Windows OS input

[Eric91Z]

OK, so I have a HDD that took a dump. So I am going to get a new HDD and need to pickup the Windows OS to install on it (never had a copy originally). So, I am looking for some input.

Now, I know there are lots of options other than Windows, but I want to stay focused on Windows only. So here are my questions:

1) For a home computer use, which one would you guys recommend: Windows XP Home or Windows XP Pro (not going to go with Vista)?

2) NewEgg.com carries both "System Builder" and "Retail" versions. Retail offers full support and "Builder" version seem to offer limited Microsoft support, but I can't find any differences beyond that. Can anyone recommend whether I should go with the System Builder or full retail version? The Builder version is quite a bit cheaper, so it would be nice to go that route if possible.

3) What is the largest HDD that can be run and fully used without partioning under Windows XP SP2/3?


Any and all input would be appreciated.


Thanks,

[Breadfan]

You should be fine with home version. Pro does offer a few extra admin tools plus the ability to connect to a AD domain. You probably won't miss that especially if not a laptop.

How much support do you feel you need from MS? I've never called them myself. Well wait, once to fix an activation issue after swapping a motherboard out for someone.

I don't know the differences in MS support from oem to retail versions. Anyway, for most issues in Windows, you'll find support on the net faster than MS will answer the phone.

I've only used OEM versions and never had an issue, but again, I never call MS.

As for question three, you can have a single partition of 144 petabytes. Well, if you can find a drive that size that is. :) Simply put any drive on the market can run as one partition with 48bit lba which started on XP SP1a (possibly even on regular XP but I can't recall)

PS 144 petabytes is 144,000,000 gigabyes, or 144,000 terabytes.

(Should be fine for a few years atleast)

[Eric91Z]

You should be fine with home version. Pro does offer a few extra admin tools plus the ability to connect to a AD domain. You probably won't miss that especially if not a laptop.

How much support do you feel you need from MS? I've never called them myself. Well wait, once to fix an activation issue after swapping a motherboard out for someone.

I don't know the differences in MS support from oem to retail versions. Anyway, for most issues in Windows, you'll find support on the net faster than MS will answer the phone.

I've only used OEM versions and never had an issue, but again, I never call MS.

As for question three, you can have a single partition of 144 petabytes. Well, if you can find a drive that size that is. :) Simply put any drive on the market can run as one partition with 48bit lba which started on XP SP1a (possibly even on regular XP but I can't recall)

PS 144 petabytes is 144,000,000 gigabyes, or 144,000 terabytes.

(Should be fine for a few years atleast)

Thanks for the information. It is much appreciated and helps in the shopping side of things.

Yeah, I think that should be sufficient HDD space... :eek:

[Breadfan]

Thanks for the information. It is much appreciated and helps in the shopping side of things.

Yeah, I think that should be sufficient HDD space... :eek:

No problem, hope it helps!

Just an FYI 48-bit LBA has been out for several years now. It's what allows computers to use a single drive beyond 137gb. LBA changes happen every few years, back in the early 90's the limit was 8gb, LBA upgrades made it 137gb, everyone went "NO WAY we'll ever use that much!"

Anyway, the 48bit support must be built into two places:

1.) The motherboard BIOS
2.) The operating system.

XP in those flavors you mentioned are fine with 48bit LBA support.

You computer SHOULD be, unless it's older than 4 or 5 years old. If it's older, I'd find a 48bit lba check utility and if for some reason it didn't have it, usually there are bios upgrades. But...I'm betting 99% that you are fine on the hardware side.

It's stuff like this an Y2K that helps to keep computer pro's busy and employed. ;) I wonder how many jobs get saved those many years ago when it's time to cut costs and then the company realizes they need to upgrade bios'es on all machines to get 48bit lba :)

[Eric91Z]

OK, quick question on HDD's. I am going to guess that based on the age of my computer it is a SATA150 setup. Most of the HDD's on NewEgg are SATA300 drives. Will a SATA300 drive work on a machine setup for SATA150, but just work at the slower SATA150 speed?

