NIC and video w' shared memory of 128 MB or so? 80 Gb, 7200rpm SATA HDD, DVD rom.

Attempts:

Reformatted C: and re-installed OS from Dell recovery partition. Ran memtest86+ in STD mode for 8 hours w' no errors. Tried using Ubuntu Live CD and it just stalled after asking for language, etc. Black screen! I disabled Windows search, indexing, Google desktop, search. Set system for maximum performance, i.e. It looks like windows 98, 2000??! No improvement! I've physically inspected the memory, MB and all hardware and connections. Everything "looks" fine.

I have the System disk and drivers from Dell and at this point my only option is to test the HDD? and/ or wipe the HDD, hidden partition and all, reinstall, OS, sp1, and drivers and utilities from disk.

Please help!

I realize the Celeron w' 1Gb shared memory w' video is probably undersized but it should function, shouldn't it? Others have said it does. There is nothing installed on the computer other than Dell support stuff and Google desktop stuff that it came with from factory. I can't rule out a defective HDD or MB, malware, virus, but have had no bluescreens and very limited internet access, as stated above, all while fully protected via KIS 2009.

 

Have you tried removing all the bloatwares? Also, try disabling KIS 2009. Also do a benchmark with hdtune on your hdd.

 

Thanks for the reply! I'm not sure what bloatwares are? The only thing other than MS, Dell stuff is Google desktop. There is no office suite or anything else on the machine. KIS2009 is not installed since the reformat and reinstall of Vista via recovery partition.

I'm not sure what hdtune is, but I will Google it, thanks again.

 

I had high usage on my CPU when I got my computer. You can disable the security warnings, and disable your gadget sidebar and you will drop a lot of CPU usage.

 

Mind if I ask a tangential question? How come it didn't get sent back to _Dell immediately when it started exhibiting this behaviour?

The specs of the machine appear to be within the minimum system requirements to run _Vista Home Basic, so it doesn't seem like it should be that.

Do you have a system recovery disk (or set of disks)? If not, don't wipe the recovery partition.

When you fire it up, can you go into task manager and see which process(es) is(are) consuming the most processor time? If so, would it be possible to grab a screenshot and post it up here?

 

YO60N, The gadget sidebar and Google search are turned off. Security warnings?

Shyster1, I didn't return it because it was included with a course I took for CompTIA A+. It was NIB! The paperwork stated it wasn't under warranty because it was purchased in bulk for educational purposes or something to that effect. I found out two days ago that it was in fact under warranty. Also, I had a lot going on at the time, didn't need the system and "ASSumed it was a memory issue as lots of folks stated their Vista was slow as well.

I do have the disks that came w' the system. Vista basic, Vista basic SP1, and Drivers and utilities disk, all from Dell. I have no valuable info or data on the system.

I can get into Tskmgr and it states 100% CPU usage 100% of the time. It splits the usage up between 2- 4 processes that are running. When I click on show all users it shows what is consuming it all. tskmgr.exe and system consume most along w' various other processes, svchost, explorer, etc.

I can post a screen shot, but will have to get it from that machine to this one as I can't access the internet with the Vista machine. I don't know how to do that. Please instruct? Thanks! I have a thumb drive!

jackluo923, I checked the HDD w' hdtune? and it checks out a-ok. As my next step I considered running chkdsk and scannow. Would that be advisable?

 

The svchost.exe process (Service Host) associated with the Windows Update service often consumes 100% CPU. There's not too much you can do about it, though, other than to wait.

I don't think your hard drive has any issues. Chkdsk won't fix your problems.

Get Process Explorer (link in my signature) and run it (no installation required). See what processes are taking up a lot of the CPU - often Hardware Interrupts will also consume a large fraction of the CPU power, which could result from a buggy driver.

 

Thank you! Will do!

 

MidnightSun, I ran Process explorer.

Results: I'm not 100% sure what I'm looking at, but...

