Need Help Badly

New to the forum and somewhat new to Vista. By way of some background,
I've been building my own systems since Win 3.1 and 20 Meg hard drives
so I have some experience.

Here's the issue...

I've been trying to install Vista Home Premium (clean install from
Upgrade media) on my primary desktop for over a week with major issues.
Most appear to be driver related on an nVidia board using nForce drivers
for the SATA control. I installed using the default drivers that Vista
loaded and had to deal with multiple hangs during installation. Finally
got it installed only to have it hang during Win Update and blue screen,
then fail to boot. Recovery was unsuccessful and so another reinstall
was done. Next blue screen ended up with a "Corrupt or missing" error on
ci.dll and absolutely no ability to reboot to Windows.

Decided I'd had enough and went to reinstall XP. Now I have issues with
the drives being accessible to either XP setup or Vista setup. Tried
loading SATA drivers and nothing worked. No drives visible.

I had managed to create an Acronis image after the last succesful Vista
install and decided to try to restore the drive using the boot DVD.
Acronis loads but when you use Drive Manager to view the drives the
drives appear as follows in Acronis Drive Manager:

Maxtor 500GB drive (new and formatted for install NTFS as 2 partitions
equal size) set as Drives C: and D:

In green (Unallocated) = Unallocated 80.4GB
Yellow (Primary) =
0x65 Netware 3.x+ 0 bytes
811.6 GB 0x72 (unknown)
259.4GB 0x74 (scramdisk)

Seagate 320GB single partition formatted NTFS set as Drive E:

In green (Unallocated) = Unallocated 3.136GB
Yellow (Primary) =
C: 914.5GB (FS NONE Partition 0x7 NTFS, HPFS)
0x72 (unknown) 5KB
867.2GB 0x43 (LinuxNAT/DR-DOS)

I am at my wits end. I have not tried to reformat as I cannot access
the drives from anything. I can see them in Acronis, but cannot use
Drive Mgr to format. Win XP setup sees one partition at 136GB but will
not allow installation while Vista doesn't see any of the drives at all
and asks for drivers. Tried the ref drivers for the board after all else
failed but no luck and machine has no Floppy Drive for XP driver
install.

BIOS shows both drives on their correct SATA channels and reports them
correctly. Machine was checked for any viruses prior to install and has
been continously covered by AVG since new. Machine was rock solid 24/7
on XP but needed an HD refresh so decided to try Vista.

I'm sure Ive done something to cause this but I have no clue what, or
how to recover. ANY help would be appreciated.

System Specs are:
DFI LanParty UT NF590 SLI M2R/G
4GB (currently only 2GB installed) Corsair 6400 C4 (checks healthy)
AMD Athlon X2 5000
eVGA Geforce 8600GTS driving Gateway FPD2485W display
700 watt PS SLI certified
Onboard Realtek HD audio
PS2 Mouse and keyboard
No other devices installed or in use
NO O/C, system runs very cool


--
Ralphw

Ralph W.
"Life's Short, Fly Fast"

"Ralphw" <Ralphw.37u9i6@no-mx.forums.net> wrote in message
news:Ralphw.37u9i6@no-mx.forums.net...
>
> New to the forum and somewhat new to Vista. By way of some background,
> I've been building my own systems since Win 3.1 and 20 Meg hard drives
> so I have some experience.
>
> Here's the issue...
>
> I've been trying to install Vista Home Premium (clean install from
> Upgrade media) on my primary desktop for over a week with major issues.
> Most appear to be driver related on an nVidia board using nForce drivers
> for the SATA control. I installed using the default drivers that Vista
> loaded and had to deal with multiple hangs during installation. Finally
> got it installed only to have it hang during Win Update and blue screen,
> then fail to boot. Recovery was unsuccessful and so another reinstall
> was done. Next blue screen ended up with a "Corrupt or missing" error on
> ci.dll and absolutely no ability to reboot to Windows.
>
> Decided I'd had enough and went to reinstall XP. Now I have issues with
> the drives being accessible to either XP setup or Vista setup. Tried
> loading SATA drivers and nothing worked. No drives visible.
>
>

<snip>

Stop right there. In the case of either XP or Vista you will need to install
your SATA drivers at the beginning of the installation
or there is no sense in going any further.

With Vista you will be asked for add'l drivers and Vista will accept them on
either a floppy or CD

with XP, you need to hit F6 when asked for add'l drivers and you will need
them on a floppy


If XP or Vista cannot find the drivers then you either made the floppy
incorrectly (VIZ: forgot to extract the drivers if zipped etc)
or else they are just plain...the incorrect drivers.