On the same note, when buying a SATA cable for an OEM drive install, given the above, should it be a SATA150 or SATA II(300) cable?

Thanks for the input.

[Breadfan]

Sata300 was designed for backwards compatability. So yes, you should be able to run a Sata300 drive on your Sata150 controller. The drive may have a jumper to force it to Sata150 operation, I hear this is not 100% necessary to do but will ensure proper operation. I think most sata300 drives today have this jumper spot even if not advertised, still you should be able to confirm on the drive manufacturers website.

Also, Sata150 cables can work with current Sata300 drives, so any cable you buy should work for what you buy. i.e. if you get a new Sata300 cable it should work with your setup.

Sata300 and 150 are theoretical throughput limits, 3.0gbps and 1.5gbps respectively. Most of the time you won't be maxing out this speed, so it's not like a Sata300 drive plans or epxects to run at 3.0 all the time, it should simply run with the controller and the only time you'll probably even fill up the 1.5gbps on a modern drive is with a burst read from the onboard drive cache.

Actually, hard drives are the slowness bottleneck still on computers for the most part. Drive access times are as fast as ever but pale in comparison to CPU and memory speeds. You want some good file access and transfer speeds along with super reliablity and recovery get some 10k rpm drives run them in a well configured Raid5 setup or go server class get some SCSI raid. :) (Sorry, went off on a tangent, you should be good with what your looking at though!)

[Eric91Z]

Thanks for the clarification. That is what I was hoping to hear.

It is funny, you can buy 1 SATA cable on NewEgg and the price, with shipping is about $9. You can buy 2 cables, they charge shipping on both, and total comes ot around $15. Or, you can by 8 cables at under $2 each with free shipping and end up with $8 cables for less than the price of two. I kind of thought I would order a new cable with the other items I am ordering, but if they can't include shipping with the other items then no way...

[Breadfan]

Yeah cables from Newegg stink for shipping. The cable itself is like $1 but shipping is $6, lol. I wish they would fix that.

I should have one or two spare SATA150 cables, PM me your address I will put one in an envelope this weekend and send it to you free. You get a few everytime you purchase a motherboard plus retail drives come with them. Since I do computer work for people I usually end up with spares.

Same goes for computer power cords, I have a banker's box with about 250 of them. ;)

[Eric91Z]

Funny thing is I checked the Best buy website and they are asking $19 for a SATA cable... NewEgg is still cheaper even with the shipping.

Anyway, I have one already since it is used on my current, bad HDD. I need to run by my storage unit tonight and grab all of my boxes from the computer build a couple years back and see if I have any extra cables in there that might have some with the motherboard. If I don't have any more in there I will send the PM. Thank you for the offer.

[MM2004]

Can you give us detail on the machine?

Manufacturer?
Model?
Approx. age?

I recently purchased spare HDD's for my users, and each drive came with 3 or 4 SATA cables of different lengths. I could afford to lose a few if you need them.

Mike.

[Eric91Z]

Can you give us detail on the machine?

Manufacturer?
Model?
Approx. age?

I recently purchased spare HDD's for my users, and each drive came with 3 or 4 SATA cables of different lengths. I could afford to lose a few if you need them.

Mike.

The machine was built about 4 or 5 years ago. I bought the parts, a buddy helped me put it together. It has an ASUS motorboard, AMD Ahtelon processor, 1 (bad) Maxtor 120G SATA150 drive, 1 DVD-RW, 1 CD-ROM, 1 floppy drive (left over from an old machine), and ATI Video card. I will should have the exact motherboard and processor information later today...

[Aren Jay]

Try XP Media Center if you want to do any media activites, otherwise XP Home is fine.

[KillJoy]

Buying software....

.... you guys funny!