DPCs- 50-77% CPU
interrupts- 15-33%
System- 1.5-10%
procexp- 3%
svchost and explorer occasionally 1.5%

It appears the DPCs and hardware interrupts are consuming most on a regular basis. As a whole I'm still at 100% CPU usage.

Now, what to do with these numbers?

 

Fair enough; I suppose my question was more out of curiousity than anything else. I'm sorry you got snookered on the warranty issue.

To get a screenshot across, I would take the shot (fn+home/prtscr), open an instance of Paint, hit ctrl+v to paste the shot into the Paint doc, then save it as a file. Next, stick a usb drive in the computer, transfer that Paint file (should be a .bmp bitmap) to the usb drive, and remove the usb drive from the computer in question.

From there, stick the drive into a working computer, open the bitmap in whatever image editor you like (could even just be Paint again), crop the image down so it just shows the task manager window, edit out anything that personally identifies you (or that you might consider embarrassing), and save it, preferably as a jpeg if you've got it in an image editor. Then, when you make a new post, click on the paper-clip symbol at the top of the post editor, and that should bring up a pop-up dialogue that will allow you to upload the image file as an attachment. then, just click on the paperclip symbol again, and the attachment should be embedded in the post.

With respect to the underlying problem, the process named "svchost.exe" is an all-purpose process used by the system for a wide variety of things, not just for the Windows Update process.

There's a bit of a Wikipedia article on svchost.exe here. If you want to get an idea of all of the various services and whatnot that are running under each of the instances of svchost.exe you see in your task manager, open an instance of the command console (i.e., Orb > Run...>enter cmd in the box and hit return) and run the following command (exactly as it's typed below):

tasklist /svc /fi "imagename eq svchost.exe"

for example, this is what I got just now when I ran that command:

Code:

Image Name                     PID Services                                    
========================= ======== ============================================
svchost.exe                    844 DcomLaunch, PlugPlay                        
svchost.exe                    916 RpcSs                                       
svchost.exe                   1008 AudioSrv, Dhcp, Eventlog, lmhosts, wscsvc   
svchost.exe                    204 AudioEndpointBuilder, EMDMgmt, hidserv,     
                                   Netman, PcaSvc, SysMain,                    
                                   TabletInputService, TrkWks, UxSms,          
                                   WdiSystemHost, Wlansvc, WPDBusEnum, wudfsvc 
svchost.exe                    284 AeLookupSvc, Appinfo, BITS, Browser,        
                                   EapHost, IKEEXT, iphlpsvc, LanmanServer,    
                                   MMCSS, ProfSvc, RasMan, Schedule, seclogon, 
                                   SENS, ShellHWDetection, Themes, Winmgmt,    
                                   wuauserv                                    
svchost.exe                   1088 gpsvc                                       
svchost.exe                   1136 EventSystem, fdPHost, FDResPub,             
                                   LanmanWorkstation, netprofm, nsi, SSDPSRV,  
                                   SstpSvc, upnphost, W32Time, WebClient       
svchost.exe                   1276 CryptSvc, Dnscache, KtmRm, NlaSvc, TapiSrv, 
                                   TermService, Wecsvc                         
svchost.exe                   1540 BFE, DPS, MpsSvc                            
svchost.exe                   1924 BthServ                                     
svchost.exe                    824 PolicyAgent                                 
svchost.exe                   2192 stisvc                                      
svchost.exe                   2348 WerSvc                                      

As you can see, most of the instances of svchost.exe I get have nothing to do with Windows update.

That being said, there have apparently been problems with the windows updater client in the past, problems that included 100% cpu usage by instances of svchost.exe such as you have, so it is possible that at bottom what you've got is a problem with the Windows updater.

One possible solution - if that is the underlying problem - would be to manually download and install the most current version of the Windows updater. Microsoft has instructions for just that on the web under KB article KB949104. Read through that, download and install the latest Windows updater on this bedeviled system, and see if that helps or not.

EDIT: I just re-read Midnight Sun's post, and want to clarify that, to the extent I may have criticized his post either directly or indirectly, as implying or stating that svchost.exe only related to Windows update, I mis-read MidnightSun's post, which does not say anything of the sort regarding svchost.exe.

