Can't install Windows with certain brand of optical drive

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Guest

Has anyone ever heard of anything even remotely like the following?

- When I attempted to do an install on a new hard disk I was unable to do so.


- Windows XP booted up from the CD-ROM, loaded all of the drivers and then
just when the little status bar said "Starting Windows" the system
blue-screened with an UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_DISK error.

- I subsequently tried Windows 2000, and Windows 2003 both of which gave the
same error. (Or INVALID_BOOT_PARTITION). I tried multiple hard disks,
(including the previous one that was running) ... same deal.

- I tried multiple IDE cables and both IDE hookups ... same problem.

- I tried a PCI based IDE controller ... same deal.

- Just when I was about to give up hope, I swapped out the optical drive that
I was booting from. That worked.

Apparently I can't install Windows when booting from a LITEON 4X DVD+RW
drive, but I *can* install when I boot from a basic bare bones SAMSUNG
CD-ROM. ( I was glad that I kept it when I installed the new drive. )

Very odd ... Now I have to remember to swap out the optical disk should I
need to reinstall.

Has anyone ever heard of this?
 
Has anyone ever heard of anything even remotely like the following?

- When I attempted to do an install on a new hard disk I was unable to do so.


- Windows XP booted up from the CD-ROM, loaded all of the drivers and then
just when the little status bar said "Starting Windows" the system
blue-screened with an UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_DISK error.

- I subsequently tried Windows 2000, and Windows 2003 both of which gave the
same error. (Or INVALID_BOOT_PARTITION). I tried multiple hard disks,
(including the previous one that was running) ... same deal.

- I tried multiple IDE cables and both IDE hookups ... same problem.

- I tried a PCI based IDE controller ... same deal.

- Just when I was about to give up hope, I swapped out the optical drive that
I was booting from. That worked.

Apparently I can't install Windows when booting from a LITEON 4X DVD+RW
drive, but I *can* install when I boot from a basic bare bones SAMSUNG
CD-ROM. ( I was glad that I kept it when I installed the new drive. )

Very odd ... Now I have to remember to swap out the optical disk should I
need to reinstall.

Has anyone ever heard of this?
Click to expand...

Nope.But I know what I would do.
Download this bootable .iso,
http://www.geocities.com/sheppola/bootd.zip
burn to CDR/W
Set bios boot to CDR 1st.
When CD load issue the command
aefdisk \delall
and press enter.
Shutdown and fully power off system e.g pull the power cord out.Leave
for 30 secs.

Re-boot with disk of your choice and try again.
HTH :)



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installing to a SATA drive? you have to install the sata drivers
first from floppy (if in fact this is what is happening)
 
installing to a SATA drive? you have to install the sata drivers
first from floppy (if in fact this is what is happening)
Click to expand...

Nope. EIDE.

If it were SATA, then the problem would manifest itself with both optical
drives, not just the LITEON DVD+RW, correct?
 
Nope.But I know what I would do.
Download this bootable .iso,
http://www.geocities.com/sheppola/bootd.zip
burn to CDR/W
Set bios boot to CDR 1st.
When CD load issue the command
aefdisk \delall
and press enter.
Shutdown and fully power off system e.g pull the power cord out.Leave
for 30 secs.

Re-boot with disk of your choice and try again.
HTH :)
Click to expand...

I'll give it a try.

What does this do?
 
yeah that's true hmmmm you know through experience that not all Roms
read all media. Whether it be a commercial disk or burned, the later
being far more frequent of course. The disk is stamped or burned?
 
The disk is stamped.

The odd part is this: It starts to read the disk. It looks normal, loads all
drivers ... it's just when it gets to the part that says "Starting Windows"
does it crash.

very odd ...
 
nospam said:
The disk is stamped.

The odd part is this: It starts to read the disk. It looks normal, loads all
drivers ... it's just when it gets to the part that says "Starting Windows"
does it crash.
Click to expand...

The symptom you describe is typical of having the wrong IDE driver that
fails when it's loaded, at about the time you describe, so the hard drive
becomes 'lost'. I.E. since the driver doesn't operate correctly it can't
see the hard drive.

Why the DVD drive causes that I don't know unless you have it jumpered in
some manner that's incompatible with the hard drive, like one set directly
as a master or slave and the other cable select, or two masters, two
slaves, etc, so that it becomes confused when the IDE controller goes
'smart' with the full driver. Also, some boards do not like having a
'slave' device with no master on the same IDE channel.
 
Subject: Re: Can't install Windows with certain brand of optical drive
From: Shep© <[email protected]>
Date: Tuesday 6:56 PM
Reply-To: (e-mail address removed)
Newsgroups: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt



It clears the hard drive of the faulty data that has been left in the
boot sector that is preventing your install.
HTH :)
Click to expand...

I'm thinking that this isn't the problem. (The same problem occurred with 3
different hard disks, including one brand new one out of the box.)
 
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