Install driver to non-booting system?

[Marcus565]

Hi everyone.

I mirrored an old WinXP drive to a new computer, but I didn't take into account that I was moving from an old PATA board to a newer SATA, and the install didn't have the SATA drivers built in.

Now the system won't boot because the drivers for the controller aren't loading. I've got the drivers, and verified they'll work with the board.

Now is there a way to use a boot disk, or Preinstall Environment or some sort of trick to go in and place the drivers on the system so XP would then boot up?

Thanks all.

 

[LookinAround]

I've never tried it but thought you had an interesting question so I googled/researched a bit and found something not too hard to try. See the instructions HERE. Copy the SATA driver files first then try the enable command. Though I think the correct enable command syntax for your case might be

enable file.sys  SERVICE_BOOT_START

where file.sys should be the name of the SATA driver file. (see enable command syntax HERE). Anyway, that's my best guess. Let us know if you try it. G'luck

 

[Marcus565]

Windows says:

The registry entry for the iaStor.sys service cannot be located.
Check the name of the service is specified correctly

Damn fine suggestion though, I didn't know you could even do that in recovery console. My experience with it is mostly fixing dual boot fubars by rewriting the MBR or using chkdsk

 

[LookinAround]

Interesting error message. I was wondering how the driver files actually got installed using that prior method. Answer is: They don't. (is reason for the err msg) That guy's instructions don't work (n)

I have a 2nd guess to an approach. But couple questions

• Do you have a .INF file among the driver files? Simply change its extension to TXT and upload as a text file so I can see. (or maybe just zip up and upload the driver files other then the .sys)
• Can you give me a link to the new motherboard spec?

Here's what I'm thinking: I also found posts about how to add SATA to (non-SATA) XP that's up and running. (see HERE) This involves copying the files to the right places AND then editing the registry to manually install the SATA driver into the running system.
But I would think you could also do "offline" with offline reg edit tools

See http://windowsxp.mvps.org/peboot.htm. I don't know how much work it would be or if it would work in the end, but is another thought for approach