Problems installing New operating System

Baxtor · 26 Jan 2007 at 22:26

Hi am having a real problem installing Vista Ultimate Upgrade, I format my HD and insert Vista disk it goes through the copying set up files then says starting windows and the computer reboots, and thats as far as I can get?
Never had a problem like this before, to make it worse I tried my old XP disk and that also does the same now.

BloodWolf · 26 Jan 2007 at 22:29

Dont you need Windows XP for Vista Upgrade? :eek:

Baxtor · 26 Jan 2007 at 22:31

BloodWolf said:
Dont you need Windows XP for Vista Upgrade?

Aye but normally it will ask for the XP disk to be inserted, but I just get a reboot and thats it.

BloodWolf · 26 Jan 2007 at 22:55

Sorry mate I'm clueless. maybe someone else can help.

Brian Stuart · 26 Jan 2007 at 23:00

You need to have XP installed, activated and validated before the upgrade version of vista will install. It will let you install from XP either as an upgrade or on to another drive/partition.
Not very user friendly but there you go

Baxtor · 27 Jan 2007 at 00:02

Brian Stuart said:
You need to have XP installed, activated and validated before the upgrade version of vista will install. It will let you install from XP either as an upgrade or on to another drive/partition.
Not very user friendly but there you go

Ok tried to reinstall WinXP on same disk, reformatted disk 1st and it gets to same spot, copies files then restarts computer and goes through same process in a loop.

Energize · 27 Jan 2007 at 01:10

When it says press any button to boot from cd DON'T PRESS IT or it will keep looping over and over again. If you have to take out the cd, wait for the windows installation to start and then put it back in.

LewisStuart · 27 Jan 2007 at 01:42

yeah, make sure your HD is 2nd on the boot order (cd 1st)

Baxtor · 27 Jan 2007 at 10:04

Yep done that, its not actually getting to the stage where it should reboot and you swap your boot order back to how it should be.
It is rebooting straight after going through the initial set up procedure, very strange stuff.
I have just stripped the comp down reseated memory,cpu and took out 1 of the graphics cards and the sound card, and am just about to try again, will let you know how it goes.

Baxtor · 27 Jan 2007 at 10:14

Something is not right, it now goes through the XP install process but now it locks up on the loading screen with the blue bar going across, cannot get past this stage.
This is with a newly formatted HD

Brian Stuart · 27 Jan 2007 at 10:24

Could be a memory issue. If you have two sticks take one out and try again and repeat for the other stick. Make sure the CD itself is clean and the CD drive is reading it properly. If the PC is overclocked set it back to defaults as Vista especially does not overclocked PC's when it is installing.

Baxtor · 27 Jan 2007 at 18:11

Took me all day but i finally figured it out, it was having the mouse and keyboard set to bios so you can still use them at boot that was causing the reset.
Switching the mouse to OS instead of Bios cured it and it installed straight away, the keyboard is ok set to Bios.

fester · 28 Jan 2007 at 01:35

Try zero writing your drive with Maxtor Maxblast on a floppy disk or from a cd made from the Ultimate boot cd iso http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/. This will leave your hd as is came from the factory ie no boot sectors, partions,formats or traces of vista. Good luck