Enormous Installation Headache w/ hal.dll

[Andrew Johnston]

I just added a new 160GB HD to my system, and I want to install XP on a
10GB partition on it and gradually migrate my programs and files to the
new drive while retaining the ability to boot off the old drive until
the new installation is fully configured etc. When I boot off the XP CD
and tell it to create the partition on the new drive and install XP,
once the formatting of the partition is done and the first batch of
files has been copied over, I get an error message telling me that the
hal.dll is missing or corrupt, which stops the installation dead in its
tracks.

Searching online reveals that the best solution for this is to go to the
revovery console and use the expand command like so to get the file off
the CD:


expand x:\i386\hal.dl_ c:\windows\system32\hal.dll

where x is the drive letter of the CD ROM.

The catch for me is that in the recovery console mode, I have no
freaking clue what the CD ROM's drive letter is. In XP, the new
partition is E:\ and the CD ROM is D:\. But when I'm in the recovery
console, the new partition becomes D:\. If I type in


expand e:\i386\hal.dl_ d:\windows\system32\hal.dll

the result is a "file not found" message. Ditto if I use f:\ as the CD
ROM drive letter. Anyone got a clue how I might be able to expand the
file under these circumstances?

I'm pretty sure my Boot.ini is set up correctly (that seems to be the
other typical source of this problem). Any and all advice on how to get
to the bottom of this mess would be greatly, greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

 

[Guest]

justa guess, dont install xp on the new drive, maybe bios cant see 160 gigs?,

 

[Andrew Johnston]

justa guess, dont install xp on the new drive, maybe bios cant see 160
gigs?,

Nope, I'd previously formatted the drive using the MaxBLAST utility that
came with it and was able to see the whole drive as blank space in XP, so
it can't be a BIOS problem. MaxBLAST had to tweak something so the whole
drive could be seen, true, so maybe there is something I need to tweak in
the BIOS manually--but the computer is definitely capable of seeing the
whole drive. I'd like to put XP on the new drive if at all possible so I
can devote the old one exclusively to music files.

 

[Alex Nichol]

Nope, I'd previously formatted the drive using the MaxBLAST utility that
came with it and was able to see the whole drive as blank space in XP, so
it can't be a BIOS problem. MaxBLAST had to tweak something so the whole
drive could be seen, true, so maybe there is something I need to tweak in
the BIOS manually--but the computer is definitely capable of seeing the
whole drive.

Don't try to make a partition of that size with XP Setup - and it would
be not sensible for C anyway. If you want to start clean, make one of
say 20GB for system and programs, then subsequently a second one with
the XP Disk management - Control Panel - Admin Tools - Computer
Management, select Disk Management and look lower right for the graphic
of the drive. R-click Unallocated space. Create partition.

Or use one of the imaging/copying programs like BootIT NG, from
http://www.BootitNG.com ($35 shareware - 30 day full functional trial)
to make a clone copy of the old partition to the new drive, swap over,
adjusting the jumpers, and boot on the new drive

 

[Andrew Johnston]

Don't try to make a partition of that size with XP Setup - and it
would be not sensible for C anyway. If you want to start clean, make
one of say 20GB for system and programs, then subsequently a second
one with the XP Disk management - Control Panel - Admin Tools -
Computer Management, select Disk Management and look lower right for
the graphic of the drive. R-click Unallocated space. Create
partition.

The issues involved here just keep getting weirder and weirder. I used
XP's disk manager to reformat the drive and create two partitions--one
of 20GB, the other of 132GB. When I reboot off the XP setup CD, XP Setup
only sees a 10GB partition on the new drive (the rest is unallocated
space) and when I tell it to install XP on the 10GB partition, it says
it was formatted with incompatible file and the partition needs
reformatting. When I reformat it, I'm back to square one with it telling
me it hal.dll is absent or corrupt after it starts the install.

Or use one of the imaging/copying programs like BootIT NG, from
http://www.BootitNG.com ($35 shareware - 30 day full functional trial)
to make a clone copy of the old partition to the new drive, swap over,
adjusting the jumpers, and boot on the new drive

I'd rather not clone the old drive (75GB, single partition) since it's
too big to fit on a small partition and my goal is to have a completely
clean, fresh install of XP on a 10 or 20GB partition and to use the rest
of the drive for apps and files--and to be able to boot off the old
drive in the meantime as I gradually migrate files and purge old junk I
don't need. Is that too much to ask? It's sure starting to seem that
way.

 

[Alex Nichol]

The issues involved here just keep getting weirder and weirder. I used
XP's disk manager to reformat the drive and create two partitions--one
of 20GB, the other of 132GB. When I reboot off the XP setup CD, XP Setup
only sees a 10GB partition on the new drive (the rest is unallocated
space) and when I tell it to install XP on the 10GB partition, it says
it was formatted with incompatible file and the partition needs
reformatting. When I reformat it, I'm back to square one with it telling
me it hal.dll is absent or corrupt after it starts the install.

That is because the XP Disk manager has implemented 48 bit LBA, and (I
suspected and this is rather confirming) its Setup from the CD does not
understand. DO NOT partition the disk in the XP system. Boot the CD,
enter Setup - New install; when it asks where, hit esc and delete
whatever partitions are shown; make a new 20 GB to install to. That
will be old 28bit LBA, but no matter. Once XP (SP1) is up and running
you can make the other partition from that

 

[Andrew Johnston]

That is because the XP Disk manager has implemented 48 bit LBA, and (I
suspected and this is rather confirming) its Setup from the CD does not
understand. DO NOT partition the disk in the XP system. Boot the CD,
enter Setup - New install; when it asks where, hit esc and delete
whatever partitions are shown; make a new 20 GB to install to. That
will be old 28bit LBA, but no matter. Once XP (SP1) is up and running
you can make the other partition from that

I'll try that, but I'm a little confused--unless making a 20GB partition
instead of a 10GB one makes a big difference, I can't see what's going to
stop the hal.dll problem from ocurring again in this scenario. But I'll
give it a try and let you know what happens...

 

[Alex Nichol]

I'll try that, but I'm a little confused--unless making a 20GB partition
instead of a 10GB one makes a big difference, I can't see what's going to
stop the hal.dll problem from ocurring again in this scenario. But I'll
give it a try and let you know what happens...

You have made a partition using 48 bit LBA. Access is different. Setup
looks at it and gets confused. Stop trying to install into it and let
setup make a partition for itself