 

Thanks again,

Updates are working slowly and I posted the processes which are consuming CPU above, DPCs and interrupts. svchost.exe is only consuming 1.5% and only intermittenly at that. So, svchost.exe isn't the problem. Eh?

Only MS services are runing and I even disabled non essential ones. I've disabled all Startup objects except for Intel and Windows defender. There are now only 39 processes running and only DPCs and interrupts are consuming vast amounts of CPU. I believe this is hrdwr/ driver related, but don't know how to fix.

I have followed all common tips for making Vista run faster and it is still unresponsive. It's not a question of running slow, it's a question of virtually not running.

 

Midnight Sun,

the Hardware interrupts and DPCs are taking up the CPU. I think you were onto the problem. Drivers! Can you look at this and tell me what you think, or offer a possible resolution. I posted the % of CPU usage on pg. 1 of this thread.

Thanks!

 

If DPCs are consuming the vast majority of your CPU time, and you've ruled out something like svchost.exe, then in all likelihood you have some sort of horrendous driver conflict - drivers are the code most likely to be at the source of horrendous amounts of DPC latency.

There is one more test that is probably a bit redundant, but for which it would be interesting to see the results. The tool is called DPC Latency Checker, and the direct download link is here.

Unfortunately, DPCs aren't broken down by the originating driver/executable, so tracing a high DPC latency back to the misbehaving code can be difficult.

Do you have a separate sound card installed, by any chance? That may also be a source of DPCs.

I'm trying to find a really good Mark Russinovich blog discussion of hunting down the ephemeral DPC latency; when I find it, I'll post it up; in the meantime, just in case anyone's really, really bored (or just really interested in the theory behind the problem), Mark Russinovich of SysInternals, one of the masters of the Windows plumbing universe, has an article on some of the advanced properties of DPCs here.


EDIT: Also, check under the System Information applet (msinfo32.exe) under the subheading "Components" to see if there's anything listed under "Problem Devices." If so, check which device(s) are shown, as it could very well be the driver for that device that's causing the problem.

Finally, check in the event viewer to see what's getting logged. Since I am going to guess that a lot is getting logged, I would boot the system up with a cold boot, and then go immediately to the event viewer to see what's being logged - if the system's getting lagged even at startup, there should be events being logged that relate to the executable(s) responsible.

And I just re-read your original post, so you can ignore the question about a separate sound card, as you stated you have integrated sound only.

 

I'll run the latency checker just to see and maybe it will help me eliminate suspect drivers. Which suspect drivers? I don't know! LOL! I didn't see any problem devices listed, but under conflicts/ sharing there were a few listed. It didn't state whether they were conflicting or sharing though.

Thanks again Shyster1

 

There probably isn't anything under the "Conflicts/Sharing" subitem, although I suppose the better rule is "never say never."

Have you checked the event logs yet (via the event viewer from the computer management applet in the control panel)?

 

Yes, there are endless errors and warnings. I researched the critical ones and several others, but came up with nothing from Microsoft.

There are items under the "conflicts/ sharing" subitem.

 

I guess I wasn't clear enough. There certainly ought to be items under Conflicts/Sharing; but what I meant was that I doubted we would find the source of the problem there.

If it's not too much trouble, it would be useful to get a screenshot of the items that get logged under applications and system immediately after a cold boot. To keep the list from being unreadable, I would suggest clearing the logs just before you shut it down, and then when you cold boot it next, most of the items will relate to the boot process (some will still relate to the previous shutdown, but those can be marked off using the log item for when the eventlog was shut down - that's usually one of the last services to shut down, and it always logs an entry when it does a graceful shutdown).

 

I will do that. Thanks!

FYI,

I went thru each individual device in "device manager" to check for "device working properly" and "conflicts". Only one device showed a conflict and several said there was no driver installed.

The conflict: High Precision Event Timer shows a conflict w' memory range FED0000-FED003FF, which is used by: ACPI x86-based PC. HPET has no driver installed as well.