I'd go the the manufacturer's website and download the latest SATA driver
for both XP and for Vista
then start over from scratch


BTW: I suggest you only use Vista if your hardware has been made within the
last year or two.

If your machine is 2 -3 years old or more...Just install XP and do not go
with Vista for now

"Ralphw" <Ralphw.37u9i6@no-mx.forums.net> wrote in message
news:Ralphw.37u9i6@no-mx.forums.net...
>
> New to the forum and somewhat new to Vista. By way of some background,
> I've been building my own systems since Win 3.1 and 20 Meg hard drives
> so I have some experience.
>
> Here's the issue...
>
> I've been trying to install Vista Home Premium (clean install from
> Upgrade media) on my primary desktop for over a week with major issues.
> Most appear to be driver related on an nVidia board using nForce drivers
> for the SATA control. I installed using the default drivers that Vista
> loaded and had to deal with multiple hangs during installation. Finally
> got it installed only to have it hang during Win Update and blue screen,
> then fail to boot. Recovery was unsuccessful and so another reinstall
> was done. Next blue screen ended up with a "Corrupt or missing" error on
> ci.dll and absolutely no ability to reboot to Windows.
>
> Decided I'd had enough and went to reinstall XP. Now I have issues with
> the drives being accessible to either XP setup or Vista setup. Tried
> loading SATA drivers and nothing worked. No drives visible.
>
> I had managed to create an Acronis image after the last succesful Vista
> install and decided to try to restore the drive using the boot DVD.
> Acronis loads but when you use Drive Manager to view the drives the
> drives appear as follows in Acronis Drive Manager:
>
> Maxtor 500GB drive (new and formatted for install NTFS as 2 partitions
> equal size) set as Drives C: and D:
>
> In green (Unallocated) = Unallocated 80.4GB
> Yellow (Primary) =
> 0x65 Netware 3.x+ 0 bytes
> 811.6 GB 0x72 (unknown)
> 259.4GB 0x74 (scramdisk)
>
> Seagate 320GB single partition formatted NTFS set as Drive E:
>
> In green (Unallocated) = Unallocated 3.136GB
> Yellow (Primary) =
> C: 914.5GB (FS NONE Partition 0x7 NTFS, HPFS)
> 0x72 (unknown) 5KB
> 867.2GB 0x43 (LinuxNAT/DR-DOS)
>
> I am at my wits end. I have not tried to reformat as I cannot access
> the drives from anything. I can see them in Acronis, but cannot use
> Drive Mgr to format. Win XP setup sees one partition at 136GB but will
> not allow installation while Vista doesn't see any of the drives at all
> and asks for drivers. Tried the ref drivers for the board after all else
> failed but no luck and machine has no Floppy Drive for XP driver
> install.
>
> BIOS shows both drives on their correct SATA channels and reports them
> correctly. Machine was checked for any viruses prior to install and has
> been continously covered by AVG since new. Machine was rock solid 24/7
> on XP but needed an HD refresh so decided to try Vista.
>
> I'm sure Ive done something to cause this but I have no clue what, or
> how to recover. ANY help would be appreciated.
>
> System Specs are:
> DFI LanParty UT NF590 SLI M2R/G
> 4GB (currently only 2GB installed) Corsair 6400 C4 (checks healthy)
> AMD Athlon X2 5000
> eVGA Geforce 8600GTS driving Gateway FPD2485W display
> 700 watt PS SLI certified
> Onboard Realtek HD audio
> PS2 Mouse and keyboard
> No other devices installed or in use
> NO O/C, system runs very cool
>
>
> --
> Ralphw
>
> Ralph W.
> "Life's Short, Fly Fast"


Philo's advice on SATA drivers for Vista *may* apply, depending on the
vintage of your hardware.
On modern hardware Vista should detect your SATA controller(s)
automatically. At least, it has on three different machines for me: Asus
M2N-E (NVIDIA), Asus P5B (Intel) and Asus M3A (AMD).
Do you have two SATA controllers on your motherboard? Have you tried both?
On some motherboards I've encountered, only some of the SATA connectors are
bootable.

This is 1 yr old hardware that "should" detect the controller and in
fact has done so without issue during the (semi)successful install and
the original XP install. Installation is being done via a SATA DVD that
continues to work without issue. MB BIOS has been reset to failsafe
default AND Optimized setting with no change. Drives are detected in the
bios and ID'd in the correct size/type/mfg.

