I have a problem booting from my Windows XP installation disc. When I installed Windows XP for the first time, I didn’t have any problems. I could see “press any button to boot from CD,” and pressing the button would start the installation process. As soon as Windows XP is installed, I reboot and I see “press any button to start from CD,” but nothing happens when I press a button, and it loads Windows from the hard drive, not the installation CD. It looks like the keyboard isn’t recognized.

I have a Gigabyte GA-K8NXP-SLI motherboard and a Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 videocard. My processor is an AMD 64 X2 4800.

See the solution to Vitaliy's problem after the jump.

I recently downloaded a program called Zitec E-Z Checker from Download.com and installed it. I determined it didn’t do what I was looking for and ran the uninstall program conveniently included with it. What I got was an error message, in Italian no less, that said the uninstall program was unable to uninstall the software, but offered no remedy. When I tried to use the Install or Add or Remove Programs feature in Windows XP, I got an error message that said it was unable to uninstall E-Z Checker due to a file sharing problem. I used another program (ZTREE) to attempt to manually remove the files, and got the same message about a file sharing error. I tried emailing Zitec, but they have not responded. I don’t know what the “file sharing error” is or how to fix it so I can delete or uninstall the E-Z Checker software. Meanwhile, it was still popping up every time I rebooted. I removed the link in the startup menu, and it doesn’t pop up any more. Various spyware and malware programs have not detected it as a threat, but I’d like to clean it out. Any suggestions?

Doc, I recently built a new computer with the following specs: an EVGA Intel X58 motherboard, a Core i7 920 2.66GHz CPU, three sticks of 2GB OCZ Gold DDR3/1600 RAM, an EVGA GeForce GTX 280 SSC Edition 1GB GPU, and a Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium soundcard.

When I installed the memory, the motherboard ran it at 1,066MHz, far below what my memory is supposed to do. I’m aware that memory sticks generally report the JEDEC speeds to the mobo, so I wasn’t surprised by this. I just went into the BIOS and set it to what’s written on the sticker on my RAM: 1,600MHz, 8-8-8-24, and 1.65V.

However, I just read your “Pushing Core i7” article and now I’m wondering. Even though the startup screen for my mobo now says the memory clock is at 1,600MHz, is it really running at that speed? According to the article, I’d have to change the uncore speed to double the desired memory speed, which I believe on a 920 would require changing the base speed. I didn’t do anything other than change the memory settings in the BIOS. So what’s my memory really doing?

I bought an E6850 because I’d read how easy it is to overclock. I followed the instructions in your article about overclocking Intel CPUs and I can’t get an extra 10MHz out of mine before it locks up! I’m running the CPU on an Asus Striker Extreme, with 2GB of Corsair Dominator RAM, a Raptor 150GB HD, an 8800 GTX, an Enermax 850W PSU, Win XP SP3, etc. The CPU and GPU are water cooled and run at about 40 C under load.

Each time I raise the front-side bus speed in the BIOS it boots fine and runs for about two minutes before locking up. I tried unlinking the RAM; still no luck. Everything is running at stock settings, but I want to be able to OC the proc.

Any ideas on what the problem might be?

—Andy Saint

Read on to see the answer to Andy's question.