XP Disk setup is flawed

  • Thread starter Thread starter Half_Light
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Half_Light

I wiped my HDD0 and left HDD1 as is (NTFS). I then did the disk
partitioning and formatting of HDD0 using the XP install utility, I
usually use Partition Magic so never noticed this issue before. Well,
when I finally got XP installed and booted into XP there was no C: or
D: partition. XP had assigned my primary partition to E: and my DVD-RW
as D:. What a friggin' mess. Went to disk management and when I tried
to change the drive letter to the primary parttion was informed that
you can't change the primary partion drive letter. Great! I see now
the way around it would have been to physically disconnect my HDD1 and
then isntall XP to HDD0. I'm supposed to take my PC apart just to
solve this issue with XP? As I said, this is a joke. As it is now, I
have no C: or D: partition and my primary partiton is E: Couple of
progs have wanted to install to a C: partition that doesn't exist but
that's easy to change. One prog install said there was 1k on C:
??? Go to Indexing Services Directories and see it has created a C:
directory. Deleted that so now no prog will think I have a C:
partition with 1k of free space. I'm not looking for help here, just
posting a bit of a rant. It shouldn't be this way Microsoft, I should
have been able to assign drive letter and label when I installed XP.
I'll use PQ magic next time.
 
Please start over using the following installation procedure:

The Windows XP CD is bootable and contains all the tools necessary
to partition and format your drive. Follow this procedure and allow
Windows XP to partition and format your drive:

NOTE: It would be best to physically disconnect all your peripheral hardware
devices, except the monitor, mouse and keyboard, before installing XP.

NOTE: If you have an internal Zip Drive installed, physically disconnect the
EIDE and power cable to it before proceeding, otherwise your main
hard drive may not be assigned the customary C: drive letter.
After installing Windows XP, you may then reconnect it.

1. Open your BIOS and set your "CD Drive as the first bootable device".

===> Accessing Motherboard BIOS
===> http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/bios_manufacturer.htm

2. Insert your Windows XP CD in the CD Drive and reboot your computer.
3. You'll see a message to boot to the CD....follow the instructions.
4. The setup menu will appear and you should elect to delete all the existing
Windows partitions, then create a new partition, then format the primary
partition (preferably NTFS) and proceed to install Windows XP.

5. Clean Install Windows XP
http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html

[Courtesy of Michael Stevens, MS-MVP]

6. ==> Immediately after installing Windows XP, make sure XP's Firewall is enabled:
==> http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/protect/windowsxpsp2/Default.mspx

7. After Windows XP is installed, visit the Windows Update website
and download the available "Critical Updates".

8. After installing the critical updates, be sure and visit the support website
of the manufacturer of the computer to download and install any
available Windows XP compatible drivers, such as video adapter
and audio drivers.

9. If you happen to run into any installation difficulties, use the following resources:

How to Troubleshoot Windows XP Problems During Installation
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;310064

Troubleshooting Windows XP Setup
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_setup.htm

[Courtesy of MS-MVP Kelly Theriot]

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows - Shell/User
Microsoft Community Newsgroups
news://msnews.microsoft.com/

---------------------------------------------------------------------------­----------------

:

| I wiped my HDD0 and left HDD1 as is (NTFS). I then did the disk
| partitioning and formatting of HDD0 using the XP install utility, I
| usually use Partition Magic so never noticed this issue before. Well,
| when I finally got XP installed and booted into XP there was no C: or
| D: partition. XP had assigned my primary partition to E: and my DVD-RW
| as D:. What a friggin' mess. Went to disk management and when I tried
| to change the drive letter to the primary parttion was informed that
| you can't change the primary partion drive letter. Great! I see now
| the way around it would have been to physically disconnect my HDD1 and
| then isntall XP to HDD0. I'm supposed to take my PC apart just to
| solve this issue with XP? As I said, this is a joke. As it is now, I
| have no C: or D: partition and my primary partiton is E: Couple of
| progs have wanted to install to a C: partition that doesn't exist but
| that's easy to change. One prog install said there was 1k on C:
| ??? Go to Indexing Services Directories and see it has created a C:
| directory. Deleted that so now no prog will think I have a C:
| partition with 1k of free space. I'm not looking for help here, just
| posting a bit of a rant. It shouldn't be this way Microsoft, I should
| have been able to assign drive letter and label when I installed XP.
| I'll use PQ magic next time.
 
