help on removal of vista and load windows xp 2

[porabai]

Hello All

Good Morning!

I am trying to help my neighbor who is not in job (due to recession) He had a toshiba Satellite U300 laptop with visat preloaded. Unfortunately he didn't create the recovery disks earlier and now the system is not booting and showing blank screen. I created the vista recovery cd per instructions in the website and tried to boot thru cd. its booting and loading files but at certain point its showing vista blank screen with mouse pointer on the screen.

I checked the hard drive using hiren boot cd and diagnostics show fail. looks like the hard drive is corrupted or bad.

i tried to use my spare 80gb hard drive and tried to load windows xp on it but i am not able to load as it is showing hard drive not present. Then i took out the hard drive and i am able to format on my external hard drive enclosure. Please advise as what steps i need to follow.

Also if vista is preloaded and experts state that create a windows xp with sp2 cd which i created but still not able to go beyond the options where it prompts user for install xp press enter
for repair Press R

Please advise as how i can help him so that he can save some money during this recession times.

regards
Sean

 

[linney]

Startup Repair.

Startup Repair is a Windows recovery tool that can fix certain problems, such as missing or damaged system files, that might prevent Windows from starting.

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Wi...809f-ed90-415f-a83f-89b42108b3551033.mspx#EFF

Startup Repair: frequently asked questions

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/Help/5c59f8c1-b0d1-4f1a-af55-74f3922f3f351033.mspx

If you enter the Bios are the hard drives visible in there?

Does he need the old F6 in XP option to load drivers to see the hard drive, or Vista's "Load Drivers" via any System Recovery Options? In either case you would not need this option if the hard drives are just IDE hard drives and not SATA.

Assuming you get over the hard drive problem, the next hurdle to overcome is the Driver's issue. These will elaborate the problems you may face.

Vista to XP?.

http://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=1520465

How to install Windows XP over Vista
faq779-6713

Downgrading from Vista to XP
thread1583-1350480

Using DBAN
thread1583-1373898

XP Drivers for a Gateway w/Vista?
thread779-1329243: XP Drivers for a Gateway w/Vista?

How can I install Win XP Pro SP2 on a Vista Pre-installed PC ?
thread779-1373663

Vista OS to xp pro OS?
thread779-1375858

 

[porabai]

Thank you Linney for the tip

When i go to setup in vista with his original hard drive on boot pressed F2 and it goes to bios setup and on info page it shows 1024mb memory and hard drive model number/name is displayed on screen. There is no other area where it shows about the hard drive capacity but upon checking it is 160gb hard drive.

I even removed his hard drive and tried my hard drive which is formatted using external hard drive(NTFS Format) but the xp cd is not recognizing this hard drive too. the laptop is Toshiba Satellite U300 model.

Thanks again for your help.

 

[linney]

How to install and run a FULL Windows XP from a USB drive

http://www.ngine.de/article/id/8

http://www.google.com/search?q=inst...-au&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1

Your friend's hard drive manufacturer will have free diagnostic tools to thoroughly check the hard drive out.

You can also check his RAM via here or use the built-in Vista memory diagnostic tool..

http://www.memtest86.com

It may be time for a repairer to check the machine out in case it is purely hardware related problems you are seeing. I know that your friend is battling hard times but this may be the only solution?

 

[porabai]

Thank you and appreciate your help.

As far as memtest is concerned i cannot go to website on his laptop as its not going beyond black screen with curson icon on center.

secondly. I took out his hard drive and inserted in my usb enclosure but my system is freezing and i had to hard boot my desktop. at this point i got my spare hard drive on his laptop and thought i can install xp by formatting it. but never went thru as the xp failed to recognize hard drive.

I am able to format the hard drive on my external hard drive enclosure successfully.

Per your suggestion, i will give a try by installing Danik boot and nuke on usb drive and give a shot

thanks once again for the tip.

 

[BadBigBen]

xp failed to recognize hard drive.

of course, XP does not have SATA drivers, and thus will not recognize the drive at all... see the HINT that Linney pointed you to by asking about the F6 option, shortly after the BLUE SCREEN of SETUP pops up, right after the F2...

Also look in the BIOS, look close at the drive settings, there should/could be a setting as LEGACY or COMPATIBLE MODE, enable it or set it accordingly (should not be AHCI nor RAID)...

if the above settings are not available you will need to create a XP CD with preferrable SP3 and add the SATA driver to it... use nLite, it is easy and quite good...

