XP Pro install stuck: repeats after first system restart

I'm installing XP Pro from an original full retail CD, pre-SP1, on a new
computer (upgrading my old hardware). It goes fine until the first system
restart, after which everything repeats as if nothing had happened. Except,
after I choose a partition, the installer says there's another operating
system installed, which must be XP from the first time around. I'm
installing to a 200GB FAT32 partition, which is the first partition. The
hard drive is SATA running in IDE mode. If I try to boot from the hard drive
itself, I get a disk error. I assume the system should boot from the CD
after the restart and then notice that it's already written to the disk, but
for some reason this isn't happening.

Any help very much appreciated.

The problem is related to 48-bit LBA and disks larger than 137GB.
Because the XP cd that you are using doesn't have SP1 or later it cannot
properly use disks that are larger than 137GB. Slipstream your cd with
SP2 and you should have no problems. Alternatively, create smaller
partition on the disk for the XP installation and after you install SP2
you can create another partition in the unallocated disk space. Also,
why FAT32? Unless you have compelling reasons to use FAT32 you would be
better off using NTFS, esspecially on such a large disk.

John

Alfredo wrote:
> I'm installing XP Pro from an original full retail CD, pre-SP1, on a new
> computer (upgrading my old hardware). It goes fine until the first system
> restart, after which everything repeats as if nothing had happened. Except,
> after I choose a partition, the installer says there's another operating
> system installed, which must be XP from the first time around. I'm
> installing to a 200GB FAT32 partition, which is the first partition. The
> hard drive is SATA running in IDE mode. If I try to boot from the hard drive
> itself, I get a disk error. I assume the system should boot from the CD
> after the restart and then notice that it's already written to the disk, but
> for some reason this isn't happening.
>
> Any help very much appreciated.

Thanks, John. I created a slipstream CD with SP2, but I'm still having the
same problem. After the first restart, if I let it boot from the hard drive
(which is what I'm supposed to do, right?), I get "Disk read error". And, as
before, if I boot from the CD the installation just starts over.

I'm using FAT32 because I'm dual booting with Ubuntu Linux, and Linux can't
write reliably to NTFS. I've not heard any clear statement of why NTFS is
better than FAT32. Is it more space-efficient? It doesn't seem to fragment
any less, and I've not heard of FAT32 being any less reliable, but I don't
really know. If NTFS really is better, then maybe I'll set up a small FAT32
extra partition that both XP and Linux can read and write from; then XP's
main partition can be NTFS.

"John John" wrote:

> The problem is related to 48-bit LBA and disks larger than 137GB.
> Because the XP cd that you are using doesn't have SP1 or later it cannot
> properly use disks that are larger than 137GB. Slipstream your cd with
> SP2 and you should have no problems. Alternatively, create smaller
> partition on the disk for the XP installation and after you install SP2
> you can create another partition in the unallocated disk space. Also,
> why FAT32? Unless you have compelling reasons to use FAT32 you would be
> better off using NTFS, esspecially on such a large disk.
>
> John
>
> Alfredo wrote:
> > I'm installing XP Pro from an original full retail CD, pre-SP1, on a new
> > computer (upgrading my old hardware). It goes fine until the first system
> > restart, after which everything repeats as if nothing had happened. Except,
> > after I choose a partition, the installer says there's another operating
> > system installed, which must be XP from the first time around. I'm
> > installing to a 200GB FAT32 partition, which is the first partition. The
> > hard drive is SATA running in IDE mode. If I try to boot from the hard drive
> > itself, I get a disk error. I assume the system should boot from the CD
> > after the restart and then notice that it's already written to the disk, but
> > for some reason this isn't happening.
> >
> > Any help very much appreciated.
>

Okay, I converted the partition to NTFS, and now the install goes smoothly
(with the slipstream XP + SP2 CD). I guess I just can't install to such a
large FAT32 partition. Anyway, thanks for all the help.

"John John" wrote:

> The problem is related to 48-bit LBA and disks larger than 137GB.
> Because the XP cd that you are using doesn't have SP1 or later it cannot
> properly use disks that are larger than 137GB. Slipstream your cd with
> SP2 and you should have no problems. Alternatively, create smaller
> partition on the disk for the XP installation and after you install SP2
> you can create another partition in the unallocated disk space. Also,
> why FAT32? Unless you have compelling reasons to use FAT32 you would be
> better off using NTFS, esspecially on such a large disk.
>
> John
>
> Alfredo wrote:
> > I'm installing XP Pro from an original full retail CD, pre-SP1, on a new
> > computer (upgrading my old hardware). It goes fine until the first system
> > restart, after which everything repeats as if nothing had happened. Except,
> > after I choose a partition, the installer says there's another operating
> > system installed, which must be XP from the first time around. I'm
> > installing to a 200GB FAT32 partition, which is the first partition. The
> > hard drive is SATA running in IDE mode. If I try to boot from the hard drive
> > itself, I get a disk error. I assume the system should boot from the CD
> > after the restart and then notice that it's already written to the disk, but
> > for some reason this isn't happening.
> >
> > Any help very much appreciated.
>

You're welcome.

John

Alfredo wrote:

> Okay, I converted the partition to NTFS, and now the install goes smoothly
> (with the slipstream XP + SP2 CD). I guess I just can't install to such a
> large FAT32 partition. Anyway, thanks for all the help.
>
> "John John" wrote:
>
>
>>The problem is related to 48-bit LBA and disks larger than 137GB.
>>Because the XP cd that you are using doesn't have SP1 or later it cannot
>>properly use disks that are larger than 137GB. Slipstream your cd with
>>SP2 and you should have no problems. Alternatively, create smaller
>>partition on the disk for the XP installation and after you install SP2
>>you can create another partition in the unallocated disk space. Also,
>>why FAT32? Unless you have compelling reasons to use FAT32 you would be
>>better off using NTFS, esspecially on such a large disk.
>>
>>John
>>
>>Alfredo wrote:
>>
>>>I'm installing XP Pro from an original full retail CD, pre-SP1, on a new
>>>computer (upgrading my old hardware). It goes fine until the first system
>>>restart, after which everything repeats as if nothing had happened. Except,
>>>after I choose a partition, the installer says there's another operating
>>>system installed, which must be XP from the first time around. I'm
>>>installing to a 200GB FAT32 partition, which is the first partition. The
>>>hard drive is SATA running in IDE mode. If I try to boot from the hard drive
>>>itself, I get a disk error. I assume the system should boot from the CD
>>>after the restart and then notice that it's already written to the disk, but
>>>for some reason this isn't happening.
>>>
>>>Any help very much appreciated.
>>

hello, I have a problem installing a retail copy of windows on my machine,
due to my old IDE hard drive dying, I had to purchase a new hard drive thats
SATA, it's only an 80 gig hard drive, thats been formatted to NTFS, one
partition, when I boot from cd, it goes through the steps of instillation,
(after I put in the floppy disk with the SATA drivers on it) does the setup
CD recognize the hard drive , only to the first reboot, after it installes
the files needed for windows on the hard drive, it reboots, and cant find the
hard drive, and asks to boot from cd or floppy, I have a 3rd party set of
drivers for the motherboard, and they only work when the install cd askes me
to chose the driver from a list, thats on the floppy, is there anyway I can
make a startup disk with the raid SATA drivers on it, so I can boot from a
floppy when I install Xp? any help will be much appreciated. And thank you
for your time