Other devices with no driver installed are as follows: Intel ICH9 Family SmBUS controller-2930, Direct Memory Access Controller, Intel 82802 Firmware Device Hub, Numeric Data Processor, Programmable Interrupt Controller, System Speaker, System Timer.

I have no clue if these things should have drivers, be disabled, or if the conflict is a problem or not. I'm in over my head!

Do you think this could be the problem?

 

Ooh, ouch! If all those drivers really are missing, I'm surprised the thing managed to start up at all, let alone perform well enough for you to pull system data off of it!

Yup, I definitely think this is the source of the problem. The drivers should have been installed along with the preinstalled OS when you bought the machine, as well as when you reinstalled from the recovery partition; however, for whatever reason that doesn't appear to have happened.

In an earlier post you stated that you had a disk from _Dell with the drivers on it, is that correct? If so, then you should be able to put that disk into the optical drive, and then open up the "properties" dialogue for each device that's missing a driver, go to the drivers tab, then click on update driver, and if/when it asks you where the drivers are, point it to the optical drive. You should go through each device individually to make sure that everything gets its driver back properly.

 

Thanks Shyster, I will do that. I should point out that this OP was posted in several other forums as well. I thought I made that clear in the OP, and subsequent posts, but members of other forums have taken offense to the fact that I seeked help across the internet from other sources than their own.

I apologize if this is unnacceptable. I would think one would search for answers everywhere possible, but that's just me.

 

No skin off my nose (but then, I'm dense like that). I cannot speak for NBR itself, but as far as I can recollect, the no-cross-posting rule applies to cross-posting within the various NBR forums; I don't think it applies to posting also in any other non-NBR forums (e.g., like the _Dell forums). Of course, I coudl be wrong. Still, like I said above, no skin off my nose.

 

Sorry to say it sounds very much like a trojan. I suggest you quickly do a format of your HDD before it infects your other files man!

 

I doubt that is the case.

That could indicate driver conflicts, as Shyster posted, but it could be other problems as well (I would rule out malware as the issue, though). I have used programs before that did cause Hardware Interrupts to use a large percentage of the CPU, for some unknown reason (Digsby had that problem on my old computer before), but I don't really know of any good way to actually single out which driver is causing your problems, if it is a driver's fault.

Normally, I would suggest a reformat, but it seems like even that drastic measure didn't solve your problems, which could indicate that the problem lies within the default drivers.

As a point of clarification, though: the 100% CPU usage issue occurs before you install anything on a new reformat install?

 

Yes! I've installed nothing. I did go to Dell and update several out of date drivers. Reatek sound and NIC. That was this afternoon. I also disabled the sound, NIC, DVD and FDD just to see if they were causing the hangup. No resolution yet and I diabled and re enabled the devices one by one.

I'm afraid to disable any other drivers for fear of making the system unusable. I believe I listed above the devices which had no drivers installed and that HPET has a memory conflict, no driver installed as well.

I truly appreciate your help, MidnightSun.

I did post a hijackthislog elsewhere and could post it here as well, but I don't think it's a virus/ malware issue. It was a pretty small list.

 

On what basis? Did you read the OP, including the discussion of the limited amount of exposure the system has had to the internet?

 

@rwc1969: When you did the reformat and reinstallation, you did do it from the recovery console and from off of the hidden recovery partition, correct, or did you do it from the _Dell system disks you have?

 

From the recovery partition. It reformatted C: and re-installed OS.

Also, I ran the latency checker you mentioned. Max latency was 110. Average was around 60. It stated: "this machine should be able to handle realtime streaming audio and video data without dropouts".

Also, I retrieved updated drivers and inf. files from Intel website for the G33/31 chipset. It didn't provide drivers for the devices that are missing them. I installed the new chipset drivers w' no change in operation. The drivers it updated are reported as functioning fine in devmgr.

I don't recall if I posted this, but this afternoon I also updated the drivers for the integrated Realtek sound, video and NIC. With no change in performance.

