Help with my boot order

[MrMiyagi]

Hello all

My buddy just gave me his HP XW8200 workstation. I've got a copy of Vista Ultimate that's been sitting around I'm now trying to install.

DVD-ROM is IDE
HDD is a 250 gig SATA

I've set the BIOS to boot CD first then to HDD.

Vista started setting itself up no problem...then on first restart during the installation it got hung up on the BIOS for "hit any key to boot from CD/DVD" ...normally it should then skip this and move to second boot device (which is now the HDD with data on it)

It's not doing this though...basically it's not moving down the boot order once the first option has expired.

Any ideas???

Thanks

 

[jackschmittusa]

Change the boot order to hd first.

Granted, it should move on to the 2nd device after 5 seconds, and I don't know why it doesn't, no need to have the cd 1st in the boot order now.

 

[MrMiyagi]

Originally posted by: jackschmittusa
Change the boot order to hd first.

Granted, it should move on to the 2nd device after 5 seconds, and I don't know why it doesn't, no need to have the cd 1st in the boot order now.

Actually already tried that. Does the same thing but tries to boot from HD and just sits there. Does not boot into windows and does not move onto the second option (DVD ROM at this point).

I might try and babysit the installation. Once Vista finishes it's first copying/expanding files and does it's initial restart I'll have to manually use F9 and pick HDD as first. Seems unnecessary and is a pain (esp if I don't catch it in time) but I don't know what else to do.

Dont know why it's no moving down the list

 

[Billb2]

Do you have RAID enabled in your BIOS?

 

[MrMiyagi]

Originally posted by: Billb2
Do you have RAID enabled in your BIOS?

I don't think so, I'll have to check after work.

The computer was working/booting into a previously installed version of XP64 from the SATA HDD drive prior to me attempting to install Vista.

At this point I'm actually getting different errors that wont even let me install windows "windows could not set the offline locale info" and attempting to boot from HDD after that gives me "bootmgr is missing"

This is going to take some fiddling I guess

 

[MrMiyagi]

So I'm not really making any progress so far. Good news though, the boot list problem seems to be fixed.

I fixed the bootmgr problem by rebuilding the boot file in command prompt only to run into another weird "unexpected windows error" down the line that is terminating the install.

I'm wondering if it's an HDD issue at this point. Slapped the WD 250 gig SATA drive into my Black X dock in my old XP comp and windows says it's corrupt. Reformated and repartitioned and placed back into the problem comp...Vista attempts to install with all similar errors...back to the Black X dock and again XP tells me it's corrupt.

My next step after work...I've written zero's the the HDD...I'll see if that makes a difference. Then it's off to try a new HDD...and heck probably a different OS like XP or Win 7.

 

[MrMiyagi]

I realize I'm sorta having a conversation with myself but...

WTF is up with Vista. I just installed XP Pro on the system with zero problems...took 10 minutes. So, at least I know now that it's not a hardware issue...makes things much easier.

Stupid Vista....although I'm going to try and upgrade in the Win environment and see if that works.