If you don't like where I'm going then you really won't like where I've been.

[plonq]

Why can't I even do something as simple as update a video driver without having my computer remind me of mortality, and the fleeting nature of existence?

In this instance it wasn't a problem with Windows, but a machine that refused to post on reboot -- the kind of thing that screams "hardware malfunction!"

I started systematically unplugging things from the machine on each power cycle until eventually I had nothing plugged in but keyboard, mouse and video card. Finally it booted, and then complained aloud (bloody voice alerts) that it couldn't find the floppy drive. No shit. That was one of the first things I'd unplugged. This was where I ran into my second crisis; I'd forgotten to make note of where the plugs had gone for my RAID.

Ah well, only eight possible combinations for that (two RAID chips, each with four possible plug combinations). I got it on the 6th try. In the end, it turns out that I could have saved myself a lot of grief if I'd just unplugged my USB key before I'd rebooted. Dunno why that was hanging it up in the post process, but there you go. I suspect it was mistaking it for an unreadable boot device and getting caught up in some kind of logic loop.

Comments

[tzisorey.livejournal.com]

Dunno why - but I've had the same problem often enough that, if a PC doesn't boot, and there's a USB key in it - it's the *first* thing I remove.

But since you can get a fingerprint protected bootable version of linux on a thumb-drive, I'd assume some BIOSes are able to successfully boot from one.

[plonq.livejournal.com]

As soon as I unplugged the USB devices and it booted, I wanted to kick myself for not doing that first.