[MicksChick]

Ugh... ok, I bought a used laptop with Vista installed. I, unknowingly, installed the windows sp 1 update and the computer is taking a fit! It will not boot. I cannot start in safe mode nor can I restore to an earlier point.

So, I'm trying not to deal with Vista errors and install XP but set up says... "set up did not find any hard disk drives installed on your computer." Why not? I'm confused. Help please!

My boot menu says:
1. IDE0: ST980811AS
2. CD/DVD: Optiarc CD-RW CRX880A-(PM)
3. PCI LAN: Network Boot

And the laptop was working fine until I installed the windows update. Now I just wanna cry!

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(Off-Topic side note)
If your laptop has a factory installed version of Vista, it is likely that you could have issues if attempting to revert to XP.
Hardware and Drivers may be Vista specific, and manufacturers may not have developed drivers that work with XP.
You can certainly give it a try, but unless you have access to media for reinstall of Vista, you are venturing into a project that may eventually cause you to need installation media for Vista or Win 7


As to your machine not finding any Hard Disk during whatever procedure you are using to install XP...
Vista and Windows 7 use a different BootLoader and no longer use boot.ini that XP has historically used.
Therefore when XP media attempts to find where to install, it may see... Nothing.

You may benefit from more information about Vista bootmgr.dll

Vista Boot Configuration can be edited via BCDEdit.
And there is a useful third-party boot configuration editor called EasyBCD which may prove useful to you.

Will you please tell us more about what you wish to accomplish.
And be specific about what you have done up to this point, including what you have done that lead to your current error situation.

Best Regards

[Doug]

(Off-Topic side note)
If your laptop has a factory installed version of Vista, it is likely that you could have issues if attempting to revert to XP.
Hardware and Drivers may be Vista specific, and manufacturers may not have developed drivers that work with XP.
You can certainly give it a try, but unless you have access to media for reinstall of Vista, you are venturing into a project that may eventually cause you to need installation media for Vista or Win 7


As to your machine not finding any Hard Disk during whatever procedure you are using to install XP...
Vista and Windows 7 use a different BootLoader and no longer use boot.ini that XP has historically used.
Therefore when XP media attempts to find where to install, it may see... Nothing.

You may benefit from more information about Vista bootmgr.dll

Vista Boot Configuration can be edited via BCDEdit.
And there is a useful third-party boot configuration editor called EasyBCD which may prove useful to you.

Will you please tell us more about what you wish to accomplish.
And be specific about what you have done up to this point, including what you have done that lead to your current error situation.

Best Regards

[Doug]

So, I'm trying not to deal with Vista errors and install XP but set up says... "set up did not find any hard disk drives installed on your computer." Why not? I'm confused. Help please!

"If"... you are determined to install XP on that machine, you will have to completely format the Hard Drive (not just C:\, but must also format to remove the hidden boot drive partition which Vista uses.

If you go that way, you will loose "everything" on the HD including installed software, data and media files, and ability to revert to Vista (unless you have Vista installation DVD media)

Edited by Doug, 30 April 2011 - 12:10 PM.