i am having an issue with setting up windows xp on my pc- the xp setup disc is booted when the computer is powered on and all the files seems to load fine- the first screen where it prompts you to press F2 or F6 and then process to load setup files- but one the next screen appears- press Enter to setup XP, R to repair etc, the pc freezes completey- they keyboard won't even respond. sometimes the pc will not freeze and i can proceed through the menus, but most of the time this is where it freezes. i have tried a number of windows install discs- both for xp and windows 2000- and all these discs have been used for successfull installations in the past- and they all freeze in the same place. i have replaced the optical drive, the RAM (using only 1 stick now) and the HDD and i still get the same issue. i have reseated the CPU and even placed a large desk fan beside the case for cooling the cpu in case this was an overheating issue but still the same results. i have even tried loading an old copy of windows 2000 from a set of floppy disks to see what would happen, and sure enough, the pc freezes onnce again in the same place. i have been able to successfully install ubuntu on the pc however after rebooting once the installation was completed it appears that the OS boot process crashes. does anyone have any ideas/suggestions on this issue? my hardware is as follows: asus a7v8x-x motherboard amd athlon xp 2500+ cpu 256MB DDR PC2100 RAM 60GB IDE 7200RM hard drive thanks.
Seem you have problem with virtual memory. Basically virtual memory controller is in built in motherboard. Get it repaired or replace your motherboard with new one.
I think he meant memory controller, but yeah, its definitely a hardware problem. Its pretty hard to say at this point what exactly it is, it seems logical that it would ether be your motherboard or power supply not supplying correct voltages.
Im gonna lean towards an unrecognized hard drive. I see this problem on some SATA ( serial ata hard drives) which need an additional driver to install an OS. Now that may be a bit premature since Ubuntu has its own drivers for sata and ide raid, devices and they usually work quite well. But on an older model motherboard, say an IDE only,this type of hang can simply be an unknown partition type. From the symptoms you mentioned It looks like the hang happens when the OS is trying to either read or write to the hard drive. Take a look at the Asus site and see if your board is supposed to support raid in the OS, or your Bios may be set to IDE Raid mode and needs the driver for a proper install. Try obtaining the added driver for your board if Asus lists it, make the floppy windows needs when you press F6 for additional drivers and install it at that time. If your board is the one I think it is, then this will fix your hang. If not, disregard the above. Take a look at your drive Jumpers, then check your cable and make sure it isnt an addressable ribbon cable ( one that is marked master and slave) or one that has square factory holes punched in the ribbon. If the cable matches what I just described, try an older 40 wire cable like the one commonly used on CD-Roms and retry your install.
