Win 2KSP3 Setup Hangs (Freezes) on Keyboard Input In Text Mode

[Steve Sr.]

This is a brand new system configured as follows:

Asus P4C800-E Deluxe Motherboard
ATI 9800 Pro AIW Video Card
2X WD1200JD SATA Hard Drives on ICH5R controller
Lite-On XJ-HD166 CD/DVD ROM
Lite-On LTR-52327S Burner

1394, LAN, Raid, Sound have been disabled in the BIOS with no effect

At first I thought that this was SATA issue since obviously Win 2K
knows nothing about SATA but I now have my doubts...

The W2K install program gets as far as loading the all the drivers and
then hangs at the "Welcome to Setup" screen where you press "Continue"
"Repair" or "Quit". Pressing F6 (or not) at the begining doesn't seem
to make a difference. Setup never asks for any drivers anyway. The F6
prompt mentions only RAID drivers and the system is not setup for RAID
in the BIOS. I also have the Promise RAID controller disabled in the
BIOS since there is nothing attached.

I made a set of 4 setup floppys to try to at least see if the
machine would boot this. It boots the first floppy and asks for the
second but refuses to go any further. Enter or F3 keyboard inputs are
ignored.

It is begining to appear that W2K setup is not taking any *keyboard*
input for some unknown reason. The keyboard that I'm using is an old
PS2 122 key from Gateway / Maxi-Switch. This keyboard works fine in
the BIOS. I also tried an old Northgate 122 in both XT and AT modes
with similar results.

I tried switching the BIOS to PNP O/S = Yes and the machine won't even
try to boot anything so I guess its not that so I switched it back.

It will boot Win 95 or 98SE from a single floppy and the keyboard
works after the boot is completed including CTL-ALT-DEL.

With the Win 2K Setup the keyboard is completely catatonic by the time
it asks for input. CTL-ALT-DEL doesn't even work. It's like the
keyboard interrupt gets shut off by the setup program.

I tried to check the HCL list for Win2K but the MS site wouldn't let
me FTP it, open it directly, or search it via several web pages.
Several MORE hours wasted.

Does anyone have anything else to try?

Steve

 

[Steve Sr.]

UPDATE:

I Turned off all ACPI and APM in the BIOS. I even disabled the USB
controller all without effect.

I next did a test to see when the keyboard stopped responding. I
continued pressing the CAPS LOCK key while the machine was booting
from floppy. The CAPS LOCK light on the keyboard stopped responding
shortly after the "Windows Is Inspecting Your Hardware..." message
comes up.

Based on this it appears that the keyboard interrupt is being shut off
by Windows and never gets turned back on. Go figure...

Steve

P.S. this system is not overclocked and will run Memtest86 for DAYS.

 

[Steve Sr.]

UPDATE - 2

I finally got the install past this point by clearing CMOS memory on
the motherboard. I then went back and started putting the BIOS
settings back where they were trying to figure out which one was
responsible for the problem. I got them all put back and setup still
worked. Go figure...

The only thing I can think of that might have caused this is that
Memtest86 or Doc Memory overwrote part of CMOS and confused Windows
Setup. Or there may have just been random garbage in a location that
Windows didn't like.

Win2K didn't have a problem with the SATA controller. It partitioned
and formatted its own partition and let me partition the remaining
drives. I hit F6 to try to load the SATA driver but Windows was
looking for a "TXTSETUP.OEM" file which I didn't have for the ICH5R
chip so I just went past this step.

Now if I could just get Windows to detect the keyboard and the mouse
but this is a subject for a different thread!

Steve