install says copied files missing/corrupt

[Jan Plett]

Very strange problem. Have Dell Dimension with OEM XP
Pro. Original 20GB disk died, and as I don't need anything
like that much storage, I replaced it with an old 4GB
drive freshly formatted FAT32.

Drive is too small to use OEM recovery CD, so I blagged a
mate's XP Pro install disk just to get up & running
again. First part of install runs OK, but then after
restart and copying a few more files, install complains
that it can't find a .dll and says installation must be
corrupt. If I choose to ignore that file it finds
another .dll or whatever also invalid, and so on.

I've tried everything including getting XP to reformat
NTFS, but always same thing. Out of curiosity, blagged a
Win2K install CD, with exactly same result. Makes no
difference whichever of 2 good source CD drives I use.

Does this ring any bells with anyone??

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Greetings --

Problems copying files or corrupted files during the
installation of Win2K and/or WinXP are most often caused by defective
or sub-standard hardware; in order of likelihood, either RAM, the hard
drive, or the motherboard. On much less frequent occasions, a bad CD
or defective CD drive can also cause this.

In your case, the old 4 Gb hard drive would be the prime suspect.


Bruce Chambers

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You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. -- RAH

 

[Guest]

Thanks for your message Bruce. However, I twice ran
scandisk with surface check on the HD and each time it
came up clean; I also ran that fantastically useful MS RAM
check utility that boots from a floppy and subjects the
RAM to a real battering - it ran overnight without error.
The CD drives are both beyond reproach, a brand new Sony
reader and a fairly new Plexor re-writer, so I find it
difficult to believe that the hardware is faulty in the
normally accepted sense of the word. And as an
experiment, I've just successfully installed Win98 SE with
no problems.

However I take it from your reply that there's no known
peculiarity installing NT type Windows, so I guess I'll
just have to try another HD...

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Greetings --

Again, and I _cannot_ seem to emphasize this enough, a piece of
hardware's working with Win98, is absolutely *NO* indication of its
suitability for use with WinNT, Win2K, or WinXP.

Computer components designed for, sold and that run fine with
Win9x/Me very often fail to meet WinXP's much more stringent hardware
quality requirements. WinXP, like WinNT and Win2K before it, is quite
sensitive to borderline defective or substandard hardware
(particularly motherboards, RAM and hard drives) that will still
support Win9x.

FYI, for future reference, comparing WinXP to Win98 is a lot like
comparing a Lexus to a Yugo -- any similarities are entirely
superficial.


Bruce Chambers

--
Help us help you:




You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. -- RAH

 

[Guest]

Not familiar with the term 'blagged' if that means you've copied his disk then this will be your problem

From my experience all the occasions where Xp failed to install come about because people have provided me a 'backup' copy of their installation CD [a duplicated CD] and the files just won't copy correctly. Must have something to do with the burning process itself and size of the particular Windows file

From my experience, Xp will run out of space after installation on your 4 Gb drive. System restore file size, Swap File Size etc

Go out and spend $100 on a new Hard Disk [you should get one of around 120Gb for this money just about anywhere] and then try using your Factory Original Recovery CD

Also the 4Gb Drive would be ATA-66 and your 20Gb should be ATA-100. Just check this out and make sure that you don't buy a Serial ATA drive which may not be compatible with your older Dell Motherboard.