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***CAN'T BOOT FROM WIN XP DISC - UPDATE: DYING PSU TO BLAME!

brigden

brigden

Diamond Member
Sorry for the all-caps title, but I'm pissed off. My roommate just came home with a CD-RW. We installed it on the primary IDE as slave. The new drive was detected under BIOS. I set CD-ROM as first boot device, and HDD-0 as second. I popped in the Windows XP disc and got ready to reformat and start a fresh install...

The computer decided to load Windows ME, the previous OS, installed on the HDD.

WTF?

Why can we not get this computer to boot from the XP disc?

UPDATE:

OK, during the Windows install the system restarted itself. I am at a loss as to where the issue is with this problem. I have tried everything, yet nothing works.

The system is as follows:

Intel Pentium 3 800MHz
Abit VL6
384MB PC133 RAM
Fujitsu MPD3173AT 5400 RPM 17.3 GB HDD
32 MB Diamond Viper V770 4x AGP
52x32x52x LG CR-RW
Panstar 230W PSU

The Windows XP Home Edition is a retail copy.

BIOS settings have been changed to "fail safe."

Setting the CD-RW as first boot device results in the HDD booting only, regardless of which IDE channel the CD-RW occupies. The system posts, the HDD boots, the CD-RW does not. There is no "Boot from CD..." dialogue.

Unplugging the HDD in an attempt to boot via the "redneck way" only works until the HDD is connected (even before the blue setup screen), then Windows Setup asks for the installation disc on A:. If the HDD is connected during the blue setup screen a fatal error occurs.

The only time the CD-RW boots and begins Windows Setup is when the CD-RW is set as Master on the primary IDE channel. Windows will begin setup, but fail when it cannot find an HDD.

I am at a total loss as to what the problem is. I am grateful for any suggestions. Thanks to all who have been posting in this thread.

UPDATE #2:

With a brand-new HDD installed (the old one was clicking and grinding), I flashed the BIOS to the latest version, and with the HDD and CD-RW on seperate IDE channels, managed to get the CD-RW to boot first but during installation the system would unexpectedly restart. This only occurred when the disc was spun at top-speed. This lead me to believe the new CD-RW was drawing too much power from the wimpy 230W PSU on the 12v line.

I installed my 16x burner and managed to completely installed XP. However, as soon as I installed the new CD-RW, the system would shut down. If I popped my CD-RW back in the system would function normally.

Anyway, after having bought a new CD-RW and a new HDD, my roommate has simply decided to abandon upgrading his old POS and has ordered all new parts.

Thanks a million to everyone who replied to this thread.
 
Did you miss the screen that says "press any key to boot from cd". Turn it on and keep pressing enter. Also if you have a quick boot feature on turn it off. Increase the delay for hard drive seek. What are your system specs?
 
I suppose it's possible as the expected "Boot from CD..." dialogue never comes up. I'll try hitting enter over and over...
 
No, that didn't work. Tried hitting enter and turned off quick boot.

The system is:

P3-800
384MB of PC100

The new CD-RW is 52X...
 
So you say the XP was on a Writeable disc, not the original?

If so, whoever made taht disc must ahve forgotten to make it bootable by using Isobuster to put the microsoftcorp.img file in the boot sector of the CD. Believe me, that's how it boots up is if it has that file.

EDIT: See, at the very bottom of this guide successfully make a bootable XP disc w/ sp1a, you MUST put that file in there via ISO buster!!!

GUIDE
 
Yes, he wants XP.

We've tried putting the CD-RW as master on the second channel, but got the same result...
 
Originally posted by: brigden
No, it's a original copy of WIN XP...
Click to expand...

oooh, sry. hehe, i read it wrong. You meant your roomate came home with a CD-RW drive.


So, put that new drive on the secondary ide channel and set it as slave (I assume there is already another optical drive in there).

Then, try booting to the CD-ROM (preferably the sec master), and as you said, the hard drive as the secondary boot device, and the third, who gives a crap. 😉
 
I worked at a pc repair shop. You have 2 options:

in the bios, select to boot from cd as primary boot device, and disable every other boot device.

If that doesnt work, do it the redneck way. unplug the hard drive and boot, when it loads the winxp installer, plug it back in, make sure you plug it back in before the blue screen.

I have had one or two instances where crappy cd-roms/mobos will not boot from the winxp cd but will from other bootable cds, and sometimes not boot from any cd. All I had to so in those cases was boot with another cd-rom, or get a mobo that costed more than $10
 
Guys, I have tried everything. It's baffling!

We've tried two XP discs. Neither worked.
The redneck way didn't work.
Disabling the HDD-0 results in system failure.
Alternate device is disabled. Makes no difference.

I am stumped!

We booted ME and then popped the disc in and now we're installing it from there. I want to do a fresh install though...
 
Its gotta be a picky bios setting somewhere in there then.
i think if you press F10 or F11 in or something like that in Abit Boards you get a boot from... menu.
 
Originally posted by: derekblankmccoy
Its gotta be a picky bios setting somewhere in there then.
i think if you press F10 or F11 in or something like that in Abit Boards you get a boot from... menu.
Click to expand...

That's what I thought, a picky BIOS setting. Hitting F10 or F11 does nothing.
 
I dont remember it could be tab, enter, anything, read your manual.

Does it boot from other bootable cds? If it does, your CD-rom could be one of the older ones which cant read the MBR of the XP CD.
If its fairly new (and by that i mean that its more than 16x) it definitelly is a bios setting.
 
Originally posted by: derekblankmccoy
I dont remember it could be tab, enter, anything, read your manual.

Does it boot from other bootable cds? If it does, your CD-rom could be one of the older ones which cant read the MBR of the XP CD.
If its fairly new (and by that i mean that its more than 16x) it definitelly is a bios setting.
Click to expand...

It's a brand new CD-RW. An LG 52X. We even tried with the old 8X DVD-ROM. Nothing.

I loaded the BIOS fail-safe settings and now nothing will post. What's the multiplier settings for a P3-800?

Christ...
 
OK, does the BIOS detect both drives ok? Can you try the XP disc in another computer? Since it's PC100 SDRAM, I'm pretty sure the multiplier is 8. But that computer is a bit slow for XP, you might want to put 2K on there. I know my Athlon (not XP) T-Bird 1.33GHz w/384MB PC133 is a bit slow with XP, but runs great with 2000. Good luck!
 
LOL
Go through each bios page calmly, make sure all drives are detected and everything is set the way its supposed to be. Take your time.
Eventually youll find out it was something very simple
 
LOL...

We set the multiplier to 6, which was correct as the RAM is 133. Set CD-ROM as first boot device and volia! It worked! Apparently this guy's buddy came over a few months ago and he was screwing around with the BIOS settings. I don't know what stopped the disc from booting, but everything seems to be working now...

Thanks a million to everyone who replied to this retarded thread! Cheers!
 
Have you considered creating the 6 floppy boot disks as a workaround? I've had to do that on occasion, specifically with some old Dell machines that worked great with 98se. Just a suggestion, and I believe the utility for creating them is a free download. =)
 
Have you considered creating the 6 floppy boot disks as a workaround? '

*recalls the horror's of doing that.


I thought there was a way to boot XP by launching a file on the CD, not setup, but a file in the NT directory?
 
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