How to install XP?

[AndyDavis]

My daughter's HP DX2400 desktop was having problems, probably infected. I decided to wipe it and reinstall XP Pro using the HP Restore Plus CD that came with the PC. The hard drive reformatted OK and it was installing XP Pro when right at the end it asked me if I wanted to install any of the demo CDs (MS Office 2007) that I have. I said no (gives you the option to skip) and it seemed to carry on fine, then suddenly stopped with a "There has been a serious error" message.

Since then there is no sign of life, it starts up and just sits there, Windows doesn't seem to start at all. I've tried to restore again but when I put in the CD and restart nothing happens, just sits there.

What am I doing wrong?

 

[Astra99]

Hi

It sounds like the Restore CD you were using is damaged, and some "rather important" files did not get copied over. Alternatively, it could be your CD drive is worn and/or the laser dirty. Try a CD cleaning disc and re-run the Restore CD. If still no good, can you beg/borrow/scrounge/otherwise obtain a Windows XP installation CD? Once Windows is reinstalled, you may need to download the PC's drivers from HP's website, but please remember to install antivirus before connecting to the internet.

 

[AndyDavis]

Thanks for that.

I cleaned the CDs with an Allsop CD Cleaner kit and tried again, but it made no difference. Nothing happens when I insert the HP Restore Plus CD but when I put in the HP XP Pro CD it seems to go through the motions but still returns the message

“An unrecoverable error has occurred. The installation program cannot complete”

I tried the other drive (there are 2 separate drives on the PC) and no change. I tried repeating using a different XP Pro CD and the same message pops up.

Any thoughts?

 

[Astra99]

When you insert the HP Win XP Pro CD and reboot, do you get the start of the Windows setup screen ------
Oh I've just thought - - - If your BIOS is set for AHCI hard disk access, it requires an additional driver which does not automatically get installed during the initial setup process. Go into the BIOS and set the hard disk access to standard (may be IDE or SATA or even INT13), but the current setting will be AHCI. Then reboot and restart SETUP from the CD. Setup should then continue give you a new clean install! Once installed, provided that the AHCI driver exists, you can revert in the BIOS, but to be perfectly honest, I can find no speed improvement using non-AHCI access.

Anyway, I was going to ask, where during setup does the error message occur?

 

[AndyDavis]

No, it doesn't get as far as the Windows setup screen.

The BIOS setting has always been set to IDE, factory setting. I've tried changing this to AHCI and trying again but no change. I've changed it back to IDE.

The error message comes after the HD has been refomatted by the HP Restore Plus CD and the HP XP Pro CD has been read. The XP Pro installation is (I assume) at its last stage when the error message appears.

I was thinking about starting again, from the reformatting, but nothing seems to happen when I put the HP Restore Plus CD in. Not sure if its just in a funny state because XP Pro didn't complete?

 

[Astra99]

Moderators, please could you tell me how to send a private e-mail to this OP. I would prefer not to discuss one possible solution on the public forum.

 

[gblades]

I would suggest going to http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/ and downloading the ubcd software and burning it to a cd. You can then boot off it and use the various tool to run a self test on your compuer memory and the hard disk. Then you at least know the compuer internals are ok.

 

[AndyDavis]

Thanks for that. I've not come across UBCD but before I started all this I ran MemTest (to test the RAM) and SeaTools (to test the HD). Both reported that the RAM and HD were fine.

How do these compare with UBCD?

 

[xr4x4]

Could be a problem with the cd/DVD drives, or they are breaking down when under hard, continuous use.

 

[gblades]

If you have run those tests you are probably fine. UBCD comes with a whole load of utilities on a single cd. It can test lots of things aswell as having tools to securely wipe drives before reselling computers etc...