Installing Windows XP onto a blank Harddrive

[JumpManboy]

I have just built my first PC and everything was going well until it came to installing windows, I Have tried everything but all I get is a repeat cycle of; Windows is checking your hardware configuration, then the option to format the drive, then the installation of files, then the computer restarts and goes back to Windows is checking your hardware configuration.

Can anybody help?

I'm not sure if you need the specs but here they are...

Windows XP Home Edition SP2
Intel Pentium 4 E 3.0GHz Prescott Processor and Heatsink/Fan
VANTEC Tornado Fan
Maxtor 200GB Hard Drive Disk SATA 150
2x Kingston 512Mb DDR Memory Modules
Gigabyte 8S655FX-L Motherboard

 

[Blitze105]

Your bios might be set wrong...
enter the bios and make sure it can boot from your hard drive

 

[JumpManboy]

The problem looks a little like this;

Verifying DMI Pool Data ............
Boot from CD :
BOOT DISK FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER >

Boot from CD: >

Setup is inspecting your computerÂ’s hardware configuration >

Windows Setup
(Setup is loading files > Setup is starting windows)
>

Windows XP Home Edition Setup

Welcome to Setup.

This portion of the setup program prepares Microsoft <R> Windows <R> XP to run on your computer.

To set up Windows XP now press ENTER.
To repair a Windows XP installation using Recovery Console press R.
To quit Setup without installing Windows XP, press F3.

<ENTER>

Windows XP Home Edition Setup >

Windows XP Licensing Agreement

<ACCEPT>

The following list shows the existing partitions and unpartitioned space on this computer.

To set up Windows XP on the selected item press ENTER
To create a partition in the unpartitioned space, press C
To delete the selected partition, press D

194475 MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on bus 0 on atapi [MBR]

*C: Partition 1 [NTFS] 1994466 MB (193948 MB free) *
Unpartitioned Space 8 MB


<ENTER>

You chose to install Windows XP on a partition that contains another operating system. Installing Windows XP on this partition might cause the other operating system to function improperly.

CAUTION: Installing multiple operating systems on a single partition is not recommended. To learn more about installing multiple operating systems on a single computer, see

Microsoft Homepage

using Internet Explorer

To continue Setup using this partition, press C
To select a different partition, press ESC.

And thatÂ’s about it, everytime I install windows it just goes back to the top of my description and continues through until the end.

 

[Blitze105]

I should really stop posting when i am that tired...

go here and get this floppy:
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=1386

Save it to my documents, then open it with a floppy in your A drive. After that itll make the floppy. Reboot with the floppy in your drive and boot from it. Format using the disk and then try installing windows.

 

[EricB]

or look in my signature for it or the cd.iso file

 

[JumpManboy]

Still not working.

I always thought that the tricky bit of this would be the actual making of the computer, not the part where I just have to insert a CD.

Thanks for your help so far guys, much appreciated.

 

[EricB]

I have just built my first PC and everything was going well until it came to installing windows, I Have tried everything but all I get is a repeat cycle of; Windows is checking your hardware configuration, then the option to format the drive, then the installation of files, then the computer restarts and goes back to Windows is checking your hardware configuration.

Can anybody help?

I'm not sure if you need the specs but here they are...

Windows XP Home Edition SP2
Intel Pentium 4 E 3.0GHz Prescott Processor and Heatsink/Fan
VANTEC Tornado Fan
Maxtor 200GB Hard Drive Disk SATA 150
2x Kingston 512Mb DDR Memory Modules
Gigabyte 8S655FX-L Motherboard

just wondering. after it run through setup and install the files it then will reboot. when it reboot and say hit a key to boot from cd, do you hit a key?

that sound like you might be doing that. at this point (the second time around that it says this) you are suppose to ignore the "hit a key" part and let windows finish installing itself. if you keep hitting a key you will go over and over, again and again.....

 

[saravanakumar]

u should have been hitting any key after the first reboot also......ignore the message else go to bios and change the first boot priority to hard disk after the first reboot....

format and partition your drive first and perform a clean installation.

 

[JumpManboy]

If the Windows CD is in the drive then it returns to setup automatically. If there is no Windows CD then it says 'BOOT DISK FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER' so I do.

 

[Osiris]

When you get to this point:


The following list shows the existing partitions and unpartitioned space on this computer.

To set up Windows XP on the selected item press ENTER
To create a partition in the unpartitioned space, press C
To delete the selected partition, press D


Delete the partition and then install windows