Can't install XP on NF7-S 2.0 RAID+0. HELP!

The equip is in the sig.... but in a nutshell, I have two Maxtor 200MB SATA's in a RAID + 0 array.

I boot from WinXP CD no prob, I hit F6 to load the SATA drivers from floppy, WinXP sees the drive as one large 398gig drive. I partition into two partitions (tried both 120meg and 200meg for the boot partition) and then do the first round of XP file xfer/installing.

One first reboot, I reset the BIOS to boot off the SATA and I get this error upon startup:

Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:

<Windows root>\system32\Hal.dll Please reinstall a copy of the above.


I have tried both modded bioses (1.8 and 1.9) with the SATA 4.2.27 version.

Any ideas?

TIA,

Wazoo

I remember having a very similar error messgae. I was not do to RAID though. I think it was do to a bad CD. Try installing on just one of the drives and let me know what happens. If you still get the same error, than atleast you know that its not the RAID array.

I am not familiar with RAID setup, but I thought you needed to set your partitions to no greater than 137gb ??

I will be following this thread.. I want to learn more myself about this.

{PMS}fishy said:

I remember having a very similar error messgae. I was not do to RAID though. I think it was do to a bad CD. Try installing on just one of the drives and let me know what happens. If you still get the same error, than atleast you know that its not the RAID array.

Click to expand...

Well... I killed the RAID and installed to one of the 200gig drives without partitioning it. WInXP went through the install just fine.

So it definitely seems RAID related.

Man! This one is driving me nuts!

BTW- I am using the latest SATA drivers from the Abit site. I think v1.21.

Any ideas?

I had exaclty the same error and tracked it down to the SATA driver version.

Make sure you have the latest Bios and download the latest SATA driver. With the SATA driver on a floppy start the install and press F6 when the screen goes blue for the first time and asks if you want to install a third party RAID driver. It will ask later for any additional devices and this is where you say yes and use the floppy to install the Silicon Image RAID driver for XP.

It should go through fine after that.

Good Luck

NobbyStiles said:

..........................
Make sure you have the latest Bios and download the latest SATA driver. With the SATA driver on a floppy start the install and press F6 when the screen goes blue for the first time and asks if you want to install a third party RAID driver. It will ask later for any additional devices and this is where you say yes and use the floppy to install the Silicon Image RAID driver for XP....................

Click to expand...

Thx man, I was looking for ways to install the new driver, damn Abit, there is no instruction whatsoever on the web.

Glad I could help.

By the way, I got the SATA driver from the Silicon Image web site. Don't know if Abit have the latest one on their site or not.

NobbyStiles said:

I had exaclty the same error and tracked it down to the SATA driver version.

Make sure you have the latest Bios and download the latest SATA driver. With the SATA driver on a floppy start the install and press F6 when the screen goes blue for the first time and asks if you want to install a third party RAID driver. It will ask later for any additional devices and this is where you say yes and use the floppy to install the Silicon Image RAID driver for XP.

It should go through fine after that.

Good Luck

Click to expand...

Ok... I'll try the Silicon Image website for the driver as I have the one from the Abit website (I believe v1.21) and that has not solved the problem.

Thanks!

Wazoo

wazoo said:

Ok... I'll try the Silicon Image website for the driver as I have the one from the Abit website (I believe v1.21) and that has not solved the problem.

Thanks!

Wazoo

Click to expand...

Don't remember where I got it from, but my ver. is 1.28 according to the driver info in hardware profile.