Toshiba drivers:

http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/...300-ST3091&selCategory=3&selFamily=1073768663

nLite

http://www.nliteos.com

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[porabai]

Thank you Badbigben and linney.

i tried the Darik's boot and nuke by creating it on cd and typed autonuke and after few seconds i got a message no errors and start and end time.

i took out the cd and inserted the windows xp installation cd but i am still getting the hard drive not recognized.

I would appreciate if you could let me know what files i have to download from toshiba website. should i download the ACPI Flash bios file and use nlite to embed it in windows xp cd.

please advise.

have a great weekend.

Regards
Sean.

 

[porabai]

i got it i should download the intel matrix manager from toshiba site and embed in windows xp cd using nlite. correct me if i am wrong.

regards
sean

 

[linney]

I can't answer about intel matrix manager as I don't honestly know that answer.

As for memory checkers, they do not need an operating system to run, they are bootable media that run without any operating system. You can download them from any working machine and on that same machine, create the boot floppy or CD, and then run it on the problem machine.

 

[BadBigBen]

DBAN = did not wipe the drive, because it would take more time than a few seconds, so I am assuming that it did not recognize the drive at all...

as to the correct driver: You can try the Intel Matrix Storage driver...

32-bit Floppy Configuration Utility for Intel® Matrix Storage Manager

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/T8C...p&agr=Y&ProductID=1809&DwnldID=14796&lang=eng

you will need access to a Floppy drive, and a floppy

here is a ZIP file, I created, that contains the driver that you could try:

http://www.badongo.com/file/15088919

the BIOS though, should have a setting that would make this superfluous...



Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[porabai]

thank you linney and ben

i tried the darik's boot and nuke on dvd and tried for my laptop too as i am getting the cannot install xp after it prompts user to install/repair.

so i used dariks' boot and nuke in few seconds i got message on screen start and end of the process and also told me to remove the media from cd drive. i downloaded the intel storage manager for my ibm pc from ibm website and used nlite and slipstreamed with xp with sp2 version.

i booted the pc but its says it not bootable cd. then i went to bios on next boot and then saw the option for hard drive which shows sata and i changed to compatibility and then put back my original windows xp cd (SP1) and i am able to install xp on my ibm pc.

I just took my neighbor laptop and used dariks cd and got the same message on screen with start and end time of process.

i then inserted my original xp cd but at the prompt i pressed enter for installation which didn't go thru as it shows the same error message as hard drive not found. and also says if u have inserted any drivers or change the hardware remove it and retry again.

now i am downloading the drivers from toshiba and slipstream with xp sp2 version and try and update you again

thanks
sean

 

[porabai]

Hi Linney and Ben

I tried all possible ways. I even changed the hard drive and used dariks cd and wiped out everything. inserted the windows xp cd but i am getting the following error.

A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer.

If this is the first time you've seen this stop error screen, restart the computer. If this screen appears again, follow these steps:

check to be sure you have adequate disk space. If a driver is identified in the stop message, disable the driver or check with the manufacturer for driver updates. Try changing video adapters.

Check with your hardware vendor for any BIOS updates. Disable BIOS memory options such as caching or shadowing. If you need to use safe mode to remove or disable components, restart your computer, press f8 to select advanced startup options, and then select safe mode.
<bold>
Technical information
***STOP: 0x0000007E (OXC0000005, 0xF76120bf, 0xF7A5E208, 0xF7A5DF08)
*** pci.sys - Address F76120bf base at F760b000, datestampe 3b7d855c
</bold>

 

[BadBigBen]

You receive a stop error 0x7E in Pci.sys

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/839641

Remedy: Slipstream SP3 on to the install CD...

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[porabai]

Good Morning

sorry for the late update. tried to update late last night. I did slipstreaming with sp2 updates on different dvd and it worked. also the original hard drive which is 160 gb is corrupted as xp is not installing. i removed it and installed my spare 80gb hard drive on it and it worked.

i googled last night for pci.sys error and it worked as you(ben) suggested.
thank you once again ben and linney for the support. i will later today gave my neighbor his laptop back with his bad hard drive.

 

[BadBigBen]

Glad to hear that you got it up and running...

at least you now have experience in installing, in case this happens again... ;-)

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"