Monday, December 12, 2011

Tough one here, XP install related - need true guru.?

I have a machine that will not allow me to install windows xp. As a background, i have multiple microsoft MCP certs, i have done thousands of OS installs using every microsoft product from windows 3.11 through vista premium 64bit.



I was using this as a second home PC, used mainly in the bedroom to watch DVDs and access the internet or play games if someone else is on our primary PC. XP home was installed and running fine until I upgraded the CPU from celeronD 2.66Ghz (single core) to P4 2.8Ghz HT (xp and vista see this as a dual-core cpu). I started getting random shut-downs. No warning, no BSOD, just reboots. I made sure BIOS was configured to enable HT. That didn't help.



Using monitoring software, CPU temps were at the lower end of the normal range as I have a great cooling setup in this case. I try to get this CPU above 54C (well within P4 operating temps) and can't no matter how many apps/games I try to run at one time.



I then figured it was the single core HAL needing to be changed to the dual core/hyperthreading HAL. No problem. Instead of simply trying to update or copy and replace the existing file, I decided to do a clean install. Using the same OS install CD-ROM, a retail upgrade version of XP Home, I run setup and format the C: Drive. Everything is going fine until I try to copy files. Certain files (approx 30 in all) won't copy no matter what I do. I thought maybe my disk had small scratches, but I took it to MMX and they cleaned it and it is better looking than many 'new' cd's or dvd's I have seen.



I try install again and the same 30 files won't copy correctly. Ok, maybe it's just a bad disk. Lets try a little trick. I allow it to install to 100% (obviously, less the files that wouldn't copy). Windows setup has to quit in the GUI portion because Shell32 didn't copy correctly. Well, maybe since setup is trying to run, we can repair the install.



I took out another XP install DVD (this time) and attempted to repair my current installation. Everything fine until it trys to copy certain files.



IT'S THE SAME FILES THAT WON'T COPY. I'm not guessing, I had made a list of the files that wouldn't copy off of the CD and it matched exactly with the files that wouldn't copy using the DVD.



This can't be a problem with a bad CD-Rom or DVD-Rom. I even tried switching out the DVD burner for a CD-RW drive instead. It's definately not a media or drive issue. I have run memtest with both 1 and 2 sticks present and get no errors. I have tried disabling HT'ing in the bios and still get the same results.



Any true PC Guru's out there that have successfully dealt with this problem. I have seen others post questions regarding problems with XP refusing to copy files, but the answers given were usually clean the disk, get a new OS cd-rom, check BIOS, check RAM, etc... the things that I have already done. I am in a somewhat unique position due to the fact that I have licensed copies of Win95, Win98, Win2k (all versions including server and advanced server), XP home, XP media center, Vista 32 HB (also gets disk copy errors when i try to install on this PC), Vista Business premium, and Vista Home Premium 64.



My MOBO shipped from the factory listing the CPU that I upgraded to as supported. I am at wit's end here.Tough one here, XP install related - need true guru.?
did you try this with an other H.D.D?

if i were you i would installed the HDD on a different PC

backed up the info on it

Formatted the whole HDD even MBR sectors

tare a part all the partitions and setting new ones

and tested it again



if it didn't work

i would install Ubuntu or open suse just to see if this problem is on Windows only if not i would install the old cpu and tested it again



it might not make sense but your problem is wired i guess the only way is trail and errorTough one here, XP install related - need true guru.?
Have you tried updating/flashing the bios.
This is leagues above my expertise, but I've had excellent help at support with knowledgeable answers to my specific questions over at bleepingcomputer.com. You do have to register, but they never send you anything.
Have you tried using a different HDD? I was going to suggest one of your RAM modules was bad, but that is not the issue. I also started to think maybe the OS install CD you were using had to be the problem, but I realize that isn't it either. So my only thought is the HDD.
I think this is a bad place to get a pro answer, tried that, doesn`t work, but any way, the problem seams to be the win cd bot the hardware, you could try to create a image of the cd and rewrite it on a new cd using the computer you r using now, you could use bad copy pro trial (http://www.jufsoft.com/badcopy/) to recover the data from the disk.



if is not your main computer you should consider instaling linux mint or ubuntu, is a very good os and is free.

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