Problems installing Windowns XP

[essasin]

Here are the system specs
-XP mobile 2500
-2 x 256
-9800np
-120 sata wd hd (single)
-Dfi LanParty
-nec 2500a

After i set up the drivers of the hd and reformat using NFTS (regular) I get errors many errors when setup stats to copy files over before the reboot. The first error i get is cannoy copy the file: si3ii4r.sys. It also asks me if to make sure the ced is in the drive or if i want to skip the prcoess. If i skip the process many other files can not be copied over. i tried a low lvl format using the raid utlilty, trying dffierent cds and cd drives, different HD's, but it always gives me the same problem...i can't copy files over after the formant. Any suggestions?

 

[Hyperlite]

The file you listed there is the Silicon Image SATA driver for your motherboard...do you have a floppy that came with your mobo with SATA drivers on it? you should be prompted to press F6 at the begining of the windows installation to load SATA drivers.

 

[SelArom]

this happened to me once. here's what I did to fix the problem

make sure your cd isn't scratched, if it is, make a copy (and stick in sp2 while you're at it), there's a guide for this online

if you have two optical drives, try installing from the other one

if you have more than one ram stick try taking one out and trying again. your ram might be bad!

when i took out one of the ram sticks on mine it continued just fine. another time, it turns out my cdburner was the master drive, not the dvd as I thought! if this doesn't help, sorry that's all I got!

 

[MrChad]

Try changing IDE cables as well (for your CD drive).

 

[essasin]

Still no luck but thanks for the input

1. I already pressed f6 and installed the silicon image drivers
2. I switched my drive and swtiched my ide cable. I put drive on master. Tried plugging it on ide2 and ide 3
3.tried swaping out different ram (single) in different slots
4. im goin to go out and buy new cdrs to make a frew copy of xp

Any other suggestions? But thanks for all the help.

 

[FingerDemon]

Essasin,

I just went through this SATA hard drive install thing myself. My problem was a faulty primary IDE HD that I wanted to replace. I made my SATA disk of drivers and an XP install CD with SP2 slipstreamed. Unfortunately, that bad primary HD running XP caused errors to be placed into various files on that CD and the floppy with my SATA drivers. (I guess the HD is so bad, it can't even reliably copy files without corrupting them.) The CD I made is a coaster and the floppy is even less useful. I eventually had to download the SATA files onto another PC and copy them onto a floppy to get past the point you are stuck at. Then I had to use the original XP CD and use Windows Update to get SP2, etc.

One note: Just because you think it got past the F6 part that it installed the SATA drivers is not necessarily correct. I think that missing file error means those drivers are not installed on the HD. Which might mean they were never copied from the floppy. I'd verify the correct version of SATA drivers you need and RE-download them and copy them on a fresh floppy from another machine. It's a pain, but that is what worked for me.

Also I noticed that there are a couple of versions of that Silicon Image SATA drivers out there and I ended up getting not the very latest but one before that one. It was a little confusing because I was trying to follow someone's How-To document that referenced file names from the more recent version. But the motherboard maker (ASUS) only had a link to the previous version for download... so I went with that one. In any case, I got it working... finally.

Good luck with it!

FD