Help: Having huge trouble installing WinXP Pro on a 160 gb hdd

[nealh]

I have 2 maxtor 160 hdd with 8 mg cache...both made in May 2003

I have been trying to get a stable install of winxp pro with sp1 slipstremed installed....I have used maxblast software to format and partition and then try to install winxp sometimes the install works but then crashes when I try to install winxp updates..other times I get failures during install

My setup:
P4 2.4 133 fsb I am not overclocking during install
512 ram
IT7 Max2 rev2 mobo

the hdd is on the hpt ide 3 channel no other drives are hooked up and I am using latest bios on my mobo and hpt 374 drivers..both support large hdd over 137 gb

After several tries last night I did a full data wipe off one of the drives to clean off any residual crap took like 4 hrs ...the nreinstalled winxp pro and the updates off MS website get crashing and rebooting the system

 

[Woodchuck2000]

What happens if you boot off the CD and format and partition during the setup process rather than using the Maxblast software?

 

[Fiveohhh]

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000
What happens if you boot off the CD and format and partition during the setup process rather than using the Maxblast software?

Thats what I'd try also

 

[nealh]

Accordong to maxblast software they do not recommend using winxp for this since the drive is greater than 137 gb...I may retry but I had trouble getting winxp to work ..at one point it said it could not partition the drive as it was "bad"...it is brand new...so I figured it had to do with dive size and winxp pro not liking a large hdd greater than 137 gb....

wonder if I should retry with my second 160 gb drive... may regive it a try...

thanks for the input

 

[Fiveohhh]

try formatting it with a smaller part and than extend it later than

 

[nealh]

are you suggesting only partition one part of the hdd and leave the rest unpartitioned so win xp pro only sees the c drive....

thanks for the idea

 

[Fiveohhh]

yeah just setup one partition thats smaller than 137 and than extend it once you get xp up. Or just try and see if xp will do it when you boot from the cd..

 

[bsobel]

What kind of failures are you seeing? I had a system here I ripped apart due to XP being unstable, turned out to be a bad IDE cable on one of the mirrored drives. Data corruption would occur, but since they where mirrored it wasn't immediately apparent. All kinds of weird results. Anyhow, one more thing to go check...
Bill

 

[nealh]

I should not I have done a complete wipe of data on the 160gb with writing of zeros on the entire drive by maxblast software...takes like 6 hrs so there is no garabage left but the clean installs still seem like crap

The problems have been an inability to get winxp pro to install
I will get a failed to copy a driver during initially copying of files..always a different one and it occurs on some installs not all..
If I get passed the initial copying then winxp pro will start to install all the devices, and networking then fail at the very end....

I have gotten 2 installs to complete but winxp pro seems more unstable. I will install programs and I get reboot during the process..for example office xp would reboot everytime I tried to install MS Access...then I did not install access and everything was ok....(I have used the office disc before on my 80 gb hdd will no issues)

Also trying to download the winxp pro updates will cause reboots not a soft lock but a complete reboot..I literally need to install a couple at a time to avoid a problem

the Winxp pro that I have up and running now .... is more flaky alot of disc access after booting for several minutes....slow opening of programs...crashes produce BSOD, reboot and hard lock that require a reset

My older Winxp pro install on my 80 gb hdd seems a bit sluggish but is very hard to produce a hard lock up or a reboot...

I had gotten 2 160 gb hdd to replace to 80 gb drives and hoped to dump one 80 gb drive to FS/FT forum and put one in my wifes machine

Now I wish I never did this ...I have used my current winxp pro disc for three other installs..on older smaller hdd with no issues..in fact it was the some install of windows I ever experienced....


this has been an effort in torture.... I wonder if the mobo is just not happy with these drives

Now i am thinking of going with my WD 80 SE as boot drive and using 1 160 gb in the machine, place one in my fw enclosure and replace the other 80 gb in my wife's machine and sell a 120 gb and 40 gb drive...

 

[IsOs]

I installed Windows XP Pro on a new Western Digital 160GB Harddrive connected to the Promise RAID IDE connector of MS-6758 motherboard. When the CD bootup, I press F6 to load the controller/RAID driver. I formatted the drive and completed the installation without any problem.

Sounds like you are having hardware problem causing your installation to error out.

My 160GB harddrive came with a controller card but I did not use it. Did yours came with one? If so, try using it.

 

[nealh]

I agree there is probably a hardware issue...

I have updated the bios on the IT7 Max 2 rev2 to support 137 + gb drives...using most recent drivers too

How new is your mobo?
IsOS what version of winxp pro with sp 1 slipstremaed or not?

My hdd did come with a controller card but I have wanted t oavoid using it but maybe I should.....

 

[IsOs]

I just bought this motherboard last month, refurb from newegg. The BIOS was the original version when I first installed my 160GB WD. I was overclocking much better with the original BIOS. Now that I updated the BIOS, I had to lower my FSB to only 205.

SP1 was NOT slipstreamed in my Windows XP Pro OEM CD. I had to download that separately. My problem is that I was using NetBEUI for home LAN and after installing SP1, I can't connect to any of the other Windows 2000 computers in my home. I'm forced to use IPX protocol.

By the way, I could only afford one 160GB harddrive. BIOS reported it as being enabled for RAID 0 but not sure if it actually being stripped or just treated as 1 regular drive.

I hooked up a 80GB in the Primary IDE port of the motherboard and was able to GHOST the 160 drive to the 80GB harddrive. The GHOST drive booted up correctly either the Primary IDE or the RAID IDE port.

 

[nealh]

I have so perplexed by this issue..I having been using the HPT controller on my mobo that allows for extra ide/raid or even sata....I went ahead rewiped one of my 160 gb drives and placed it on ide 3 and tried to use winxp pro to format just a small partition(11 gb) and it installed the initial files went into setup and install of winxp and the nafter installing the network stuff started copying all the files and crashed again

so what i am going to try is to wipe an 80 gb drive and install on there and see if it goes ok...if so it is either a mobo bios issue or HPT drivers....I have checked my bios to confirm it supports large hdd and doubled checked the drivers to make sure they support the large hdd as well...

I also pulled out my ata133 card from maxtor and checked to see if the mobo will boot from this and looks like it will so I may give this a whirl too

Very weird