DPCs and hardware interrupts are still hogging the CPU @100%.

I can't find the drivers for the devices listed in a prior post. All the files on the CD are zipped and my computer takes forever to unzip just one file, or open a window for that matter. I didn't see anything specific to what I need. I don't even know what those devices are for. Dell has an updated BIOS for my machine, but I'm not sure if I should attempt that just yet??

I'm going to link this post in the other forums so everyone knows what has happened. I don't want to ruffle anymore feathers.

Thanks again for your help.

 

After boot, do Interrupts and DPC immediately take up 100% CPU, or is the computer fine for a while, then starts lagging like crazy?

 

I was initially tempted to say you should run the BIOS update, but this thing is running so slow that my paranoid side says it might cause something in the BIOS flasher to trigger a false time-out, which could have catastrophic consequences if it happened midstream in a BIOS flash.

Thus, I would counsel against doing the BIOS update unless either (a) you/we know that it's required in order to fix the problem, or (b) we've fixed the problem.

When you were in the System Information utility (i.e., msinfo32.exe), did you look at the entries under Software Environment>System Drivers?

That should give you a comprehensive list of the drivers that the OS "knows" about, and data regarding the status of those drivers.

 

It's immediate and consistent Midnight Sun. Even in safe mode.

That was my exact thinking on the BIOS update Shyster1. I don't think I looked at that in msinfo32, I will check it out and report back anything I find.

I did a search on high DPCs, and this came up. http://forum.sysinternals.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=837&KW=&PID=102926#102926

Many people have or had a similar issue. One member asked, and another stated the missing drivers, posted above, weren't an issue and that was normal. I haven't found any other info to back that up. The post is there if you folks would like to take a look. 6th and 7th post down on this page. It's a long thread!

The #1 culprit seems to be video cards followed by, WLAN, LAN, FDD, etc. I don't recall disabling my integrated video and re-booting, so that could be a next step?? I have no other video cards in the system. I have disabled the others.

There were several utilities mentioned in that thread that may help narrow it down as well. RATTV3, KERNRATE and XPERF. I know nothing about these myself.

Thanks again. I'm going to wait to try anything else until I hear back from you folks. I will check msinfo though.

 

Never thought of this before, but I checked the driverless devices listed above on my functional XP laptop and they too don't have drivers. So, I think I can safely rule out those devices as being problematic.

 

I just finished going thru all subcategories of msinfo32, including system drivers, meticulously and everything shows "Status OK". There were 2 faults listed in Windows error reporting. I then ran Dr. Watson and it stated no faults detected.

Would it be wise to disable the integrated video? Will I still have basic video?

 

Found out I can't disable the integrated video because it's all I have. The only other video card I have is AGP and this system only has PCI slots. I did disable the LAN, FDC and sound in BIOS to no avail.

Arrgghh!

The OS is now fully patched. SP2.

 

So, just to verify: every driver listed in the "System Drivers" subcategory under msinfo32.exe (aka System Information) shows a status of "OK" - is that correct?

Also, it's been a while, and the thread's getting long, so I'll ask again at the risk of being repetitive: you've run memtest, you've pulled and reseated the RAM modules, and you've tried pulling each one individually, all to rule out that it's a problem with the RAM, correct?

 

Yes, Yes, No! I have not pulled the RAM. It appears to be seated and the hold downs are locked in. I can reseat and run each individually though if you want.

 

It's a bit of a long shot if you ran memtest and no errors showed up, but at this point it's time to start trying everything that doesn't involve money or delicate operations that aren't relatively easy to do. So, yes, I would suggest that we try this:

First, if you have another RAM module that is known good (i.e., not one of the ones in there now), pull both modules that are in there now, and put that new module in. Fire it up and see what happens. The point of this is to do a simple test for bad memory (but if it works, we still won't know which of the existing modules, or both, is the bad one). If this works, then (a) we know the problem was the RAM, but (b) we now have to figure out which of the existing modules is bad.

