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General discussion

Need help installing XP over Vista

May 23, 2010 10:13AM PDT

Hello all,

I acquired my dad's Vista SP1 laptop, because he had no use for it. Given that Vista has a poor track record (I have firsthad experience with this OS), I decided to send Vista to Davy jones's locker and install XP Professional instead.

I went to the website of my laptop's manufacturer and downloaded all applicable drivers for XP Pro/SP2 (Toshiba Satellite L305D-S5934), and then burned them all to CD-R along with my personal files. When I put the XP installation disc in the drive and booted from it, it went through the file loading procedure. However, when it got to "Setup is starting Windows", it crashed and got the BSoD.

I summarize the BSoD as follows:

-Problem is detected, Windows has shut down your computer, etc
-Check that your Hdisk has not run out of room,
-Check for a driver problem if a driver error is listed below
-Check for a BIOS update,

Technical Info:
***STOP: 0x0000007E (0x0000005,0xF748E0BF,0xF78DA208,0xF78D9F0Cool

*** pci.sys - Address F748E0BF base at F7487000, DateStamp 3b7d855c

-----------------------------------------------------------------
How do I get rid of this so I can install XP Pro? I even created a separate 8gb partition to install to (this is only to test the run environment; if I successfully install Xp to this mini-partition, I will wipe the hdisk clean and install XP alone). I disabled my antivirus (AVG 9) and changed the harddisk controller in BIOS between AHCI and Compatibility modes.

Any help will be appreciated.

P.S. (in case someone asks), my hard drive is a Hitachi ATA drive.

Discussion is locked

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Details missing.
May 23, 2010 9:06PM PDT

This reads like the other million posts about installing XP to a sata drive. You could have forgotten to make the drive blank prior to install to "other".

Again, no exact make and model so I must keep it short as we are not sure what machine this is.

You can't install XP to a Vista formatted hard drive. Simple to solve by removing the partitions on said drive. Bye bye data, hello, where is my backup.
Bob

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Okaaayyy.....
May 24, 2010 1:41AM PDT

Bob-

My make and model is listed above. It is a Toshiba Satellite L305D-S5934 laptop computer with Vista Home Premium SP1.

The hard disk on this computer is "ATA", not "SATA". Isn't there a difference between the two? (In Device Manager, the hard drive is "Hitachi xxxxxx ATA Drive".)

And is it really necessary to wipe the hard drive clean of all traces of Vista for the installation of XP to proceed? I do not have the Vista installation DVD in case the XP install goes bad and I have to return to Vista. (I have a bootable partition manager disc "CPM" if it is necessary.)

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Looks like ATA or SATA here.
May 24, 2010 2:07AM PDT

Look at the technical data at http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/toshiba-satellite-l305d-s5934/4507-3121_7-33496264.html?tag=mncolBtm;rnav

"# Storage controller type Serial ATA "

So it's ATA which we could spend the entire discussion about what ATA is and more. But this is the same million post issue. It's been done to death. Let's move on?

As to wiping the drive that's a known area of discussion so rather than write at length let's keep it short. XP's installer has been written to not overwrite newer versions of Windows so a clean install is required.

And all the notes about SATA, IDE MODE and such apply here. Let's see if you can get it done.

-> About the restore media. Our toshiba's allow, provide a way to make the restore media. I've lost count how many don't use that to create the restore media. Sorry in advance that this seems short but this topic has been done many times. At least we know we are dealing with the same issues.

Let's hope your XP CD is a "XP SP2" CD. You should know why it matters by now after all that's been written.
Bob

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I see...
May 24, 2010 8:57AM PDT

Alright, I see that my hard disk is SATA after all. In BIOS there is a SATA Compatility mode, so I'll try to use that for installing XP Pro.

I launched the Toshiba Recovery Disc Creator. It says that to burn the recovery image to disc, you need two 4.7GB DVD discs. I am going to have to obtain some blank DVD discs then.

And no, I hate to break it to you, but my XP Pro disc is Ver. 2002; it does not have SP2 on it. I do, however, have the Network Installation package for SP2 which can be burned to and installed from CD. Is it possible to simply combine my XP and SP2 discs on a new CD-R?

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Scratch the last sentence in above post
May 24, 2010 9:50AM PDT

I managed to find a ZIP file on a CD which appears to contain XP professional WITH SP2. Now the question is: Do I simply drop in a fresh CD-R and simply drop these new, unzipped files to the disc, or do I need a special program to make this (given that it has to be bootable)?

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No.
May 25, 2010 12:47AM PDT

Microsoft didn't issue such a zip file so I wouldn't know what to do with that.

Use the Microsoft issued CD next.
Bob

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right.
May 25, 2010 1:40AM PDT
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left
May 25, 2010 1:47AM PDT

Such a thing is unsupportable and too error prone. Look at the number of posts just to get the first thing out of the way. I fear you may be upset as this fails.

Just wondering, why not use the tried and true methods? And why did it take so long to get the usual out of the way?
Bob

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slow down there
May 26, 2010 10:12AM PDT

Wait, hold on a second...
Define what you mean by (A)Tried and true methods, and (B)Get the usual out of the way.

And, if I may make a clarification: I do not want to get rid of Vista yet. What I want to do for now is to dual-boot Vista with XP and see how it goes. Then, if I can get most of the computer to get working again (eg camera and on-board microphone), I will wipe the harddisk clean and install XP Pro only. Otherwise I will remove XP and keep using Vista until I can find a solution.

Also, above you told me that Microsoft has never issued a zip file with XP SP2 files, and that I should use the Microsoft CD. Does this mean I will keep having to use my XP pro 2002 disc to install XP, instead of using an XP disc that comes with SP2 already on it?

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It took me looking
May 26, 2010 10:31AM PDT

At the machine to verify it was the same old XP to a SATA drive issue. That was a loss of a few posts. Now we are repeating the same old issues about XP, slipstreams and failures.

Why must we repeat all this? I guess you may feel it's new ground but sadly it's very well covered ground. I can only hope you understand that we must learn from history or be doomed to repeat it.

Good luck in slipstreaming or trying this without the right CD. I can only hope you get the right CD or get lucky with nlite or other.

Best of luck and since it is a repeat of all that that has been discussed many times, I have unsubscribed.
Bob