Vista install woes :(

[megakid]

Hi all,

I've just put together my new build as follows:

ASUS P5K 775 motherboard
E6600 2.4Ghz
2 * 1Gb 1066Mhz Crucial paired ram
Sapphire 2600XT Silent.
160Gb WD SATA drive
An older PATA Sony DRU500A DVD+/-RW

Here's the problem:

I attach the PATA Sony drive to the external chipset supporting 1 PATA channel (JMicron I believe) and the SATA HDD to the onboard headers, both drives get picked up by their respective controllers and the Vista CD seems to start perfectly.
This is when the issues start, once Vista has loaded it's Install GUI it seems to hang for quite sometime with just a Vista desktop background and a mouse cursor (sometimes without - i think that depends if I have my mouse connected) with no CD activity. This lasts about 4 - 5 minutes.
The then first screen appears asking which language and then "Start Installation" button. Once I click that, again, 4-5 minutes with little or no activity, then the CD Key entry screen.
I enter that and click next, again, 4-5 minutes until it comes to "Copying files (0%)..." which seems to get "checked off" (ie done) before the CD has even spun up and then I get an error message saying a file cannot be read.

I have tried disabling ALL non-critical bios stuff, I've moved my HDD to the same controller as the CD drive (it has a SATA connector here as well, for RAID I believe), I've checked the disk in another drive, it reads fine.
I've tried the RAM in all combinations, 1 stick only etc.
I connected my really ancient 40Gb PATA drive with Vista preloaded from an old computer and that booted fine (after Vista had sorted out the hardware changes). Can I leverage this to install Vista on my new drive?

I'm really stuck as to what to do next so any advice would be grand. DIMM voltage? What am I missing?

 

[Jumping]

If you are gettign the message cannot read file during install most likely its due to your media being scratched, dirty etc.

Check your install media and if possible try another disc.

 

[Snakedoctor]

If your memory is playing up it can cause data to become corrupt from media. Try installing with one stick fitted or increase voltage to memory a little. Perhaps run some memory checking software on it.

 

[sid]

If you are gettign the message cannot read file during install most likely its due to your media being scratched, dirty etc.

Check your install media and if possible try another disc.

Yes try another media or different OS perhaps

Btw vista does copy files to the hdd instantly. It will check done even before its done anything, that is normal, dont ask me why. Perhaps its just a bug.

sid

 

[megakid]

Thanks for the suggestions guys.

I tried a different media (same image) - same result. As I said, I booted up on my old install (using the same media) and that worked fine but just to double check I ran the Windows Vista Memory check and that didn't find anything up with the memory.

The only thing I cant really rule out is the IDE controllers, the CD drive (although it "boots" fine from the CD, no delays or frequent spin down/up cycles - it only starts hanging for 4-5mins per screen once the GUI is loaded), the graphics card and the motherboard in general.

Any other ideas? A temp solution, can I install Vista onto my new drive once I've booted into my old installation ... and then remove the old installation drive?

 

[megakid]

UPDATE: Yey, got it running. Basically tried the whole thing from scratch again, reset CMOS etc and although it took 20 mins before it got to the "Windows is copying files" stage and went straight past it like sid said above, I just waited and waited, this time the error didnt show up and it installed, now it's running sweet

Thanks all...