:rofl:

KillJoy

[Eric91Z]

OK, I got the new HDD and Win XP CD. The RAID controller will pick up the new HDD and reads the space, but I can not load Windows to it. It says there are no partitions to install to. Do I need to format this HDD? If so, how do I do that? Any input would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[Breadfan]

Sounds like the Windows install disk may not be seeing your RAID controller. Windows has basic disk controller drivers on the install disk. Some RAID controllers may not be picked up. It's saying there are no partitions because it's not smart enough to see your hard drive is even there due to not having the right controller driver.

XP let's you load third party drivers on setup. I think you hit F6 or F8, it will say to press that if you want to install third party drivers for the controller. Problem is, if I recall, XP looks for the drivers on a 3.5" floppy or the a:. Not sure if this was fixed in later shipped versions of XP or not. Yeah, a year ago I had to dig out a floppy drive and disk to get XP installed on a machine...

So...you may need a floppy.

An alternative is to install on a non-RAID SATA controller off the motherboard. It *should* see those fine.

The issues are usually with controllers that are PCI based RAID or disk controllers that are on PCI bus not integrated into the mobo's southbridge chip.

[Eric91Z]

OK, now we are a little beyond my knowledge. The motherboard is an ASUS K8V Deluxe:

http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=14&l3=67&l4=0&model=234&modelmenu=1

When I get to the partition portion of the install in that box it says "Unknown Disk".

So I assume you are right. I don't remember needing a floppy the first time around, but I didn't do the install myself - just watched. The hard part will be finding a machine to get those drivers loaded on a 3.5" disk since none other than my home one I am working on have it...

[Breadfan]

Dual SATA RAID
The Promise 20378 RAID controller incorporated two Serial ATA and one parallel connectors with RAID 0, RAID 1 and RAID 0+1 functions while the VT8237 RAID controller provides another two Serial ATA connectors for RAID 0 and RAID 1 functions. The K8V is the ideal solution to enhance hard disk performance and data backup protection without the cost of add-on cards.That is from the ASUS product page. This board has 2 RAID controllers...

VT8237 is the VIA controller "southbridge". What is a southbridge? Well most boards have 2 main chips (aside from the CPU socket), called Northbridge and Southbridge. Northbrdige is the larger chip with a small heatsink and maybe a fan towards the top, hence north. It controls things like memory, cpu bus, etc.

Southbridge is the main chip towards the bottom, usually without a heatsink. It genereally controls onboard PCI bus things like disk controller, USB, etc.

Anyway...

If you look at your board, you will see the VT8237 southbrdige, and there will be another small chip down there with "Promise" on it. This is the Promise RAID controller. It's between the blue IDE connector and cMOS battery.

There will be seperate connectors. Most likely if you have this connected to the Promise controller you will need 3rd party drivers. Try the ones that correlate with the VT8237.

You can get a PDF version of the manual at the ASUS Support page. Search "K8V Deluxe" then click the result and you will get a listing with all the software and manuals for this board.

http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us

See page 21 of the Manual for a diagram of the board. Note the SATA connectors (there are 4) are seperated into pairs. The pair next to the VT southbridge most likely are for that controller, the ones below the blue IDE connector near the promis chip are for that RAID controller. Use the ones on the top nearest the VT southbridge.

Interestingly enough, the manual is incorrect in it's diagram. The numbers on the diagram do not correspond correctly to the descriptions on pages 22 and 23, most notably #13 which points to a second set of SATA connectors yet calls it a Winbond Super I/O chip, and #14 which points to the Winbond chip stating it's a southbrdige. That is not right. (Typos and errors in board manuals is common)

So...try the other set of SATA connectors, and see if that gets you anywhere. I can tell you right now XP does not ship with Promise controller drivers natively, but the ones on the VIA southbrdige should work!

[MM2004]

Mike,

When I wiped the drive on my new Dell box I recently purchased, the intent was to partition the HDD 4 ways--three 30GB parts and whatever remained of the 500GB HDD. (~370GB)

C: Xp Pro
D: Vista Home Premium
E: Unformatted
F: Data (share)

The box has SATA II drives and had to make sure the OEM Dell OS CD had a copyright of 2007 or greater in order for the OS to see the SATA HDD.

