BleepingComputer.com: "1st Floppy Drive" Suddenly Appears In Bios

I noticed a computer booting slower than normal because it was pausing before the WinXP screen. One of the first things I checked was the boot order in the bios, and suddenly I see a "1st Floppy Drive" listed there that has never been there before. This pc doesn't have a floppy drive, so I removed the "1st Floppy Drive" listing from the "Boot" > "Removable Drives" selection. This fixes the problem of it appearing in the boot order and slowing down the computer's boot time, but why is it suddenly showing up in my bios to begin with? Can I remove it altogether?

This happened shortly after I ran a chkdsk (auto fix errors). I'm not sure if this is coincidence or not -- I don't really see how chkdsk could cause this.

This is an emachines pc. It uses their own bios for an intel motherboard. There are no bios updates from the manufacturer.

System manufacturer and Exact Model(if name Brand):
Bios Revision:

need to see what you have before I can get into correcting the problem.

System manufacturer and Exact Model(if name Brand): emachines T2958
Bios Revision: SR84510B.44T.0038.P07

The first floppy is the default on some BIOSes, particularly when the default settings are triggered by removing/replacing the battery or shorting the CMOS jumper. I found this out the hard way .

I suppose that you can disable the floppy in the CMOS settings, but I would not do that.

Louis

need to find out why it started showing up. a good tech doesn't do quick fixes.

okay, I may have an answer.

what antivirus do you use. version number of it?
what antispyware do you use. and version number of it?
what system software cleaner do you use? version?

On this computer...

> what antivirus do you use. version number of it?
Avira AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic 7.06.00.270

> what antispyware do you use. and version number of it?
None on-access. Spybot 1.5, Ad-Aware 1.06, Ewido 4, and SuperAntiSpyware 3.9 have all been used on-demand.

> what system software cleaner do you use? version?
None. I "clean up" manually. I use chkdsk and Windows Defrag (usually in safe mode) if those count.

okay, spybot has a nice utility that runs at startup called teatimer, I'd suggest you use it.

never used Avira. but the reviews I've read are decent.

download http://www.ccleaner.com/ install it and run the cleaner, and then run the registry option (may take multiple passes till it says no errors).

then run http://housecall.trendmicro.com/ will take a hour or so for a complete scan.

when finished, let me know the results.

Housecall comes up clean. This computer shouldn't be infected because all of the above scanners were used to clear an old infection and have come up clean ever since. The HJT log is clean too.

I don't use registry cleaners because I've seen them lead to a re-install of Windows on more than one occasion, CCleaner included. I sometimes delete obviously orphaned keys manually, but I don't spend too much time on that.

I suppose it is possible that something triggered a reset of the bios like previously mentioned, although I have no idea what. Disabling the "1st Floppy Drive" under "Removable Drives" seems to correct the problem enough.

Thanks for your time on this.

Housecall only ran for less than an hour? I would say there's something wrong, even on a clean machine should take a hour.