how to stop repair install

hey guys...need some help...The short story is that I got a new motherboard (amd 64 via from intel 865pe) the sata drivers were not obviously installed so I have been trying many things like a repair install (I did set the ide drivers to standard before removing old mobo) but the repair install hangs when it tries to get into gui mode but I can get into safe mode but the only problem is when I get into safe mode it tells me you cannot run setup in safe mode so I want to stop the thing from trying to run setup and just get into safe mode. Here's where I need help I want to know how to stop setup running and repair reinstalling and just go into safe mode if anyone can tell me what file(s) to modify or delete to stop the repair install
thanks
p.s. I have tried googling but can't find the right wording to get the result I want

Is there any reason why you can't just perform a clean install? It's always recommended when installing a new MB to backup any important data beforehand, and perform a fresh install...instead of trying to do a repair. I know a lot of folks have performed repair installs after installing a new MB, and made it to the desktop without any problems...but the chances of that happening without incident are pretty slim. If you're not dependant on any data from your previous install, then I would highly recommend a clean install of Windows.

yeah the decision to upgrade came pretty quick so I need the repair in order to get the data

wait... why do you have to be able to boot windows to run a repair install? You could boot from the cd and do one. Or am I confused about what you're trying to do?

You definitely need to reinstall Windows. If you don't, you'll have problems of one sort (or another) at some point in the near future.

For your data, I would suggest putting your drive in another machine, copying files over, then reinstalling Windows on your drive.

cw823 said:

You definitely need to reinstall Windows. If you don't, you'll have problems of one sort (or another) at some point in the near future.

For your data, I would suggest putting your drive in another machine, copying files over, then reinstalling Windows on your drive.

Click to expand...

Agreed. Once you start the installation/repair process, it's next to impossible to stop, depending on how far you've let it go. You can however re-initiate the process, after manually removing the now corrupted registry files, and rebuilding your hive manually. But, it's more time consuming than it's worth.