If you don't have a spare RAM module, then pull both modules that are in there out, and then reseat one in the slot you're supposed to use if you're only going to have one RAM module in the computer (check with your user manual - there's usually an order to how the RAM slots are supposed to be filled).

The, fire it up and see what happens. If we get better performance, then we know that the remaining module was bad. If we don't get any change, then swap the modules out and fire up again. Again, if we get better performance, then we know that the module not in the computer was bad.

But, if we don't get any change in performance, we then have two alternatives, (i) both RAM modules are bad - this is a fairly unlikely scenario, but it would be useful to be able to verify that this isn't the case by getting a completely different module of RAM to stick in there - of course, it's not really worth buying another RAM module just for the purpose of testing here; and (ii) the RAM isn't the problem.

So, if you're comfortable pulling RAM modules in and out - and you have an antistatic wrist guard to use (I blew an old _Dell motherboard doing exactly this without any antistatic measures once) - I would suggest that we give this a try, just to be able to exclude the easy possibilities.

 

This is cause the virus/ spyware i got the same problem reformat my comp and it's running smooth again.

 

If I keep in contact w' the bare metal of the case or power supply I should be fine on the static, right? I have one othe rsystem, not sure if it's the same RAM, but will check. If not I'll do the swap, then fit one, then fit the other like you suggested. One at a time!

Also, I'm trying to find an inexpensive way to test power supplies. A little research showed that is one possible cause of this problem, Faulty PSU, UPS, or laptop battery. Mine isn't a laptop, though.

 

Matixrider, I've already reformatted and re-installed OS. No viruses, spyware, adware, or malware of any kind. That definitely is one possible cause though, just not mine. Honestly, at this point I wish it was!

 

Well, what you actually need is something other than the computer on which to discharge any static electic build-up. Touching something large and metal that's grounded through your house (e.g., plumbing) is one way to do it.

The PSU is also a good thought - it's amazing how many ills can be traced back to poor PSUs, and unfortunately, _Dells have more than their fair share, in large part I think because _Dell insists on going with proprietary PSUs so often.

 

The memory isn't the same between systems. so, before I went in pulling stuff I figured I'd try this. I posted this in the other forums as well. I did try switching the Ram sticks, but it didn't help. I'm not even sure if the system could run on one stick, because the memory usage is always over 50%.

I figured I'd start from scratch and reinstall from the dell vista 32bit setup dvd disk. That failed because the system wouldn't shut down after the initial required restart. Got a BSOD instead! Drive_power_state_failure. Stop 0x0000009f (0x00000003, 0x80b58c78, 0x80c4d790, 0x819e6008) I couldn't find anything Vista specific for this stop code. So, I reformatted and reinstalled again using the other Dell supplied Vista dvd disk, 32 bit sp1. For some reason Dell supplied 2 disks. One labeled Vista 32bit and the other labeled Vista 32bit sp1. I got the exact same results with a slightly different 0x9f stop code. Then,I tried repairing vista using the supplied sp1 disk, same result w' a slightly different 0x9f stop code again. Plus it now showed 2 instances of Vista on C drive. That is strange, because I reformatted C after every reinstall.

So then the system would not turn off and would never fully boot. After the initial scrolling windows bar at the bottom I would just get a black screen with a blinking cursor in the upper left corner of the screen.

I then tried using the Dell recovery partition again to restore to factory default, but couldn't access it from BIOS. Found an article on how to manually do this from the elevated command prompt in BIOS boot options. So, I managed to get the system restored once again to the factory default.

Upon the initial restart an error box popped up and stated Rundll32.exe "windows cannot access the specified device, path or file. You may not have the appropriate permissions to access the system."

this jogged my memory and I now recall getting that same error box after the initial install way back in September 'ish and again a week or so back when I reinstalled from Dell partition to factory default.

