HowToFixComputers.com

vtowntommy · Member Joined: 14 Aug 2006 Posts: 2

I can't install anything for nothing, the bios overrides any attempt to install win, just says missing operating system over and over, bios sees the drive, winxp writes to it on the first install phase, wont boot hd after reboot. Epox won't answer me how to fix this. Changing the boot order around seems to do nothing says the same thing no matter what, need help about to rip my hair out. has a sempron 3300 chip, does this board need a 64 bit operating system ?

R. C. White · Guest

Hi, Tommy.

HOW are you trying to install Windows?

Are you booting from the WinXP CD-ROM? After the first phase of Setup, the
computer must boot from the HARD DRIVE for the first time. By this point,
the HD must be connected (of course), the proper drivers must be in place,
and the boot order in the BIOS must be set to boot from the HD. The HD need
not be first, but any device (CD? floppy?) before the HD must be skipped
somehow, such as by leaving the drive empty or its door open. (My 8KDA3+
BIOS lets me press <Esc> during POST to bring up a boot device menu. From
this, I can choose to boot from the CD for the present session ONLY; on the
next reboot, it reverts to the BIOS setting for boot device. This comes in
handy for jobs like installing WinXP so that I don't have to change the BIOS
before and after the CD part of Setup. Does your 8KRAI BIOS have such a
feature?)

But I suspect that the actual problem is missing drivers. I'm not familiar
with the 8KRAI and you've given us no clue as to how many HDs you have or
what interface they use. Are they "plain vanilla" IDE/PATA drives? Or SCSI
or SATA? Are you using any type of RAID? We can't see your computer, but
if you'll tell us some of this information, we'll have a better chance of
helping you.

Drivers for plain IDE HDs are built into WinXP, and drivers for SOME other
types are in there, too. But drivers for many kinds of HDs and RAID must be
added during the early stages of WinXP Setup so that they will be in place
and ready for use when WinXP tries for the first time to boot from the HD
and continue to the GUI phase of Setup.

To install such HD drivers, you must have them on a floppy diskette. Then
boot from the CD and start Setup. Very early, as Setup is detecting your
computer's hardware, it will flash a message on the bottom of the screen to
"Press <F6> to install drivers for mass storage devices", or similar
language. Press F6 now; the message will stay for a few seconds, but if you
miss this chance, you'll have to reboot. Setup will continue as though
nothing happened, loading all those hundreds of files. When it finally
stops, there will be instructions for how to use that floppy to install your
drivers. After that, Setup will continue and when it tries to reboot, your
hard drive will be ready for it.

vtowntommy · Member Joined: 14 Aug 2006 Posts: 2

it's an ide quantum fireball set to master, bios sees it as master win writes on first pass to the hd, then after reboot nothing, either the install will restart like it never wrote to the hd, which it did or it will say press any button to continue from a cd boot, but will say missing operating system and wont continue so boot order is superceded by the bios, either way it stops, starngest problem ive ever encountered