I appreciate any help or suggestions offered.
I bought an Acer Aspire X1200 which came preloaded with Vista. Two critical programs I use cannot run on Vista and require XP. I reformatted the HHD with FDISK and Format from a DOS command, loaded the Windows XP disk. After all the drivers were loaded from the XP disk, I got the BSOD "STOP: 0x0000007B". I thought there was a problem with the boot sector. I removed the HDD and hooked it to another computer. The Windows install proceeded properly allowing me to partition and format the drive. It loaded the first round of the OS. I removed the HDD and re-installed it to the Acer X1200. BSOD again with the same error code.
I seem to have narrowed the problem to the HDD controller on the Acer. During boot-up I can see that it is using an AHCI controller. Several posts have mentioned XP not having the drivers in its install disk. I have gone into BIOS to change the ACHI to IDE. Unfortunately, this is not an option in the Phoenix R01-A2 BIOS that Acer installed. There are no other BIOS firmware updates or downgrades that I have been able to locate that would allow me to change from AHCI to IDE.
I have tried several different generic AHCI drivers (Intel) slipped into the XP install disk using nLite. These have not worked.
I contacted Acer tech support but they would not provide any information other than "no drivers posted - no support for anything other than Vista". Their website has a file for formatting the HDD (for the X1200) for use in downgrading to Windows XP. However the use of this also results in a BSOD with a STOP: C000021a. Acer has not provided any information as to the actual manufacturer of the HDD controller chipset (where I could get drivers directly from them).
Does anyone know what drivers I can use that will allow me to access the HDD for a Windows install? Also, if I can load DOS and access the HDD, why can't XP installation load?
Any ideas on how I can get Windows XP loaded on this machine?
Thanks
I bought an Acer Aspire X1200 which came preloaded with Vista. Two critical programs I use cannot run on Vista and require XP. I reformatted the HHD with FDISK and Format from a DOS command, loaded the Windows XP disk. After all the drivers were loaded from the XP disk, I got the BSOD "STOP: 0x0000007B". I thought there was a problem with the boot sector. I removed the HDD and hooked it to another computer. The Windows install proceeded properly allowing me to partition and format the drive. It loaded the first round of the OS. I removed the HDD and re-installed it to the Acer X1200. BSOD again with the same error code.
I seem to have narrowed the problem to the HDD controller on the Acer. During boot-up I can see that it is using an AHCI controller. Several posts have mentioned XP not having the drivers in its install disk. I have gone into BIOS to change the ACHI to IDE. Unfortunately, this is not an option in the Phoenix R01-A2 BIOS that Acer installed. There are no other BIOS firmware updates or downgrades that I have been able to locate that would allow me to change from AHCI to IDE.
I have tried several different generic AHCI drivers (Intel) slipped into the XP install disk using nLite. These have not worked.
I contacted Acer tech support but they would not provide any information other than "no drivers posted - no support for anything other than Vista". Their website has a file for formatting the HDD (for the X1200) for use in downgrading to Windows XP. However the use of this also results in a BSOD with a STOP: C000021a. Acer has not provided any information as to the actual manufacturer of the HDD controller chipset (where I could get drivers directly from them).
Does anyone know what drivers I can use that will allow me to access the HDD for a Windows install? Also, if I can load DOS and access the HDD, why can't XP installation load?
Any ideas on how I can get Windows XP loaded on this machine?
Thanks