[Boris]

After many tribulations
Relpaced mobo
has Intel ICH6
CDROM as slave to sata as master. Sata is Seagate Barracuda 160gb and is new out of the box.

As I only have the XP on upgrade disk have taken some time to get XP to install.

Start up with Bios in fail safe settings, with floppy disabled ( don't have one )
boot priority CDROM the HDD, the when asking for installation of XP or repair, insert my "master " XP disk and away we go.

Partitioning - Going NFTS and choose the quick setting because otherwise it sits at 0% for hours.

Quick setting gives near immediate 20% and then sits and looks at you for ever, no movement.

Because 20% of 160 = 32 I am thinking what might be wrong is not a failed disk, but have traveled around checked all I know and nothing works.

If I play around with the bios settings in peripherals the OS boot gives error and freezes the boot.
-------------------------------------------------------

My option now is to look at the HDD and see what the prob is.
Question - What is best software to do this . I saw Partition Manager and it seemed promising because it runs in a Linux shell and therefore can support anything as I do not have an OS installed.

Urgent responses please and " go get em " advice is good.

[KnowItAll]

A 32MB partition should not be a problem for XP to handle.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/313348

[Boris]

Your missing the point.
The partition install freezes at 32gb ( not mb ) which is the limit under FAT, however I have a NFTS setup so its going to be just one partition of 160 - 8mb for the windows stuff.

I need -- TOP URGENT some insight into a plain bootable app that can sit in Ram and get into the HDD to see what the prob is.

HELP !!!!!

[jonnye]

For partitioning problems I've always used gparted (or qparted):
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/

Needs to be burnt to a CD though, which I guess could be problematic if you don't have another PC to spare. Acts like a free version of Partition Magic. It seems that FAT32 can support larger than 32GB partitions, but Microsoft's partitioning tool cannot create beyond this. Odd.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/184006/

[Boris]

So far have managed to partition using the Repair in XP and have done so to a series of 30522b sections starting with c:

So on we go to format.

Format this smaller partition as NTFS and ---- stops at 20% -- SPOOKY !!

Any answers on this?

[Boris]

So we try it as FAT32 and ---- stops at 20%.
This is getting ridiculous !

[discobay]

Hardware problem? If it's new then take it back.

[KnowItAll]

Should be a hardware problem - Like I said, I have not encountered such a problem on either XP (NTFS or FAT32) partitions being much larger than 32GB.

Also, check for any BIOS setting that might indicate OS type or put restrictions on the partition size.

[Boris]

The way I am working around the problem is in Repair mode.

After several expresso, I have got to a stage where
a) Partitioned 32gb
b) Formatted NTFS on that partition

So good eh !!

MMMMMmm
Now installed all the files of XP and got to the registration page

Now it says " the product ID you entered is not valid "
and it is . Its a pukka disc and a pukka reg.
OK its the upgrade version HOWEVER its not telling me its not the correct program its saying the disc and number don't match.

PnP my arse !!

[Boris]

So now back at the recovery console.
Looking for info on where the product key details are kept.
FYI _ I have no regedit file to do it that way. I also only have the commands in the cosole to work with.

Its been eons since I last worked with DOS. HELPPP !!!