Loading SATA Drivers while Installing XP from Boot

SillyHeatsink · 15 Feb 2009 at 14:54

I'm in a bit of a pickle.

Reinstalling Windows XP Home Ed 32 bit from boot on my brother's PC (Dell Dimension 8100).
The XP CD boots, and I get as far as hitting enter to confirm a fresh XP install.
However, after that it says that no hard drives are detected.
There is one HDD - a Seagate Barracude 160gb, SATA 150. In order to get XP to recognise it, I need to load the drivers separately (by hitting F6) to tell it to load third party drivers.
I have been to the Dell website, and found the correct chipset drivers. However! The .exe downloaded creates a bootable floppy that provides the drivers, and will only provide a bootable floppy.
I don't have a floppy drive, haven't used em since the last century. Does anyone know of a way I can get these drivers into the install? Preferably on a USB or similar.

Cheers guys, any help is appreciated, I'm at my wit's end here.

SillyHeatsink · 15 Feb 2009 at 15:10

Yeah, a USB floppy seems my best option.
I procured an antique Roman floppy from the shed. Problem is, the Dell doesn't have the power supply 4-pin output necessary for floppies. So I have an old PSU now I'm going to jerry-rig it with.
Odd that the Dell mobo has floppy connections, but the PSU doesn't. Then that's Dell for you.
There's bound to be a way of decompiling the .exe to separate out the drivers, anyone know how to do this?

SillyHeatsink · 15 Feb 2009 at 15:12

Skyfall said:
Have you tried putting them on a USB drive? I haven't had to do this for some time, but when I did I had to use a floppy disk.

I'd love to put them on a USB pen drive, but the .exe I downloaded from Dell won't allow me to do that, it only allows for a floppy to be written.
I am tempted to just copy the .exe to the floppy and try and load drivers from that, but that's desperation speaking!

SillyHeatsink · 15 Feb 2009 at 15:19

Nope, DDR RAM.
My google-fu has failed me in obtaining the chipset drivers. I'll look harder after dinner, I really can't be having with this floppy malarky. Getting the drivers in a format which will allow me to load them via USB is the ideal solution.
Cheers for the help, chaps.

SillyHeatsink · 15 Feb 2009 at 15:50

ns400r said:
You won't be able to use a USB pen drive, it will have to be a USb floppy. Best method is to slipstream the drivers into a new Windows CD.

Which chipset does the motherboard use?

If I google Dell Dimension 8100, all I see is the old RDRAM model.

Looks like it's gonna have to be the floppy then.
I don't know the motherboard chipset, but there's a sticker on the board that says CN-0X8582 70821 579 G02M.

Heh, I am a retard, I apologise for my poor typing. PC is a Dimension 9100: http://support.euro.dell.com/suppor...temID=DIM_P4_9100&os=WW1&osl=en&catid=&impid=

SillyHeatsink · 15 Feb 2009 at 16:56

.one. said:
I can not do with out me floppy never been with out it.

Truer words have never been spoken.
I have made a floppy with the drivers supplied by Dell on their support site. So far so good with that, but I came up to a screen making me choose between ICH6 and ICH7. I checked with CPU-Z and it gave me the following information on my mobo:
i945P
82801GB (ICH7/R)
When I booted into the Windows install this time, I hit F6. It then gave me the choice between four drivers to load from the floppy, none of which matched my motherboard. Two were ICH6, two ICH7:
82801 GR/GH SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH7R/DH)
82801 GR/GH SATA AHCI Controller (Desktop ICH7R/DH)

I have tried both. Both result in a BSOD when setup attempts to launch windows for the install. I'm at the end of my tether; I've formatted many PCs including a few Dells but never came across crap like this. I'm going to go hunt for the drivers on the Intel website, since the ones Dell supply are incorrect.

SillyHeatsink · 17 Feb 2009 at 21:30

Bit late for an update, but! in the end I used ctrl+f11 to boot to the Dell restore partition.
Not the ideal solution, as all the pre-loaded adware that came with the system were reinstalled(lol, Dell), but the SATA drivers were simply not wanting to be loaded.
I tried fiddling the BIOS, but the functionality simply was not there (lol, Dell).
Makes you wonder that they sold a PC with a XP disc that did not work with the hardware configuration. Do they not test these things? Ah well, over and done with now.
Once again, cheers for the help!