System won't install windows

The easiest one to test is probably SATA cable. If that doesn't solve it see if you can find a willing SATA HDD donor :D

Assuming that doesn't fix it you have a duff SATA controller.

SiriusB
 
Yep. :D

This has to be one of the biggest PITA problems i've ever had.
The only other one that comes close is a cd drive i have which prevents a system posting when set to master. That one had me fooled for a long time. :p

I can get hold of another sata hd, i have tons of cables. But my money is on the sata controller. And thankfully i've just discovered my board has a 3 year warranty not a 1yr, so with any luck i can rma it for the second time. And with a little more luck they won't have any to give me back so i'll get a different one or a refund.
 
thefishdude said:
i have a dvd drive that wont detect my windows disc. it will detect every other disc but when i put window disc in sais nothing there :confused: wierd huh
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Wierd indeed. Almost as wierd as having a sata controller which will boot into windows but won't install it. :p Thats what i reckon this problem is.

Anyway i'm going to install windows on my seagate coffee grinder first to check it all works. Never has that sound been more welcome...
 
Are you sure that it is not a small hard ware problem? Maybe dirt has got in to the connectors of the cables of the drives? try taking out the cables, blowing them and then replacing or something.

Or maybe somehow or rather the cable itself is bust, not sure how that could happen though!
 
Dark_Angel said:
Are you sure that it is not a small hard ware problem? Maybe dirt has got in to the connectors of the cables of the drives? try taking out the cables, blowing them and then replacing or something.

Or maybe somehow or rather the cable itself is bust, not sure how that could happen though!
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Yes, i'm going to be replacing the cable shortly.

Its still extremely strange how the drive, cable and sata controller all work fine running windows, but won't install it.


If i install a fresh copy of windows on a harddisk and then boot into another copy of windows, can i make a copy of the clean copy for use in future instead of having to reinstall? Is this the same as ghosting it?
 
I notice with this fresh windows install theres still a discrepancy with the memory. Taskmanager says i have 500mb in use but adding up the total memory in use by all the running processes doesn't come anywhere near 500mb. Can anyone shed some light on this?
 
Joe42 said:
I notice with this fresh windows install theres still a discrepancy with the memory. Taskmanager says i have 500mb in use but adding up the total memory in use by all the running processes doesn't come anywhere near 500mb. Can anyone shed some light on this?
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Hmmm, maybe a stick of ram is damaged then? try taking one stick out then trying to install, then taking the other one and trying that?
 
It passed memtest fine. :confused:
And it reports the full 2gb of ram...

Just did a brief check on my laptop and i don't think the numbers are right on that either, i think there's some unaccounted for.

Are any of you able to do a quick check for me and open task manager and see if the memory you have in use (performance tab, total minus available) adds up to the total listed in use by all the processes under the processes tab...
 
Can anyone tell me, if i copy this windows install from my ide disk to my sata disk will it all work ok?
 
if your still have the "NTLDR Missing error message" then heres what to do if you haven't already tried it

boot from the winxp cd and enter the recovery console

login as administrator and then run "fixboot"

this should recopy the NTLDR back to the disk and it should all be good. if that doesn't make the machine boot then try "fixmbr" but the mbr doesn't sound damamged.

Hope you fix it, its a PITA when this happens. i've had it happen because i powered a machine down for 6 hours. it didn't like that and crapped out on me but one fixboot later and all was good.
 
had the same problem setting up a pc made up of old parts for a my mum a few days ago. It turned out to be one of the memory modules. took one out and it works fine..
 
this might help, i got the NTLDR error once before on a 300Gb maxtor sata drive and the only way i could fix it was to
purchased a new nec dvd drive
purchased a new akasa ide cable(ive read about faulty asus cables that come with boards!)
downloaded a programme called maxblast (the bootable cd version)which does a low level format which takes ages but it completely covers the drive with 0s and theres NO way of recovering data after.
got a copy of xp pro(1 i no that works as i have put it on a pc about 1 hr earlier :D )
set bios to default (no matter what a default bios will let you install xp) granted if using ram that needs timmings and voltage configure them
did the install again and it worked perfectly, but i lost MCE 2005 and all my data(naughty pics and movies :D )
hope this helps m8
 
Thanks for the help and advice.

I'm going to be swapping my sata cable out first, if that doesn't work then i'll try some of those things mentioned above, and if that doesn't work i can get hold of a different harddisk and a different sata controller.
 
Well, i swapped the cable, nothing. Then i swapped the disk, and voila.

So what i apparently have is a harddisk which tests fine on harddisk utilities, works fine, but won't install windows.

Its got a 5 year warranty so sending it back should be easy and with any luck i'll get one of the new single platter ones as a replacement.

My only concern is, what if its just this disk when used with this sata controller, what if it works fine when they test it and they find it not faulty...

Edit: I've just tested it on my other almost identical raptor and it works there too so thats definitely pointing at the disk. I'm going to try the 'faulty' disk again in a moment, just to make sure.

Edit2: Still doesn't work on the other disk, so its definitely faulty. What tests can i do on it that should tell me its faulty? I ran the hitachi disk test and that said it was fine.
 
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The harddisk tests fine with the hitachi utility, fine with the western digital utility, i can store stuff on it etc. However it won't boot windows and windows won't boot from another disk when its plugged in.

So when i rma it they'll run some standard disk checks on it and it'll pass... what could be wrong with it to cause this?
 
I just did some more testing and i've found a serious problem and i don't know what to do. :(

Heres the situation:
I have a harddisk that when i try to install windows on it windows won't start the setup, it just says inspecting hardware and then gives a blank screen.
Do exactly the same thing with my other identical harddisk and it works fine.
So its the harddisk right?

Well, i just plugged the 'faulty' disk into another system and it installed windows fine. :eek:

I've tried different windows cds, different cd drives, different sata cables, different sata ports, different bios revisions, different bios settings, different identical harddisks, and now a different sata controller (and system).

What this is saying to me is i have a harddisk which will not install windows when connected to this sata controller but will install it when connected to another sata controller. Yet other identical disks work with this sata controller fine so it can't be the sata controller.

What the hell do i do now? I can't rma it if it works in another system. I can't rma the board with the sata controller on it because that works fine with another disk...

Edit: I think what i'll have to do is send the disk and board back together, and hope that when they test it using a different psu or cpu or memory doesn't affect it.
 
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