At this point the system is back to the point when I first started this thread. I looked into the rundll32 error and couldn't find it in the appropriate folder in Windows. So, I ran sfc /scannow from an elevated command prompt. The process took over 4 hours and it stated when finished. "found errors and couldn't repair some of the files" or something to the like. I researched that and it was stated that upon restart sfc /scannow usually fixes them. I checked after restart and the rundll32.exe file is now in the system32 folder along with many more that weren't there before I ran sfc /scannow.

This makes me think that the factory default install is missing many files. The system will now shutdown and restart on it's own, but it takes 10 minutes or longer to do so. It pretty much takes 10 minutes to do any one task. i.e. opening "computer", "C:", "Windows", "system32". I no longer get the bluescreen error code 0x9f, or the rundll32.exe pop up box when I restart.

On the previous factory default restore I updated my video, sound and lan drivers to the latest available with no results. In fact the latest Intel chipset driver kept giving me a "Vista" pop up asking me to run in legacy mode, so I went to Dell and got their latest driver update which was an earlier version, the pop up went away. As of now all drivers are factory default. Other than running sfc /scannow the system is as it was the day I bought it.

The thing I don't understand is why Ubuntu live won't run and even the restores from dvd disk took forever and failed. I'm starting to think the driver for, dvd-rom or psu to dvd is defective. What gets me even more is the fact that every error I've researched eventually leads to a Microsoft website that states the problem was in an earlier version of Windows, nothing specific to Vista, and that the problem was corrected with XP sp2 or the like.

 

It does sound like the CD/DVD drive is going on the fritz. You don't, by any chance, have a spare you could swap out, or perhaps a USB optical drive you could use, do you?

 

I do! I'll swap em out.

 

Here's a thought:
If it is related solely between the PSU and the cd/dvd drive (or anything isolated around the cd drive) you could try to boot off of a USB stick and see how that works.

This is a great and simple article on how to do just that, with Ubuntu.

Now, it could still get all fussed up after the boot, but it would be interesting to see if it does boot at all.

EDIT: Or you could, you know, swap it out like you already are...

 

Thanks, I'm making a bootable USB for flashing the BIOS already.

 

I updated the BIOS. It's a Dell/ foxconn g33mo2 motherboard It seems they had some firmware issues. I updated to the latest Dell provides and it still doesn't work. something to do with ACPI not functioning properly. ACPI.SYS overwhelms the cpu with hardware interrupts and DPCs making it impossible for anything else to access the cpu. ACPI.SYS is the driver for "Microsoft ACPI-compatible system" in Device Manager. I've tried disabling and uninstalling this device, but Vista just re-installs it automatically upon reboot.

Thanks folks for the help.

 

Have you tried talking to _Dell's tech support folks to see if they know anything about a conflict between that motherboard and the ACPI.SYS file for _Vista?

The ACPI system is very deeply intertwined with the OS, and will be reinstalled. Is it possible that the copy of ACPI.SYS you have is corrupted, so that each time the OS reinstalls it, it's merely installing an already-corrupted file?

In this SysInternals' forum post, you mentioned the Intel matrix storage manager - your motherboard may not support the Intel matrix storage manager. There are two Foxconn GM33 motherboards, the G33M and the G33M-S - only the G33M-S supports the Intel matrix storage manager; I am going to surmise that your motherboard is of the G33M variety and therefore doesn't support the Intel matrix storage manager. You should be able to check the specific model name of your motherboard using CPU-Z.

Googling indicates that there is a problem with foxconn's implementation of ACPI on that board. What's the date on the latest _Dell BIOS, and is it newer or older than the foxconn direct BIOS for the basic motherboard model (you can check for that on the foxconn website)?

 

Shyster1, you've been a great help. I truly appreciate your efforts. As far as Dell, I did contact them. They would not give that info without charging me a service phone support fee. Two fees actually, 45+ 45= 90 bucks american. one fee for software support and the other for hardware as they stated it was both, but wouldn't give the answer. Of course those fees are for a one time only phone support and parts aren't included.

