USB ports power off after BIOS on Intel DX38BT mobo

[simonjester]

Hi! First time poster looking for a little help. I'm building a system around an Intel DX38BT motherboard. I was able to install XP fine. After I installed the MB device drivers and rebooted, the USB ports became unresponsive. I can get into and manipulate BIOS fine, but once the bootcodes disappear it seems like all the USB ports lose power - the numlock on the keyboard and the laser on the mouse go out. Windows boots, and hitting the power switch causes Windows to initiate a shutdown, so the system isn't locked. I've tried the following:

• Booting from the DVD drive - system doesn't respond to KB at the "Press any key to bood from CD" prompt.
• Tried all available USB ports
• Removed all non-essential hardware (including FP USB ports)
• Reseting BIOS to "Optimal" settings
• Resetting BIOS using the HW jumper
• Removing all hardware and reseating the motherboard
• Replacing the CPU (longshot, but I was getting desperate...)
• Removing the hard disk on the off chance USB drivers loaded *very* early
• Booting from a USB drive (yea, I thought it was pointless too, but again...)

None of the above helped. I'm leaning towards "there's an issue" with the mb, but can't explain why installing new drivers in Windows would cause the issue. Thoughts..?

 

[raybay]

I think it is a simple case of not having all your drivers and downloads installed.
The secret is usually in the Chipset, rather than the BIOS, but also in the Embedded Controller... and other downloads. If you have all the possible downloads installed (BIOS, Chipset, Audio, Video Graphics, Ethernet, etc.) , then run Microsoft Windows Updates four times, rebooting after each install, and adding all your other microsoft software, you should see everything working.
After each round of updates... drivers, then Microsoft... check your device manager to see what is missing, or what is showing up as yellow or red alert flags.
Then go to www.belarc.com and download the free Belarc Advisor. Once downloaded, run updates. Then Belarc will give you a complete list of what is installed, and what updates are still needed. The Free Everest is better, but is not updated as frequently as needed... Belarc always shows any missing updates.

 

[simonjester]

ok, well, one step forwards. I found that enabling "Legacy USB Support" gets my hardware operational again - outside Windows. ...and I can boot from a USB device, so progress is forward, if slow. . .

 

[simonjester]

I think it is a simple case of not having all your drivers and downloads installed.

If I were having issues with hardware other than MY KEYBOARD AND MOUSE, I'd be all over this. I should clarify my original post. The USB ports have no power after POST, and the system has no PS/2 ports to fall back on, so all I can use is the non-functional USB KB/Mouse. Unfortunately interacting with the OS is not currently an option for me. . .

You're probably right though; once I enabled Legacy USB in BIOS I could use the KB to tell it to boot from a CD. Since it's a clean build I'll just re-install -- and this time NOT use the drivers Intel provided!