Hey guys I've had this problem for a long time now and I think its the reason my pc has been incredibly slow. Symptoms include long waiting times, CPU showing its busy, things becoming non responsive for a while then eventually coming right.

 

As you can imagine this is rather annoying and I haven't yet found a way to fix it.

 

So the problem: I think its because of the two ATA channels refuse to work (figure 1). It also seems I have double ups in my device manager, I know I'm running sata so I have no idea why there are IDE channels there. The ATA channels 0 and 1 have an error saying windows cannot load the drivers required. These were originally listed as IDE channels and when i uninstalled them they reinstalled as ATA devices but still didn't work.

 

I've tried downloading new drivers for them however I'm not sure if I've got the right ones. Either way it didn't work.

 

Also windows event viewer has a massive list of Errors, Warnings and Criticals, I assume most of which relate to this although there are some other problems as well.

 

Specs

Vista 32 bit

Intel Dual core 6300

2gb RAM

Asus P5B motherboard with P965 Chipset

 

Oh and let me know what other info to provide, I'm not sure whats relevant.

 

Figure 1: Device manager and driver properties of one of the ATA channels

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Edited December 17, 201015 yr by PhoeniFOX

System restore to a previous point before the problems ?

 

This can't help:

http://www.regsofts.com/free_registry_repair/registry_repair.htm

Free Window Registry Repair 2.0

It is an *extensive* registry cleaner and is free.

 

Just wait for Psyrus to get here. He has all the tech shizzle you need.

I think the problems actually began when I did a reformat at the beginning of the year.

I hope you don't have to reinstall your Windows entirely.

 

Are you able to upgrade to Win7 ?

 

Again, Psyrus will have the shizzle you need...

it's a pity Pill_Monster isn't around much anymore... he was

someone else with all the answers.

I'm starting to get desperate enough for it to become a viable option. Might also consider upgrading to windows 7. Vista has been a constant array of headaches.

I never used Vista - went straight from XP Pro x32 to Win 7 Pro x64 thanks

to a philanthropist who will remain nameless.

 

I have heard that Win7 is what Vista should have been, or wanted to be...

but I found the performance and utility (i.e. usefulness) increase significant

in Win7 x64...

 

When I worked in IT tech support for an ISP, on the list of things we hated

were notorious criminals such as

• Vista
  
• Norton
  
• McAfee

etc.

go to the mobo manufacturer site and download their drivers - don't use default winblows ones.. there's loads of P5B boards - check the model on the board and use the correct one - I'd almost guarantee you have the incorrect driver

 

and anything you don't use, disable in bios

once you fix this problem i would show all hidden devices then remove ALL drivers cept mouse and keyboard and reboot and let it re-detect.

Ah I had a problem like this back in the day, I can't remember if it was with Vista or Win7, it was about 1-2 years ago though and for the life of me, I can't remember what I did to fix it. It was an unbelievably aggravating issue, because the whole computer would just 'stop' for a good 1-5 seconds, as in even my G15's LCD clock would freeze (at which point you know it's bad).

 

I recall having tried a myriad of things, from drivers to monitoring programs to changing out components... and despite racking my brain I can't remember what the solution was. I have work again tonight and I'll continue to think about what it was that was causing it. What I think I remember is that despite my assumption that it was HDD thrashing, it was in fact not the hard drive causing the issue.

putting it in brothers computer?

ati driver?

I've seen pauses like this a few times before and it was a directx issue

Ok last night I tried installing the latest chipset driver for the p5b board.

 

This was taken directly off the Asus website: Intel® Chipset Software Installation Utility V9.1.1.1019 for Windows 32/64bit XP & 32/64bit Vista & 32/64bit Windows 7.(WHQL). Dated:18/09/2009.

 

The driver version for the ATA channel is 9.1.1.1016, dated: 5/08/2009. Clearly different.

 

Now upon install, it took ages but eventually did its thing, however nothing changed. The ATA driver remains the same. So my questions, is the chipset driver the one required to update the ATA channels? And if so, does anything need to be uninstalled prior to the new driver being installed?

 

I think I agree with you Psyrus, I doubt its the HDD itself, rather something else causing the problem. I eagerly await your brain revealing the answer!

Could it be needing the RAID controller driver even though I don't have a RAID setup?

That seems to be the only set of drivers available aside from the chipset drivers (which didn't work).

Hey I think I remember how I fixed the issue... and unfortunately I don't think you're going to like it

 

I got so fed up with the issue, having tried every conceivable fix out there... that right before resorting to a reformat, I took my hard drive out of my P965 board and put it in my brother's near identical computer with a P35 chipset (both Q6600, 4gb 1333mhz ram, nvidia gpu, hx520) and it loaded all the generic windows drivers on (due to the 965 ones obviously not working). I then chucked it back in my computer and from what I remember, the problem was solved!

 

So in the end I believe it was a driver issue of some sort, however I'd installed, uninstalled, reinstalled every driver I could think of until the cows came home... but none of the ones I did manually fixed it. Unless you have a similar setup to swap HDDs into, I think a fresh windows install might be your best bet

 

They're annoying but as long as your data is archived well it shouldn't be too much of a painstaking process

Yeah I didn't think there was going to be an easy fix. Might have to find some time next year to do a reformat.

Anyone know of a program that can fix driver issues? I'm thinking of one that can completely wipe all trace of the previous driver before installing the new one. That might be my last shot before a reformat.

 

At least its not incapacitating and next year i don't foresee spending a lot of time on this pc at home as I'll be crazy busy. its been annoying me now as I've been on holidays and trying to do more things.