trouble installing XP... screen goes black during device install.

[Siberian]

The first time I booted up my new system it went into the bios screen. I just installed the hard drives and now I am trying to format them so I can install Windows XP.

Subsequently, when I boot it up the ASUS screen comes up, then a black screen appears with some information showing that it recognizes the hard drives, floppy drive, cdrw drive, memory, processor speed, etc. Then there's a message at the bottom of the screen that says "disk boot failure. Insert system disk and press enter"

Well, I don't HAVE a system disk. The asus site says to create one by going to the dos prompt and typing A:/S, then downloading a file from the asus site called "Aflash.exe" and adding it to that boot disk. Well, how the heck do I get to the dos prompt from the screen I am in?

[Allen Hallada]

Siberian,
Put your WinXP CD in the CD drive. Make sure CD drive is hooked up to secondary IDE controller. When you get into bios go to Boot screen and make the CD drive first on the boot sequence list. I think you can change the priority by selecting the CD drive, then with the + and _ keys on the numeric part of keyboard. Don't quote me on that one. Then when you reboot it should give you the option to boot from the CD drive where you will install XP and it will format your drive and give you partition options before installing WinXP.
Allen [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[Siberian]

got it! Actually, I didn't have to change the boot sequence. It was already set up properly. I got the WinXP disk in and drive C is formatting right now. (I chose the regular version, not the quick version) so it is taking a few minutes.

So far so good. (fingers crossed).

I had a bit of a panic attack earlier because when I turned the PC on and let it run for a few minutes then tried to reboot it, it wouldn't come back on. Yet the power LED stayed lit. However after shutting down the power supply and waiting a few minutes it would reboot. I finally figured out that the CPU fan was going too slow and the cpu was getting too hot. I installed the speed control switch and increased the speed and it seems to be okay now. It is definately running cooler now.. (about 110 degrees as opposed to 150 before) I know there's an automatic fan speed control function on the ASUS board... I just have to figure out how to enable it.

[Siberian]

okay now something wierd is happening... Win XP is installing all the drivers, and suddenly the screen goes blank. The monitor is in safe mode or something. Does WIN XP do that on purpose while installing the software since at the last point I could see the screen it said it would take approximately 35 minutes to install?

[Allen Hallada]

Originally posted by Siberian:
okay now something wierd is happening... Win XP is installing all the drivers, and suddenly the screen goes blank. The monitor is in safe mode or something. Does WIN XP do that on purpose while installing the software since at the last point I could see the screen it said it would take approximately 35 minutes to install?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Doesn't sound right. I'd check that processor temp. again. Make sure you put Arctic Silver paste on the CPU top raised square area. Only a thin layer.
Allen [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[Siberian]

processor temp is steady at 104degrees. I have the fan on low.

Something is definately not right with the install. Every time I reboot it restarts the WinXP install. It goes okay for a couple minutes and always stops installing at exactly the same point... and the monitor goes into power save mode. The PC stays on, the fans are all running, but it's like nothing is there.

[Allen Hallada]

Originally posted by Siberian:
processor temp is steady at 104degrees. I have the fan on low.

Something is definately not right with the install. Every time I reboot it restarts the WinXP install. It goes okay for a couple minutes and always stops installing at exactly the same point... and the monitor goes into power save mode. The PC stays on, the fans are all running, but it's like nothing is there.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Go into Bios and in the Power area set it back to default and try it again.
Allen

[Siberian]

Okay, I went back in, set it to default, and then I noticed something... the boot sequence was NOT set properly. The C drive was #1 on the list... but for some reason it was still reading from the CD rom. Anyway, I reset it so the CRrom was 1st in the list and rebooted. Now it is starting over and attempting to reinstall everything from the beginning. (fingers crossed).....

[Siberian]

It is still doing it. It get's to the point where it says "installing devices" with a green progress bar. A message stating the time remaining comes up. It starts at about 39 minutes, then when it hits 35 minutes, the screen goes black, and by all indication, the cdrom stops spinning.

Any ideas?

[Allen Hallada]

Originally posted by Siberian:
It is still doing it. It get's to the point where it says "installing devices" with a green progress bar. A message stating the time remaining comes up. It starts at about 39 minutes, then when it hits 35 minutes, the screen goes black, and by all indication, the cdrom stops spinning.

Any ideas?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Sounds like a bad WinXP CD to me. Do you have your hard drive hooked to motherboard IDE primary channel on its own cable? Disconnect any other hard drives and try it again. Don't use the Promise controllers for formating the drive.
Allen [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]