Windows XP nightmare

[Research]

Hi!

I'm not sure if I have hit a bug in XP ... but this is what it is:

I got a new Hard drive and wanted to install XP pro on it. I already had it on a sloewer second HD. I started the process... Installed the HD, started my computer normally, inserted XP CD and selected the 'install windows option on a second drive' as shown here.

Now when the windows restarted, I was given 2 options during the boot process:

1. windows xp professional
2. windows xp professional setup

Now, I changed my mind and decided not to install XP on the new disk. I started Windows normally, but to my dismay, I can never get started automatically ever again .. I always get these two options .. How can I get rid of this set-up option. To add to my woes .. the default (auto start after 10 seconds) is XP set-up .. without even having the CD in my hard-drive! Help!

The second problem (which is kind of the root of the above problem) is that when windows is willing to do a clean install, it just cannot find my 250 gig SATA hard drive. It asks me which drive I want to use... gives me bunch of my 60, 80, 120 gigs ... but doesn't even show me the 250 one ...

 

[DaveSimmons]

1. you need your SATA drivers on diskette or slipstreamed into your XP CD in order to install to the SATA drive. XP doesn't have built-in SATA support. search SATA in the Operating Systems forum for lots of info.

2. you probably have a BOOT.INI file text file that lists both boot choices and which one to pick, but I'm not sure you should be editing it.

3. You might want to buy Ghost or Acronis True Image so next time you can back up your C: partition before mucking it up.

 

[JonathanYoung]

To get rid of the boot menu, no need to mess with the boot.ini file. Simply right-click My Computer, choose Properties, and then click on the Advanced tab. Then, under Startup and Recovery, click on Settings. Then, choose your default operating system (I assume you want to change this setting since you keep booting into XP setup), but don't uncheck "Time to display list of operating systems" yet until you reboot and make sure the default setting is correct. Once you've made sure the default is your original XP installation, go ahead and uncheck that box, and it won't prompt you to choose any longer. Good luck!

 

[Research]

Thank you so much for pointing me in the right direction ...

I'll l;ook for SATA driver on the internet. However, regarding the boot.ini, the only file that I could locate is boo.ini.backup containing the following info:

[Boot Loader]
Timeout=5
Default=C:\$WIN_NT$.~BT\BOOTSECT.DAT
[Operating Systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
C:\$WIN_NT$.~BT\BOOTSECT.DAT="Microsoft Windows XP Professional Setup"


I'm not sure how to deal with this. Also, my C drive has inflated by around a gig since I downloaded the updates for ne install. How can I get rid of the extra load now?

Thanks again!

 

[DaveSimmons]

JonathanYoung's instructions should help, no need to manually edit bootfiles. I don't get into these situations so I've never learned the easy way to get out

You should have SATA drivers on your motherboard CD, but you should search "SATA" in the OS forum for what to do with them. I was lazy and bought a regular IDE / PATA boot drive when I put together my XP box last december so I can't offer any additional help there

 

[Research]

Originally posted by: JonathanYoung
To get rid of the boot menu, no need to mess with the boot.ini file. Simply right-click My Computer, choose Properties, and then click on the Advanced tab. Then, under Startup and Recovery, click on Settings. Then, choose your default operating system (I assume you want to change this setting since you keep booting into XP setup), but don't uncheck "Time to display list of operating systems" yet until you reboot and make sure the default setting is correct. Once you've made sure the default is your original XP installation, go ahead and uncheck that box, and it won't prompt you to choose any longer. Good luck!

You are amazing!! It worked like a charm...

Now can I get of this option all together? Remove this option, as well as free space from my hard-drive. I know these set-up files are hidden somewhere on my hard-drive and using so much space (I remember choosing the option to download Updated Setup files" while doing this install!

 

[Research]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
JonathanYoung's instructions should help, no need to manually edit bootfiles. I don't get into these situations so I've never learned the easy way to get out

You should have SATA drivers on your motherboard CD, but you should search "SATA" in the OS forum for what to do with them. I was lazy and bought a regular IDE / PATA boot drive when I put together my XP box last december so I can't offer any additional help there

Thanks you! I do have the SATA driver from my mother board. The drive is working great. It's just when I try to clean install windows on it, this drive does not show as an option to 'install on'

Thanks for continuing to answer!!!

 

[kylef]

Originally posted by: Research

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
JonathanYoung's instructions should help, no need to manually edit bootfiles. I don't get into these situations so I've never learned the easy way to get out

You should have SATA drivers on your motherboard CD, but you should search "SATA" in the OS forum for what to do with them. I was lazy and bought a regular IDE / PATA boot drive when I put together my XP box last december so I can't offer any additional help there

Thanks you! I do have the SATA driver from my mother board. The drive is working great. It's just when I try to clean install windows on it, this drive does not show as an option to 'install on'

Thanks for continuing to answer!!!

First you need to download Windows XP drivers for your SATA controller. You will probably get those from the motherboard manufacturer's web site, or from the maker of the SATA controller chipset. One example is SiI (Silicon Image). When you download the drivers, you'll need to unzip them or extract them onto a floppy disk. To make sure you have produced the right floppy, you can look at the disk's contents and see if there is a file named "oemsetup.inf" in the root folder of the floppy. If so, you've probably made the disk you need.

Then you launch Windows Setup from the XP CD as usual. But pay attention. Near the beginning of setup, a transient message comes up that says, "Press F6 if you would like to specify additional mass storage devices". The message only stays there for a few seconds. You need to hit F6.

Later during setup, Windows will prompt you to insert a floppy disk that contains the drivers for your additional mass storage device, which you JUST put on the floppy disk. Insert the disk, follow the instructions, and hopefully if everything works out, you'll see the drive when Windows setup offers you the choice of partitions available for install.

 

[Research]

Thanks kylef!

I did the F6 thing, and finally found and located my drive. Then it says .. copying files .. and then your computer will restart.

Now the problem is that after it restarts, it again drags me through the same process ... I've already repeated the above process 5 times... Any tips?? I have wasted last 4 hours on this!!

 

[kylef]

Hmmm... spontaneous reboots while copying files in setup, especially if it's onto the SATA drive in question, probably suggests that you're installing drivers similar to what you need, but not quite right. Just enough to get in trouble later

I'm assuming that this is an on-board SATA controller, right? What kind of motherboard is it? Perhaps we can help you find the right SATA drivers.

The only time I've seen something like this happen was when trying to use generic RAID controller drivers for an onboard RAID controller made by Highpoint. When using the motherboard manufacturer's drivers, everything worked fine... but when using the generic Highpoint drivers, things would look fine for a while and then just go haywire later. Sometimes using generic drivers works fine, others not so fine. It depends on the device in question.

Did you perchance download the drivers straight from Silicon Image rather than from the motherboard manufacturer?

 

[Research]

Got it working!!

Tanks for your reply ... Actually, the problem was that boot from SATA was disabled in the BIOS. Even after I enabled it, it took a couple of hits and misses to have it properly detect as a boot drive ...


Thanks everybody for your help!!


By the way, now I'm struggling with windows XP updates, as my computer is hanging every time I choose express update!