Corrupt Cab Files that are not

[Anubis]

Hi,

I've just come to install some software on my system. There were
several errors where the file extracted failed a CRC check. Now the
disks install OK on other systems. They even copy across and can be
extracted on my system. So I am a bit puzzled about it.

I have a Athlon 64, my first AMD, and XP Pro, SP2. My only system on
SP2.

I've had the problem before on the system and I've reinstalled the OS
twice. Then it seems to be corrupted when I install some additional
SW.

I've had the problem previously but the installs have all finished and
all I did was make a note of the files and copy them across from
another system to make the SW OK.

This one however says it has failed and uninstalls everything so I
can't do that.

I suspect I have some OS software that has been updated but I've got so
much data on it now I don't want to have to reinstall it all.

Any ideas?

Regards

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

I would suspect that the problem may stem from the media or drive that the
software is being installed from. Cleaning the CD lens with a cleaner disk
and wiping the disk with a lint free cloth may help avoid file copy
corruption.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[Anubis]

Rick,

Thanks for that. I've already tried to install from another drive.
In addition I copied the entire CD on to my HD. It copied OK but
failed an install from the HD. Each try btw comes up with different
files that fail. It is really confusing as it is not repeatable in as
much it fails the same way each time but with different files.

Regards

 

[Kerry Brown]

Rick,

Thanks for that. I've already tried to install from another drive.
In addition I copied the entire CD on to my HD. It copied OK but
failed an install from the HD. Each try btw comes up with different
files that fail. It is really confusing as it is not repeatable in as
much it fails the same way each time but with different files.

Regards

Try a different optical drive and cable. Make sure for the test nothing else
is hooked up to the cable. If it still fails test your RAM. www.memtest.org
Let it run for several hours. If the RAM tests OK then it starts to get
complicated. Is the power supply adequate for what you have installed?

Kerry

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

It is possible that there are corrupt sectors on the hard drive, and they
have not been marked as unusable yet. Click start/run, type cmd and click
ok. Then run "chkdsk C: /r" from the prompt, you will need to follow the
prompts to schedule it to occur on reboot as you cannot dismount the system
drive while Windows is running. Then reboot the system and allow the disk
checker to do its job.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[DanS]

Rick,

Thanks for that. I've already tried to install from another drive.
In addition I copied the entire CD on to my HD. It copied OK but
failed an install from the HD. Each try btw comes up with different
files that fail. It is really confusing as it is not repeatable in as
much it fails the same way each time but with different files.

Regards

is the message that 'file is missing or corrupt' ? i to have seen this
happen, in my case trying to install server2003. it turned out to be a bad
RAM stick.

 

[Anubis]

Mmm. I must admit I had not thought of bad memory.

I've changed the data cable. I've ran chkdsk on it as suggested plus
the windows disk properties chkdsk. No errors detected.

I've removed each memory stick and tried the install and memtest ran
for over 50 cycles and detected no errors.

Is it possible that there could be a software problem. It was my first
thought. Could the 64 bit processor running XP non 64 bit be threading
wrong and allowing a check before the system has finished the CRC or
something?

How can I verify the system files with what is on the install CD
without doing them individually?

I'm leaning towards another OS install but it will be a real pain so I
want to avoid it if I can. If I do I will stick to SP1 I think. Any
thoughts?

 

[Kerry Brown]

Mmm. I must admit I had not thought of bad memory.

I've changed the data cable. I've ran chkdsk on it as suggested plus
the windows disk properties chkdsk. No errors detected.

I've removed each memory stick and tried the install and memtest ran
for over 50 cycles and detected no errors.

Is it possible that there could be a software problem. It was my first
thought. Could the 64 bit processor running XP non 64 bit be threading
wrong and allowing a check before the system has finished the CRC or
something?

How can I verify the system files with what is on the install CD
without doing them individually?

I'm leaning towards another OS install but it will be a real pain so I
want to avoid it if I can. If I do I will stick to SP1 I think. Any
thoughts?

It is unlikely to be a software problem but you never know. It could be a
driver problem. I have seen similar problems with early versions of the
Intel Application Accelerator. From all the tests you have described it
sounds like something in the IDE system is going wrong. We would need to
know more about your hardware. How many drives? How are the drives hooked
up? What motherboard and CPU? What power supply?

Kerry

 

[Anubis]

OK.

I'm removing the HD and going to reinstall on a spare HD I have. See
if I can replicate it on a fresh install. That way I won't lose
anything.

System is;
Gigabyte GA-K8NF-9
AMD Athelon 64 3500+
1Gb Ram
XP Pro V2002 with SP2
nVidea GeForce 6600
LiteOn DVD
LiteOn DVD RW
Power 400W

It's been running OK since I bought it at the beginning of the year
except for this problem which has happened before. Last time the
install finished without removing the faulty files and I just copied
the files from another system.