The answer is a new mobo or, perhaps, as you suggested, updating to the Foxconn g33m BIOS. I did look into that and several folks tried and ended up with an expensive paperweight. I don't believe the Foxconn BIOS is compatible with the Dell/ Foxconn board as they are slightly different. Foxconn made this board specifically for Dell. It's a Dell/ foxconn G33m02 board comparable to the foxconn G33m. Mine has no serial, parallel or ps/2 ports and only 8 instead of 12 usb ports. I believe there are other differences as well. I do intend to contact Foxconn directly and ask if it's compatible, although it's a scary proposition as others in the past have done just that and ended up with a paperweight, even after Foxconn told em it would work. foxconn has also told folks they can't legally offer fix suggestions as that board is Dell proprietary and all service must be handled thru Dell. I will check it again with CPUZ, but I think it just said foxconn g33. it is a g33m02 though.

I don't believe the driver is at fault, because I've since put a whole new OS in. XP! With fair results. See here if you like. http://forum.sysinternals.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=19701&PID=104180#104180
It's a temporary solution until I can investigate the mobo/ firmware further.

I haven't installed the Intel matrix storage manager, eventhough, Dell, using my service tag#, listed two driver downloads for it and my specific machine on their drivers and downloads website. They stated "recommended" for installing them. The instructions on Dell's site for download and installation of these is invalid. It doesn't work. I can't even unzip the files, let alone install them. Either their download files are corrupt or the process they give for download and installation is incorrect. I have no devices listed for that item anyway. It's mostly a RAID solution, but can be used with AHCI as well, mine is IDE. If it's RAID, it must be wrote to a floppy, usb, or cd boot image and installed during the pre-install of Windows, I believe, maybe so for AHCI as well.

Dell also recommends using sata0 or 1 for hdd and sata4 or 5 for dvd. From the factory my dvd was in sata1. I've since switched it. I doubt it matters, but...so much for Dell practicing what they preach.

I am a little upset as this machine was defective when I purchased it 10 months ago. A card inside or on the box stated it had no warranty as I purchased it thru a school for training purposes. If I had bought it straight from Dell it would have cost under 400 w' a 19" flat screen. Instead I paid nearly 600 and got shafted on the warranty. Dell said it was purchased in July and that my warranty ran out two days before I contacted them. I purchased it from the school in September and If I knew I had a warranty I'd have contacted them long ago. Then, after calling them they said the warranty was invalid from the start. ??? Their customer service just plain sucks and it ain't no secret. They most likely would have just told me as they have many others to replace the psu or mobo. People have paid 90 bucks for that kind of phone service only to find out it didn't fix the problem. So now their out $200 or more and still have an even more expensive paperweight.

Whew! Had to vent a little, but Thanks for your help Shyster1 and I will check with Foxconn about a firmware update or the like.

 

One thought occurred to me - I noticed the last time I googled that a lot of the people bringing up the ACPI errors in the foxconn BIOS were linux users who had tried to get a linux install working on the motherboard.

Those folks are pretty resourceful, and someone may have figured out how to run a linux on that motherboard by either working around the ACPI problems, or by fixing them (I do know that linux types know how to rewrite the ACPI tables, which are the usual source of the problems). It can be a pretty steep learning curve, and rewriting the ACPI tables is a very technically rigourous exercise, but it might be worth looking into.

I sort of know about the ACPI issue and linux workarounds because I once tried to put linux on an old Compaq notebook but couldn't get it to manage its temps properly because the Compaq ACPI was bunged up - which is ironically amusing considering that Compaq was one of the big sponsors of the ACPI standard (they could write it, just not implement it ).

 

I'm pretty sure rewriting ACPI tables is over my head, but that's interesting. Someone else pointed out to me that Foxconn posted a BIOS update that was supposed to take care of the ACPI issue for Linux users. Also, Foxconn has much more recent BIOS updates than Dell. Unfortunately, the FoxconnBIOS apparently doesn't work in the Dell/ Foxconn mobo. Several people have supposedly tried and "bricked" their mobo.

This setup was working fine until I installed NIS2009. Then it started hogging all the resources and causing freezes and slowing things down. I'm going to install KIS2009 and see if it does the same thing.