installing xp on a sata drive

[domw54]

I am trying to install xp pro on a 160 gig sata drive. the mobo is a MSI
and during boot the drive is reconized. During xp set up I press F6 and when
prompted to I insert floppy disk, showes me the right drivers and I select
the on via for xp. It reads the disk and continues loading files. I get the
partition screen and partition the drive and it formats the drive just fine.
It then prompts me that it is making a list of files to be copied and the
first file it asked for is the viamraid.sys. It comes back and tells me it
can not copy the file and ask me if I am copying from the cd make sure the
windows xp cd is in the drive. I tell it to retry and It looks at the floppy
but it can not copy from the disk. I have moved the sys file to the root of
the disk but to no avail. What am I doing wrong. I have had the same
problem on another machine also.

 

[Andy]

I am trying to install xp pro on a 160 gig sata drive. the mobo is a MSI
and during boot the drive is reconized. During xp set up I press F6 and when
prompted to I insert floppy disk, showes me the right drivers and I select
the on via for xp. It reads the disk and continues loading files. I get the
partition screen and partition the drive and it formats the drive just fine.
It then prompts me that it is making a list of files to be copied and the
first file it asked for is the viamraid.sys. It comes back and tells me it
can not copy the file and ask me if I am copying from the cd make sure the
windows xp cd is in the drive. I tell it to retry and It looks at the floppy
but it can not copy from the disk. I have moved the sys file to the root of
the disk but to no avail. What am I doing wrong. I have had the same
problem on another machine also.

Your driver floppy is problematic.
Get <http://www.viaarena.com/Driver/v-raid_v560a.zip> from
<http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?PageID=420&OSID=1&CatID=1180&SubCatID=143>
Unzip the archive and copy file txtsetup.oem and folders x86, x64, and
VISTA to the floppy disk:
C:\V-RAID_V560A\VRAIDDrv\drvdisk>dir
Volume in drive C is WIN98DOS
Volume Serial Number is 3023-16F6

Directory of C:\V-RAID_V560A\VRAIDDrv\drvdisk

01/12/2008 10:09p <DIR> .
01/12/2008 10:09p <DIR> ..
03/08/2007 05:46p 3,196 txtsetup.oem
01/12/2008 10:09p <DIR> x86
01/12/2008 10:09p <DIR> x64
01/12/2008 10:09p <DIR> VISTA
1 File(s) 3,196 bytes

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Never mind what he wrote - Hi, Andrew E.!

*TimDaniels*

 

[Timothy Daniels]

I am trying to install xp pro on a 160 gig sata drive. the mobo is a MSI
and during boot the drive is reconized. During xp set up I press F6 and when
prompted to I insert floppy disk, showes me the right drivers and I select
the on via for xp. It reads the disk and continues loading files. I get the
partition screen and partition the drive and it formats the drive just fine.
It then prompts me that it is making a list of files to be copied and the
first file it asked for is the viamraid.sys. It comes back and tells me it
can not copy the file and ask me if I am copying from the cd make sure the
windows xp cd is in the drive. I tell it to retry and It looks at the floppy
but it can not copy from the disk. I have moved the sys file to the root of
the disk but to no avail. What am I doing wrong. I have had the same
problem on another machine also.

Try this: When you get to the partition screen (i.e. when loading
from the floppy drive halts), take out the floppy disk. The system
will then look to the CD drive for data. And when you get the system
installed, the next time you start up, go into the BIOS and reset the
BIOS's device boot order so that the hard drive has highest priority
and the BIOS won't go reading a floppy disk or CD that you might have
left in the drive.

*TimDaniels*

 

[domw54]

try every thing you said and made new driver disk still get the same message
Setup cannot copy the file viamraid.sys after the format screen is complete
and it is making a list of files to copy. this is the first file it looks
for.

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Can you give us a clue as to why a Via RAID driver is being sought?
Do you have a RAID system? If not, perhaps the BIOS has accidentally
been set for RAID. Is there an entry for RAID/NoRAID in the BIOS?
If that has been set for RAID, the next question is how? Have you
tried cleaning or replacing the lithium battery?

*TimDaniels*

 

[David B.]

If he's gotten to the point of formatting the drive and copying files it's
not too likely that it's a driver problem, it's more likely either he has a
bad CD drive, bad CD, or a problem with the RAM or hard disk itself, those
are the common causes of file copy errors during setup.

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Re-read my posting. I ask why a RAID driver is being sought
(when there was no mention of a RAID system). I then imply
that there might be a mis-setting in the BIOS which erroneously
indicates that there is a RAID system.

*TimDaniels*

"David B." jumped:

 

[Timothy Daniels]

When you say you "had the same problem on another machine
also", does that mean you used the same procedure on another
machine with different media (i.e. different floppy and/or install-
ation CD), or does it mean on another machine with the same
procedure and the same media? IOW, what is common to the
two machines?

*TimDaniels*

 

[Frank Pajerski]

I recently installed WinXP Home on a SATA drive. Even with the correct
drivers loaded at F6 time, the subsequent WinXP setup process would always
fail (in the area where yours is failing). In my situation it was a BSOD,
others in other forums report this or other fatal problems.

My solution (and likely THE solution) was to build a customized WinXP
install CD with SP2 slipstreamed in. For me, the easiest way to build this
CD was via the free "nLite" program ( http://www.nliteos.com/index.html ).
I still had to use an IDE CD-drive for the install. After the installation
process finished, I could replace this ODD drive with a SATA one.

--- Frank

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Did you also slipstream the SATA drivers in with the WinXP
installer and the SP2 updates? If so, in what order?

*TimDaniels*

 

[Frank Pajerski]

No. nLite allows one to extensively customize the install CD with drivers,
programs (e.g., IE7, WMP11), and options, but I wanted to keep things simple
(i.e., not screw up) and so only included SP2. The SATA driver load was
still from a floppy at F6 time. But, as the installation process then moves
into the full-blown "WinXP Install" phase, other modules relating to this
new world of large SATA HDD's are now being found as needed (thanks to SP2's
presence). Note that is where the OP is having a problem without SP2
present. Also note that base WinXP doesn't support "large" HDD's as well as
SATA ones.

In my situation, there's an Intel DP35DP mobo with "RAID enabled" in its
BIOS.

--- Frank

 

[Timothy Daniels]

It sounds like your experience would suggest that the OP's
problem is due to both SP2 not being part of the installation CD
and the BIOS's "RAID enabled" parameter being set to TRUE.
How does one navigate to the RAID setting in your BIOS?

*TimDaniels*

No. nLite allows one to extensively customize the install CD with
drivers, programs (e.g., IE7, WMP11), and options, but I wanted
to keep things simple (i.e., not screw up) and so only included SP2.
The SATA driver load was still from a floppy at F6 time. But, as
the installation process then moves into the full-blown "WinXP
Install" phase, other modules relating to this new world of large
SATA HDD's are now being found as needed (thanks to SP2's presence). Note
that is where the OP is having a problem without
SP2 present. Also note that base WinXP doesn't support "large"
HDD's as well as SATA ones.

In my situation, there's an Intel DP35DP mobo with "RAID enabled"
in its BIOS.

--- Frank