Installing Windows

[DarkBlood]

I've installed Ubuntu on my laptop, but now I can't get my Windows XP Setup CD to detect the harddrive. If it helps, the below is what Gateway Says my harddrive is:

160-GB 5400-RPM SATA Hard Drive Assembly (CRU/EURP) [Part #2527773R]

Hardware Details (http://support.gateway.com/s//Mobile/Q106/BladeC/2527773R/2527773Rtc.shtml)

160-GB 5400-RPM SATA Hard Drive Assembly (CRU/EURP) [Part #2527774R]

Hardware Details (http://support.gateway.com/s//Mobile/Q106/BladeC/2527774R/2527774Rtc.shtml)

If you give me any jokes about stuff like: "Why do you want to switch back?" I'm not going to answer OR regard them (Plus, I'll report the post due to it being off topic or something like that.)

[themoose]

Have you reformatted your hard drive?

[DarkBlood]

Have you reformatted your hard drive?

Yes, to all known formats, and Windows still won't detect it for each one.

[themoose]

Is it registered in BIOS? (usually press DEL when you turn it on)

[DarkBlood]

Is it registered in BIOS? (usually press DEL when you turn it on)
Yes, the BIOS says it's there:

Hitachi HTS541616J9SA00-(S1)
Xubuntu says the only flags on the harddrive is "boot." The following flags for the drive are availible:

LVM, PALO, PREP and RAID. LBA is not availible. I've already tried the following flags: LVM and RAID, and they donb't help.

[Wojtek]

http://dban.sourceforge.net/

Burn DBAN
run it
pop in windows cd
install

[Decker]

Might want to try something like Hirems and fdisk and format it as FAT 32 first then try XP delete the partition and reformat as NTFS (if it'll let you)

[DarkBlood]

Might want to try something like Hirems and fdisk and format it as FAT 32 first then try XP delete the partition and reformat as NTFS (if it'll let you)

XP isn't on it right now, DOS can't detect the harddrive. First I'm doing what Wojtek said and using DBAN. If it doesn't work one way, I'll try another. Linux allows you to format the drive as NTFS, but you can't install Linux on it if it is. Also,


Have you reformatted your hard drive?
Yes, to all known formats, and Windows still won't detect it for each one.

[notnamed]

I'm not sure if this will work since Windows setup can't find the hard drive, but have you tried booting into the recovery console and running fixmbr?

[PaulP]

Hi Iyeru,

I think that XP is not seeing the SATA controller correctly and therefore not loading a driver for it. In that case the Installation of XP will not find any hard disks.

While starting the XP Install... Press F6 when you see it on the screen to add a third party storage controller driver.
You need to have a floppy drive and a floppy with the SATA drivers on it to get it to work.

After loading the SATA driver the Hard Disk will be found and the XP Install will continue.

Kind regards,
PaulP.
www.swprozee1.com

[DarkBlood]

http://dban.sourceforge.net/

Burn DBAN
run it
pop in windows cd
install

Well, the PRNG Method didn't work, so I'm nuking the whole drive by performing a "Gutmann Wipe" and then I'm going to set the whole drive with zeros.

Hi Iyeru,

I think that XP is not seeing the SATA controller correctly and therefore not loading a driver for it. In that case the Installation of XP will not find any hard disks.

While starting the XP Install... Press F6 when you see it on the screen to add a third party storage controller driver.
You need to have a floppy drive and a floppy with the SATA drivers on it to get it to work.

After loading the SATA driver the Hard Disk will be found and the XP Install will continue.

Kind regards,
PaulP.
www.swprozee1.com
Where can I find these third-party SATA Drivers? Because the Hitachi Search (http://search.hitachi.net/search?q=HTS54161&site=US&client=hitachi&output=xml_no_dtd&proxystylesheet=hitachi&Input.x=30&Input.y=3) doesn't give me anything.

Edit: Nevermind, I got it from the Gateway site. Thanks people, I think I'll keep DBAN in case I need to do anything rash.

[PaulP]

So adding the drivers with F6 did resolve your problem ?!?!?

It should work this way to succesfully install XP.

Kind regards,
PaulP.


Better make a good backup (raw image) before you have to do this all over again in the near future when something goes wrong.
Drivers seem to be very important at that point. Also the fact that we still can't get rid of the slow floppy drive by now.... When will Microsoft decide to not rely on floppies anymore during install with hardware the installer cannot recognize......

[DarkBlood]

So adding the drivers with F6 did resolve your problem

Yeah it did. :D Apparently I had to use iaStor.inf using Intel Mobile SATA AH Driver. Anyway, thanks people.