sata + xp
 

is it possible to install xp onto an s-ata drive without using the floppy? I have it on it using the floppy then it crashed with "unmountable volume" on boot and my s-ata disappeared. My floppy stopped working. Tried 2 other floppy drives and several floppy disks, in the end bought a s-ata controller and its showing up again but i dont have access to another floppy drive and I am too busy working at the minute to go buy one.
My system is asus a7v600 mainboard, xp3200 400mhz cpu + 512mb ddr400mhz, 120gb seagate s-ata ST312082 7AS drive,
I have an ide drive with working xp on at the moment. I also have a bootable win xp pro.
Everywhere I have looked has said that xp only lets you use the floppy.
Liam

Re: sata + xp
 

Not as far as I know, one of our forum members seems to think that you can install a SATA disk as an IDE device but my motherboard requires proper RAID drivers due to all SATA devices being on the RAID controllers.

Re: sata + xp
 

perhaps try something like nlite

burn (if you have a burner) your own windows install disc with the drivers intergrated.

not sure if that would work but worth a try i suppose.

Re: sata + xp
 

I think it would be a good idea to investigate why your floppy controller does not work anymore and why you have developed these faults,nlite should be able to slipstream the drivers onto a bootable copy of your legitimate xp pro,but this will not fix other problems,also you need to find out why your sata controller is faulty too,looks to be you may have more problems than just a hdd with xp on not booting
Does the driver on mobo cd install your sata drivers? for original controller?

Re: sata + xp
 

It sounds like its gonna depend on your motherboard. If your Mobo uses all the SATA connectors through a raid controlller, then you will need to install the raid controller on disk so that it knows how to use the controller, if it doesnt then yes you should be able to use it without the need of a floppy...

I have a P4P800-E and a A8N-SLI both of which you can install a drive on the sata connectors without a raid driver.

Re: sata + xp
 

My nforce3 neo platinum has 2 controllers 4 sata base settable and bootable without a floppy

Re: sata + xp
 

thanks for your help guys. I think the floppy issue is my lazyness (not installing them properly, I have been resting them on the top of the case/on top of my cd drives, I've just read this can make them burn out)

As for the s-ata controller, well its all new to me, I might not have needed the s-ata controller because it did install without but then as I said it managed to somehow forget about the drive. When I first installed the controller though I managed to get a boot menu (not bios, not raid controller menu, something else which I havent been able to get up again) and boot from the s-ata drive and I got the error then too.

I've managed to find someone who knows where a floppy drive is on a computer (:angel: ) and they are going to bring that down to me, if that wont work, then I'll have to use the nlite method, but thats last option for me as I will have to take the cdrw out of the new machine and do some learning.

cheers guys
liam

Re: sata + xp
 

After a BIOS update my Gigabyte GA7-VT600 now detects the 2 SATA connectors as the 3rd and 4th IDE controllers.