Second Attempt

zorrofox

zorrofox

zorrofox

Associate
Joined
11 Dec 2005
Posts
123
Location
Dundee, Scotland
Hello everyone.

I have been having loads of problems with an XP Pro installation. I've kinda got it all working but nothing's really working correctly. I need to start again. Since the problems have developed I've been reading a lot of info on-line and this forum in particular. Several of you folks were helping me over in the Motherboards section and I thank you all. I think it's fair to say though that the ball was burst with my initial installation and while all the advice helped it ultimately couldn't undo whatever I had cocked up in the first place. I'm getting all sorts of problems including Windows Update completely failing to install ANY updates and CHKDSK not being able to open the OS disk. You name it, it's went wrong. I live & learn.

I want to start again from scratch. Here are the individual components.

1 x Hiper TypeR 580W PSU
1 x Abit IP35 motherboard
1 x Intel Q6600 CPU
2 x 1GB Corsair DDR800 RAM
1 x Maxtor 160GB HDD SATA
1 x WD 250GB HDD SATA
1 x WD 500GB HDD SATA
1 x nVidia 7800GTX GFX Card

1 x M-Audio 2496 Sound Card
1 x Nebula Digi-TV Card

1 x Windows XP Pro CD

I understand that Windows XP doesn't recognize SATA drives ans as I don't have a floppy drive (nor access to one) I think I need to 'slipstream' the appropriate SATA drivers into the installation. To this end I intend to use nLite. I'm assuming I can't just use my USB thumb drive?

Can someone show me what drivers I need in addition to my XP disc to achieve this?

What should I set the BIOS to before doing this? Does it have a factory default setting I can use?

Should I have everything connected before install? i.e. All three drives connected or just one?

My motherboard has an 8-pin power connector whilst my PSU only has a 4-pin connector? The motherboard manual states that either 4 or 8-pin connectors can be used but that 8-pin is preferable. Is this going to be a problem? I was assuming this was to accomodate over-clocking or more than one graphics card, neither of which apply to my case. Is my assumption correct?

Can anyone think of anything else I should consider before proceeding?

I'm sorry this post is so long and that I come across as ever so slightly incompetent. I did have confidence to do this prior to my first attempt and we can see where that got me. This time it has to work.

Thanks in advance for any advice you people can lend, I appreciate all input.

Gordon.
 
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Thanks for the advice. My motherboard has six SATA ports and as far as I can tell they're all the same. You kinda lost me at the very last bit of your post there though. I have no idea what the "ISCH7" reference means, sorry. Would I be right to do the install with only my DVD drive connected to port 1 and my HDD connected to port 2? If so, should I reset the BIOS to some default level or leave it as it is?

Gordon.
 
Thanks guys. In my BIOS there are options in a sub-menu concerning "On-chip SATA device" like "On-chip SATA mode" which I really don't understand and the manual doesn't really clarify. Anyone have a clue what I should be setting it to? Should I just find a "reset to default" type option instead? Also would I be better to not even have any cards in the machine whilst installing the OS? Thanks.

Gordon.
 
I should've realised that about the graphics, lol. The options in the BIOS I'm referring to are -

Bus Master - Enabled/Disabled
OnChip SATA Controller - Enabled/Disabled
- OnChip SATA mode - IDE/RAID/AHCI (Advanced Host Controller Interface)

I have no clue what these options should be set to in my set-up.

Gordon.
 
Thanks for that. Can I assume my RAM voltages will be printed on the side of the RAM sticks?

I'll be starting this in about 15 mins, just as soon as I've copied off the important files from my PC. That's why I'm asking as many questions as I can right now.

Thanks again.

Gordon.
 
Ok guys. I'm under the desk - headtorch on - and I can't seem to get it to boot from the DVD drive. I've set the DVD as the "First Boot Device" but the system just hangs at the "verifyin DMI pool" screen. Any ideas?

Gordon.
 
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I thought I might get somewhere by loading the Fail-safe defaults. I did, now I have no keyboard. And even less hair.

Gordon.
 
Clearing the CMOS fixed that. Also, I went back into the First Boot Device menu and selected SATA CDROM. That did the trick! I've absolutely no idea why as I don't actually have a SATA CDROM but it's worked.

Gordon.
 
That's it folks. Thanks for all the help and advice, it really is appreciated. No idea why selecting a device to boot from that I don't even have worked but it did - and it's half-past-two in the morning.

Goodnight all, and thanks again. I may be back.

Gordon.
 
I spoke too soon. Installed chipset drivers and rebooted. Istalled LAN and rebooted. Installed Graphics drivers and attempted to reboot...now I'm stuck again at the PCI device listing screen.

Gordon.
 
I changed it back from SATA CDROM to NEC_DVD and all is well. Installation is complete now.

Thanks for all the help and advice folks, I really appreciate it.

Gordon.
 
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