Expert: Rider - 1/16/2008

Question
QUESTION: Hi There
I have an old Vaio SR31K which has just developed the following fault. Half way through the XP logo boot screen it locks up. That's it.
The drive is fine.  
I reinstalled XP Home SP2, fine.
At desktop, all great.  Restart, same problem.  Bootlog shows last driver loaded is usbstor.sys
Mounted drive on another box and renamed file.
Boots fine again until I plug in a usb drive when it reinstalls usbstor.sys and will then not restart.
If I plug in a PCMCIA USB card and boot it hangs in the same place but will continue booting if I remove the card. I can then replace the card and have it work for mouse and card reader. Hard drives lock up the system until I disconnect them.
usbstor.sys is the latest version. System fully patched and never connected to a network or internet.
Bios non upgradeable.
My hunch is the usb controller on the mboard is dying/dead but thought I's bounce an unusual one off you as most of your questions seem a little straightforward.
All the best.
Ade

ANSWER: Sony spec's show one USB port, you use the mouse on that port, correct?

The PCMCIA card is a USB card, it it required to access the hard drive?

Try this:
If you can get by with a regular mouse use the mouse port on the computer, uninstall the usbstore.sys file from the System Manager/Devices. Shut down remove the PCMCIA card.

Start the system then plug the hard drive into the USB port on the computer.

If it runs with out locking up and doesn't look for the PCMICA card then the card has failed, if the hard drive needs the card you will not be able to access it but this test is to see if the hard drive is the problem.

Do you have another laptop available to test the PCMCIA card with? If you do that would tell you if the card has failed or if the interface for the card in the compture has failed.

My opinon is that the PCMCIA card has failed, the interface inside the computer rarely fails, usually it is damaged by inserting the wrong type of card in the slot.

HTH
http://www.diy-computer-repair.com/laptops.html

My E-book:
http://www.diy-computer-repair.com/ebsp-1.html

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thanks for the prompt reply.  I apologise for not being clearer. I missed some bits I thought were obvious.  I've just done those too many times!

There is one usb slot.
The hard drive is internal.
The pcmcia card works on other machines.

The problem is the boot.

Once usbstor.sys is installed the vaio will hang on boot with nothing in the pcmcia slot.

At that point I am stuffed and have to pull the power.

If I have the card in the slot it will still lock up but if I remove the card it will continue to boot.

Once booted I can use anything in any slot (onboard or via card) except a drive and it will work fine. A drive will cause it to lock up until I remove the card.

I am pretty technical.  I am however stuck and loathe to think that the controller is dying as this workaround really means I'll have to junk the machine.

It's definitely to do with the usbstor.sys file, a dependancy or the onboard hardware it then tries to load because if I rename this file the machine will boot fine until I plug in something that forces the machine to reinstall it.

An odd one.
Nice little site by the way.
Thanks again
Ade


Answer
You could try this:

Search for usbstor.sys and usbstor.sy_ (the archive file) and delete them. You should find them in the System32, driver cache, and any service pack directorys.

Once you delete them it should not hang up any more but something may stop working. I would think is it a usb device by the name (I didn't search for it on the internet) and you may get the new hardware found wizard when you try to use a device.

If it is the hard drive controler, it is embedded on the motherboard, you would have to replace that, might get expensive.

Or you could look on eBay, some times there are older systems there that the video has gone out or some other problem and the owner is selling it fairly cheap. I got a new display for my T-30 there for twenty dollars, that is about 250 less than what IBM wanted.

Good luck.