HELP...Win98 + Single SATA Drive = MADNESS!

I just bought an Athlon64 3000, paired it up with some fast memory and a Chaintech NForce-3 motherboard, and decided to run the whole thing off a 120gig Seagate SATA drive.

I was under the impression that modern implementations of SATA drives on the motherboard behaved basically just like IDE drives, but now I'm scratching my head.

I need to install windows 98 SE in order to use my Upgrade disc to windows 2000. So I assemble the rig, power it on, set the bios to boot from CD and make sure the RAID is turned OFF (only 1 drive) and that the SATA controllers are turned ON.

Windows 98 Install CD starts up, detects the SATA drive...formats it with FAT32, and then proceeds to install onto the SATA Drive. Awesome! Cuz its FLYING through the install......So Windows installs and the machine reboots

ANd then, at the Windows98 boot screen.....it just.....sits there. HD activity light is off.......and it just...sits there. I reboot, try again, and there it sits.

I reboot...boot to command prompt....C: drive...ok no problems, there are all the files....windows has definately installed on my SATA drive......and guess what, it STILL wont boot up. It just sits there.

So now I am asking myself.....is the problem:
1) That windows 98 is incompatible with Athlon 64's?
2) That windows 98 is incompatible with SATA hard drives??
3) That I was a real dumbass and should have just bought the IDE version of this drive?

Any ideas? Anyone? Is it windows 98? Is it the single SATA drive solution? I've got a system just waiting to get fixed.....

Change the boot order in the bios to boot from sata first.

Hmmm....I dont think thats it. I mean, it is booting Win98 from the SATA drive.....the Win98 cd is popped out of the drive and the SATA drive is the only storage in the system, i dont have any IDE drive hooked up.

It says "starting windows 98 for the first time".....this is whrere it pre-configures itself....you know, set your time zone, all that nonsense.....but it never gets there. it literally just stops.

I don't think you actually need to install win 98 for the upgrade disk to work. Just foramt the drive and pop in the windows 2000 disk and reboot like you normally would. It will ask you to insert a windows 98 disk just to veryify that you have one and then it will just continue installation.

-Andy

Sorry, let me clarify: The Windows 2000 Disc I have has pro, advance server and workstation on it...its from the MSDN subscription from the place I work and its several years old, but its not a bootable disc.......hence the need to have WIN installed first.

Its not a "Upgrade only". With this disc I either wipe out the existing OS or dual-boot.

Either way, I just hooked up a spare 8 gig IDE drive, unplugged the SATA drive, and sure enough...Win98 installed just fine and configured itself. So its definately the drive.

Now...is it the drive all by itself (meaning I'd have trouble installing 2000 or XP Pro) or is it Win98 and the SATA drive. *sigh*....

Here is somebody with the same problem as you:

http://www.techimo.com/forum/t118705.html

Seems like you need SATA drivers for Win 98 and the OS thinks a SATA drive is coming from a RAID controller. Maybe there is something there you can use.

Yeah, wacky how I can't even install a driver to the OS because the OS refuses to complete its boot sequence

As a secondary drive it works just fine...fast, quiet. Oh well, I just ordered a 160gig seagate EIDE drive from Newegg a few minutes ago....no sense getting my panties in a bunch over this. It doesn't want to work as a boot device, thats fine by me. I'm sure it probably would if I was installing 2000 or XP with its ability to load disk drivers during the boot process, but whatever.

Off to ebay it goes, to some person looking to add some fast storage or run a RAID setup....

You can install Win2K without having to install Win98 first!!

If the Win2k CD is not bootable, simply boot into DOS, and run winnt -b (? I forget the command line, it's been ages since I've used 2k) in the folder of the desired installation.

Make sure smartdrv.exe is loaded, as the install will take ages without it.

for example, in dos type "dir winnt.* /s /p" (without quotes)

note which directories they are in (there will be three different copes, one in the pro folder, one in the advanced server folder, and one in the workstation folder).

Go into the desired folder, and start the install through DOS.

You can obtain a DOS disk w/ CD drivers (and likely smartdrv) at http://www.bootdisk.com

with all them hoops you're jumping through, why don't you just go XP?

get an valid oem cd/licence for ~$90, and then recompile the thing back to the ~200mb range; clean, spartan, and nice, and a bit better on the driver support than win2k; looks and acts just like it

and while you're recompiling the thing, don't forget to kill the product activation

all than with nlite , just search for nlite on google


assuming if you DO have a valid xp licence of course



_

I don't like XP, I like Win 2000 Pro

Never had a driver problem for anything I've ever had to install.

Adelphia83, My God I didn't know you could do that I'm going to try that out
and see if I can't get the thing working.....thanks for the tips!! So long as I can find a nice ISO of a boot image, I dont think I have a floppy drive around here...

HeadRusch said:

So long as I can find a nice ISO of a boot image, I dont think I have a floppy drive around here...

Click to expand...

You can use any version of DOS, as long as it provides a generic CDROM driver. You can do without Smartdrv.exe (sometimes it's hard to find), but the install will probably take 30-60 minutes longer during the command line portion.

Try googling "boot disk iso" or something similar. Alternatively you could download the images off bootdisk.com, extract them (use WinRAR) then create a bootable CD in Nero (w/ floppy emulation enabled).

It was all there on the Win98 disc

I just chose the option to boot computer with CD rom support, found SMARTDRV.EXE buried in one of the directories.

15 minutes later (!!!) Win2000 Pro was installed and the SATA drive was behaving perfectly. *sigh*....one day later and I wouldn't be dealing with a 15% restocking fee on a 160gig drive I dont need!

(Since the 120 SATA is working just fine now!)........guess I'll keep it..160 gigs, only 100 bucks........

Listen dude, you saved my butt here, thanks for that awesome tidbit of info, I really appreciate it.

HeadRusch said:

Listen dude, you saved my butt here, thanks for that awesome tidbit of info, I really appreciate it.

Click to expand...

Not a problem I forgot all about Win98 being bootable w/ drivers. I actually have one laying around just for that purpose.