I posted a link about that error a little earlier in the thread, check it out. MS says it may be a communication problem. Dirty CD or drive not reading correctly. They give some advice how to fix that error.

If you can get your hands on another XP CD, you might try that. Otherwise if you just cancel the error or ignore, can it continue going? Try and see what happens, or else read the MS article and try that stuff.

actually it cant continue it is a fatal error and it reboots once you click on it.

I do have another xp cd and tried both and the same result. so I dont think that it is the cd(s).

I am stuck with that install not being able to finish and that really pisses me off.

I did see the link, it said something about copying windows to another part of the hard drive and install from there, not sure I know how to do that...

point me in the right direction...

thanks for all your help...

Well, I have tried again, this time I removed the heatsink and fan and put some good ole artic silver on the cpu and did a good placement job and hooked it all back up and went into windows to reload and in the process of loading windows it hangs...

I cant even get anywhere, I keep taking steps backwards...

bummer!!!

Hammer time!

I did it!!!!!!! I am not sure how the heck I did it but Windows xp is now loaded onto my 250gb SATA hard drive... Yippeeeeee!

Now for the trouble of reinstalling everything again, but what the heck..

Now I still need to figure out how to see the rest of my hard drive, it only shows as 10 gig as I configured it in windows...

Disk Manager? where do I locate that at?

Thank everyone for the help...


Billiam

It would nice if you could remember how you got past your critical error, for reference?

I guess you still partitioned the 10gb spot, that's fine. Right-click My Computer and choose Manager. Then in the left column, you'll find Disk Manager. Once you click on that, it will show your drive info on the right. From here you should be able to see the "unpartitioned" space. Right click this area and you can create a partition and format it.

Be sure to load your motherboard drivers to get that chipset working reliably.

Hope it all goes uphill from here. Good luck.

I do agree about having the solution for someone else that would ever have this problem.. The only thing that I did any different was that I removed my jumper off of my bios, from disabled to enabled, that really was the only thing I can think of, and it was by luck that it worked..

I actually installed windows on a 10 gb hard drive and was going to relish myself to using that drive and then having the 250 gb as a secondary drive sort of mounted exteriorly.

So I shut everything off and disconnected everything and then connected the SATA drive and then started the install process, I did get excited when it reboot and I did not see the error, I almost cried... well not really.

Funny though, I had to call microsoft due to my windows xp home edition, had been activated past the "allowed" twice yesterday, once for the 10 gb and then once I got the 250gb up and runnning...

I am now having issues regarding my video card, I am using a visiontek 9600, 256mb.Windows will not install it due to the fact it says to install a standard VGA card and driver first...

I guess I am missing some drivers so I guess its off to the driver site...

Againg Thanks to everyone who assisted me with this issue.

Well just a follow up with my progress...

I am still trying to get my video card to work correctly, I am currently downloading drivers as I type...

Something very odd though? My system has not made the siren sound at all since I re installed everything... coincidence? not sure...

My son is anxiously awaiting the completion of everything working on that system.. its the one he plays his games on.

Thanks

follow up again...

I got my video card to work, I had not installed the chipset drivers like you said Vigilante, so thanks.

pretty weird, I downloaded and installed drivers and all of a sudden my computer found new hardware.. video card.. duh!!

Oh well thanks alot....

Billiam

Great going! You'll be a tech in no time!

Well..... No thanks to the tech thing, I think I was about to go over the edge on this last issue, I spent many days trying to figure this one out and I really dont think I have the patience for that...

I honestly considered removing all removable hardware and having some sledge hammer fun in the garage....

Might have been pretty cool...

Vigilante, I have a question about why do think my system has not did the siren thing since I reinstalled the os? nothing else change, same fan heatsink, same everything, except reinstalling the os and new hard drive... It has run flawlessly since 8:00 am, thats when the son got on to play his game and from what everyone else says he played relentless till 3:00, then was on again til 6, then after that till 8:30 and no errors no siren, no shut down.

hmmmm?

sure would be nice to figure out what the problem was...

Thanks,

Billiam

Sirens almost always mean "something is outta wack here". But to track it down for good, you'll need to look up your motherboard manual and see if it says. If not, research your motherboard model online. Or research the siren noise just based on your BIOS manu, like Award, AMI etc...

But being that you have one of those funky type systems, we may be outta luck tracking down much info about it. I'm still tossing the idea of a case intrusion. And even when it was put back together, it didn't reset itself. Don't know. Just guesses.

I'd also like to know, if you ever find a mobo manual or talk to the people who make the PC.

Well I do have a motherboard manual, it does not help much, there really is not much information at least in this manual, so I am not sure it really is a manual per se'.

I am glad that my system works now, I am going to try to install my 1 gig stick of ram now and see if my system becomes unstable....

Thanks again for all the help..

Billiam