Pilot error. If you know what you're doing, especially if you know how
setup behaves when assigning drive letters, you won't have to
disconnect any devices.
 
Please start over using the following installation procedure:
Click to expand...
NOTE: It would be best to physically disconnect all your peripheral hardware
devices, except the monitor, mouse and keyboard, before installing XP.

NOTE: If you have an internal Zip Drive installed, physically disconnect the
EIDE and power cable to it before proceeding, otherwise your main
hard drive may not be assigned the customary C: drive letter.
After installing Windows XP, you may then reconnect it.
Click to expand...

Perhaps you didn't understand my post? The above is exactly what I'm
complaining about. If I had used PQ Magic to partiton and format the
drive first I wouldn't of had this issue arise. The XP partitioning
tool and format tool is too limiting. Hope Vista is better in this
regard. Disconnecting all my hardware to install an OS? Get real.
 
Pilot error. If you know what you're doing, especially if you know how
setup behaves when assigning drive letters, you won't have to
disconnect any devices.
Click to expand...

If it's pilot error then tell me the method instead of just saying,
"pilot error". If the second HDD is NTFS (no OS) and the first HDD is
RAW then how do you stop XP from designating the wrong drive letter to
the second HDD? I discussed this with a friend and he ran across the
same problem. He fixed it by physically disonnecting the second drive.
You say it can be done without disconnecting the second drive. Be so
kind as to tell me how. I know how to get around it by using PQ Magic
but not using the XP setup utility.
 
Ack!..light bulb finally turned on and I realized how I could have got
around this. I should have disabled the second HDD in the bios before
instaling XP and then enabled it after the install was finished. Must
cut back on the meds. Thanks Andy!
 
If it's pilot error then tell me the method instead of just saying,
"pilot error". If the second HDD is NTFS (no OS) and the first HDD is
RAW then how do you stop XP from designating the wrong drive letter to
the second HDD? I discussed this with a friend and he ran across the
same problem. He fixed it by physically disonnecting the second drive.
You say it can be done without disconnecting the second drive. Be so
kind as to tell me how. I know how to get around it by using PQ Magic
but not using the XP setup utility.
Click to expand...

The presence of the second HDD caused Windows setup to assign C to it,
followed by D to the CD-ROM (See
<http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=234048#E0VB0ACAAA> for drive
letter assignment rules). This is why the first HDD became E when the
partition was created. What you have to realize is everytime Windows
setup is run, the existing disk partitions are re-enumerated. So the
answer is to abort setup (F3-F3), and start it again. Now setup will
assign C to the first HDD, D to the second HDD, and E to the CD-ROM.
 
The presence of the second HDD caused Windows setup to assign C to it,
followed by D to the CD-ROM (See
<http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=234048#E0VB0ACAAA> for drive
letter assignment rules). This is why the first HDD became E when the
partition was created. What you have to realize is everytime Windows
setup is run, the existing disk partitions are re-enumerated. So the
answer is to abort setup (F3-F3), and start it again. Now setup will
assign C to the first HDD, D to the second HDD, and E to the CD-ROM.
Click to expand...

Yes, I know why it happened but Microsft should give the user a
warning message and tell the user how to correct it during the disk
setup. I didn't know aborting the install would fix it but if you
read my other post I do know a way around it as I have done that
before and just plain forgot about the issue. That's becauset I've
been using Partition Magic for so long that I wasn't thinking about it
at the time and found HDD0 was assigned E: when it was too late to
correct it. I didn't want to go back and do the install over again. I
don't mind having no C: and D: dirve, I reassigned the partitions and
DVD drive so everthing is in order, it just starts at E: and not C:
I'll live with it until I next install. Thx.
 
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