I tried loading the SATA drivers when Vista stated it couldn't find a
drive to install on and that failed as well after the drivers loaded.


--
Ralphw

Ralph W.
"Life's Short, Fly Fast"

On Sun, 13 Apr 2008 22:46:12 -0500, Ralphw
<Ralphw.37u9i6@no-mx.forums.net> wrote:

>
>New to the forum and somewhat new to Vista. By way of some background,
>I've been building my own systems since Win 3.1 and 20 Meg hard drives
>so I have some experience.
>
>Here's the issue...
>
>I've been trying to install Vista Home Premium (clean install from
>Upgrade media) on my primary desktop for over a week with major issues.
>Most appear to be driver related on an nVidia board using nForce drivers
>for the SATA control. I installed using the default drivers that Vista
>loaded and had to deal with multiple hangs during installation. Finally
>got it installed only to have it hang during Win Update and blue screen,
>then fail to boot. Recovery was unsuccessful and so another reinstall
>was done. Next blue screen ended up with a "Corrupt or missing" error on
>ci.dll and absolutely no ability to reboot to Windows.
>
>Decided I'd had enough and went to reinstall XP. Now I have issues with
>the drives being accessible to either XP setup or Vista setup. Tried
>loading SATA drivers and nothing worked. No drives visible.
>
>I had managed to create an Acronis image after the last succesful Vista
>install and decided to try to restore the drive using the boot DVD.
>Acronis loads but when you use Drive Manager to view the drives the
>drives appear as follows in Acronis Drive Manager:
>
>Maxtor 500GB drive (new and formatted for install NTFS as 2 partitions
>equal size) set as Drives C: and D:
>
>In green (Unallocated) = Unallocated 80.4GB
>Yellow (Primary) =
>0x65 Netware 3.x+ 0 bytes
>811.6 GB 0x72 (unknown)
>259.4GB 0x74 (scramdisk)
>
>Seagate 320GB single partition formatted NTFS set as Drive E:
>
>In green (Unallocated) = Unallocated 3.136GB
>Yellow (Primary) =
>C: 914.5GB (FS NONE Partition 0x7 NTFS, HPFS)
>0x72 (unknown) 5KB
>867.2GB 0x43 (LinuxNAT/DR-DOS)

Looks like the partition tables are all messed up. This can happen
when 28-bit LBA limited software is used to modify existing
partition(s) on a large (> 137GB) drive.

Delete and repartition.

>
>I am at my wits end. I have not tried to reformat as I cannot access
>the drives from anything. I can see them in Acronis, but cannot use
>Drive Mgr to format. Win XP setup sees one partition at 136GB but will

Is this Windows XP incorporating SP1 or 2?

>not allow installation while Vista doesn't see any of the drives at all
>and asks for drivers. Tried the ref drivers for the board after all else
>failed but no luck and machine has no Floppy Drive for XP driver
>install.
>
>BIOS shows both drives on their correct SATA channels and reports them
>correctly. Machine was checked for any viruses prior to install and has
>been continously covered by AVG since new. Machine was rock solid 24/7
>on XP but needed an HD refresh so decided to try Vista.
>
>I'm sure Ive done something to cause this but I have no clue what, or
>how to recover. ANY help would be appreciated.
>
>System Specs are:
>DFI LanParty UT NF590 SLI M2R/G
>4GB (currently only 2GB installed) Corsair 6400 C4 (checks healthy)
>AMD Athlon X2 5000
>eVGA Geforce 8600GTS driving Gateway FPD2485W display
>700 watt PS SLI certified
>Onboard Realtek HD audio
>PS2 Mouse and keyboard
>No other devices installed or in use
>NO O/C, system runs very cool

"Ralphw" <Ralphw.37v420@no-mx.forums.net> wrote in message
news:Ralphw.37v420@no-mx.forums.net...
>
> This is 1 yr old hardware that "should" detect the controller and in
> fact has done so without issue during the (semi)successful install and
> the original XP install. Installation is being done via a SATA DVD that
> continues to work without issue. MB BIOS has been reset to failsafe
> default AND Optimized setting with no change. Drives are detected in the
> bios and ID'd in the correct size/type/mfg.
>
> I tried loading the SATA drivers when Vista stated it couldn't find a
> drive to install on and that failed as well after the drivers loaded.
>
>



Possibly a harddrive problem or even a problem with the controller itself?