Strange Xp Installation problem

[rajaram_s]

Hi..

I am having an unusual problem with the Windows XP installation. After it says, "Press any key to boot from CD/DVD" and then it says "setup is searching for hardware components..." After which it hangs up with just a blank dark screen. The same problem has been discussed in Microsoft's forum too, but no proper answers. My system configuration is as follows:

AMD Athlon X2 3800+ 2.0 GHz running on Asus M2N MX motherboard,
512 MB DDR2 SD RAM 633Mhz,
ATX cabinet,
160GB Seagate 7200 RPM Harddisk, connected via IDE (Not SATA).

If any further details are required, please do let me know. If anybody has experienced the same problem too, please help me with it.

[rajaram_s]

Please people, please do suggest me some way....! My desktop is seeming dead because of this very reason!!

[ghost at rest]

Hi rajaram_s !


Have you installed Linux or Boot Loader of any other OS in your Hard disk earlier? Third Party Bootloaders are main cause of this problem most of the time.
I would suggest you to boot up from SuperGRUB CD/USB/Floppy and select Fix Windows Boot Loader option. Windows Installation CD will definitely work after that.

http://www.supergrubdisk.org

If you have LiveCD of any Linux distro then execute this code in Terminal/Konsole of LiveCD :

sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=512 count=1

*** Please note that dd command will wipe out your Hard disk including partition table and boot loader details. Your Hard disk will be blank as brand new one.
Windows Installation CD will work fine after executing dd command.

[Krow]

This aint any solution, but I'm having a prob with XP installation too, hence I'm posting it within this thread itself.

My HDD's had XP SP3 pre-installed on them. When I connected them to my new rig, my PC kept restarting @ WinXP screen. Could this be due to the older hardware drivers installed on the HDD? I put in the Vista DVD and managed to install Vista x64 hassle-free. Its even running fine, but when I rebooted and set first boot device to CDROM and inserted the XP XP3 standalone DVD, it refuses to boot from it, instead booting into the installed Vista. I tried installing XP with the same DVD in my frnd's newly pimped rig a few days ago, it had given me the same problem, giving some crappy error like BOOTMGR not found. I cn easily install this version on XP on my drives(both) using my old Hardware, but why not the new(mine or my frnd's)? All replies are appreciated. Plz help soon geeks, as I don't like Vista at all, I prefer XP/W7.

[rajaram_s]

yes, I do have the super grub disk... And yes, I was trying out installation of ubuntu before that, but in vain. It was, however successful installing the boot loader.

The box is now running vista (With 512 MB RAM!!! My GOD!) and hence, would it have replaced the old GRUb that was in MBR? SHall I try it from the scratch now?

[ghost at rest]

If Vista is booting up fine then there is no need to worry. Vista installer has removed GRUB. MBR can store only one MBR at a time and installer of all OSes always install Boot Loader ( Linux/Mac ) or chainload code ( Windows OSes ) in MBR.
As Vista is booting up fine, its installer has removed GRUB and installed its chainloading code.

[richard09]

Last week I installed Xp in my computer and found the task quite complicated. Every time I was losing the track in the middle of the whole process. At last my brother advised me to seek help from http://www.supportonclick.com. As I followed his advice my problem was solved at once. The staffs out there helped me to install Xp by following the proper method. I think you should get in touch with them as they might help you out of this strange problem as well.

[rajaram_s]

Thank you ppl.

It worked... True.. Vista had removed the GRUB and I was happily able to install xp into it.. Thank you ppl. so much.. My comp is finally in a usable state..

Rajaram S

[nakulnpant]

ok what u need to do is boot from a win 98 disk
when u get the prompt a:\
type "fdisk/mbr"

this will solve ur problem if it is caused by any another bootloader
after that just format and re install in the drive
8)

[ghost at rest]

There must be a space between fdisk and /mbr.

fdisk /mbr