 

[Kerry Brown]

OK.

I'm removing the HD and going to reinstall on a spare HD I have. See
if I can replicate it on a fresh install. That way I won't lose
anything.

System is;
Gigabyte GA-K8NF-9
AMD Athelon 64 3500+
1Gb Ram
XP Pro V2002 with SP2
nVidea GeForce 6600
LiteOn DVD
LiteOn DVD RW
Power 400W

It's been running OK since I bought it at the beginning of the year
except for this problem which has happened before. Last time the
install finished without removing the faulty files and I just copied
the files from another system.

Is the hard drive a SATA drive and is it the only hard drive? I have seen
problems with this chipset when there is only one SATA hard drive and SATA
RAID is turned on. Looking at the motherboard manual SATA RAID enabled is
the default. If you only have one drive disable SATA RAID. If you have more
than one drive and they are configured in a RAID setup then download the
latest nForce chipset and RAID drivers from Nvidia. Also if you have more
than one drive you may be maxing out your power supply. Some 400 watt power
supplies could not handle this configuration. The GeForce 6600 alone could
be up to 120 watts. The nForce chipset uses DDR ram which can be quite a
draw with some brands of RAM, the CPU is around 60 - 70 watts, when you add
fans, the voltage regulator, and all the drives you could be pushing a 400
watt power supply to it's limits.

Note: Changing RAID settings and drivers may render your drives unreadable
so make sure you have everything backed up.

 

[Anubis]

It's a single 200Gb IDE drive. The confusing thing is that apart from
this there is no other problems with it. I have had it for ten months
with no problems bar this one. It has not crashed once. If the PSU
was running at it's limit would there not be regular crashes. It
writes DVDs while bowsing etc. all with no issues.

 

[Kerry Brown]

It's a single 200Gb IDE drive. The confusing thing is that apart from
this there is no other problems with it. I have had it for ten months
with no problems bar this one. It has not crashed once. If the PSU
was running at it's limit would there not be regular crashes. It
writes DVDs while bowsing etc. all with no issues.

It's unlikely to be the PSU but if you have or can borrow a better one it
would be worth trying it. Your idea of removing the hard drive and trying a
fresh install on a different drive was good. It will eliminate one
possibility. If that doesn't work you have to consider a defective
motherboard or the PSU. I sell a lot of Gigabyte boards and rarely have
problems but you do get the odd bad one. The distributor I buy from never
questions if I tell them I have a bad one. They just replace it. There are
some recent BIOS updates for that board. The Gigabyte web site lists the
changes as CPU code so it's unlikely the BIOS update will help. If you do
try the BIOS update be aware that if something goes wrong the motherboard is
useless until you get a new BIOS chip.

Kerry

 

[Anubis]

OK. Replaced HD with a 15Gb one. Installed a fresh copy of the same
OS, XP Pro, V2002 SP2 and set up some basic configuration.
The software installed completely with no issues bar the fact it had
Gb's on example files on two Cds and took over two hours. I did a
full nstall.

I now see only three ways forward.
1) I do a comparison of all the OS files on both HDs.
2) I keep on installing my layered products. Office 97, Acrobat Pro,
Frontpage, Diskeeper, Getright, McAfee, PGP, PSP and XP tweaks. After
each install testing to see what fails.
3) I buy a new HD and use that for just video editing.
I'm leaning towards 3 but only because I could do 1 and 2 and not
discover the problem because it was something done six months ago that
I won't do again.
Anything else you think I could try?

 

[Kerry Brown]

OK. Replaced HD with a 15Gb one. Installed a fresh copy of the same
OS, XP Pro, V2002 SP2 and set up some basic configuration.
The software installed completely with no issues bar the fact it had
Gb's on example files on two Cds and took over two hours. I did a
full nstall.

I now see only three ways forward.
1) I do a comparison of all the OS files on both HDs.
2) I keep on installing my layered products. Office 97, Acrobat Pro,
Frontpage, Diskeeper, Getright, McAfee, PGP, PSP and XP tweaks. After
each install testing to see what fails.
3) I buy a new HD and use that for just video editing.
I'm leaning towards 3 but only because I could do 1 and 2 and not
discover the problem because it was something done six months ago that
I won't do again.
Anything else you think I could try?

I think you've summed up your options pretty well. My method would be to
backup all your data, format the drive and start again from a clean install.

Kerry

 

[Anubis]

I've logged the call with the software supplier. They have asked me
to delete some configuration files as a solution. It doesn't work so
I see it being a long haul.

I'm going to get a new HD. It would be better for the video editing
anyway and I can't see me installing everything again. I can't
remember half my configuration settings.

Thanks for the help everybody. If it comes back with a system problem
I'll update this.

Regards,