Is this possibly what is happening here?

Mike.

ps. the Dual boot is working like a charm, and could not be happier with this machine.

Carry on... ;)

[Eric91Z]

I have tried on both sets of SATA connectors and it does not work on either. When I put on the second, Promise, set, it will not recognize there is a HDD there at all (in the RAID), on the first VIA set it will at least recognize there is a HDD there.

Neither set will get it to show up during the Windows install, but the VT8237 does show at boot and recognizes the drive when on that SATA set. Not exactly sure why Windows will not pick it up on either.

Going to look at getting the VIA and Promise drivers downloaded and put on 3.5" floppy to load during the Windows install and see if that helps.

Thank you very much for your input so far!

[Eric91Z]

OK, I checked out the ASUS Support page and found the downloads and drivers for the K8v Deluxe. I see it has both the Promise and VIA RAID Controller drivers on there in .zip file format. I have downloaded those, but see an issue.

Windows wants the drivers loaded from a 3.5" floppy drive. The 2 VIA zip files I found are 2.68 MB and 6.61MB each. Will I need to extract the files from that zip file and break down to smaller portions and put on multiple disks or how should I handle that if I want to use the VIA Raid Controller?

And if I go the Promise route, which is the correct SATA driver to use as it looks like they have 3 different ones. Although the one does have a "Make Disk" function to it so you can make a Promise FastTrak 378 RAID controller driver disk.

[Breadfan]

Make disk will make you a driver disk with all you need for the Promise controller.

Otherwise for VIA you only need to extract the specific WinXP driver file, there's probably lots of other drivers for different OS's and utilities within the zip package.

Another option, if you felt like it, would be to copy the controller drivers onto your own WinXP custom install disk, i.e. slipstream. You should be able to copy the XP disk to your harddrive, and manually add the controller drivers to it, in the i386 dir (can't recall precislely where at the moment), then you just reburn it.

It's kinda a pain b/c you gotta reburn as a bootable disc.

But, it's doable.

Been awhile since I've done it, but you spend the time to do it once and you have a Windows CD with the controller drivers and latest SP's you system needs. (You already have SP3 though, so only do this for the controller drivers.)

Here's an example guide:

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/How-To--Slipstream-your-XP-installation

possibly better...

http://www.ozzu.com/mswindows-forum/slipstream-sata-drivers-into-windows-pro-install-t28824.html

I'm still a tad surprised you couldn't see them on VIA controller, usually native controllers are easier for Windows to pickup, especially the SP3 edition you think it'd be SATA aware...

[Eric91Z]

Make disk will make you a driver disk with all you need for the Promise controller.

Otherwise for VIA you only need to extract the specific WinXP driver file, there's probably lots of other drivers for different OS's and utilities within the zip package.

Another option, if you felt like it, would be to copy the controller drivers onto your own WinXP custom install disk, i.e. slipstream. You should be able to copy the XP disk to your harddrive, and manually add the controller drivers to it, in the i386 dir (can't recall precislely where at the moment), then you just reburn it.

It's kinda a pain b/c you gotta reburn as a bootable disc.

But, it's doable.

Been awhile since I've done it, but you spend the time to do it once and you have a Windows CD with the controller drivers and latest SP's you system needs. (You already have SP3 though, so only do this for the controller drivers.)

Here's an example guide:

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/How-To--Slipstream-your-XP-installation

possibly better...

http://www.ozzu.com/mswindows-forum/slipstream-sata-drivers-into-windows-pro-install-t28824.html

I'm still a tad surprised you couldn't see them on VIA controller, usually native controllers are easier for Windows to pickup, especially the SP3 edition you think it'd be SATA aware...


I was reading some of the help information on Microsoft's website and it states that Microsoft has done no driver updating for SATA controllers in Service Pack updates. So even with SP3 it didn't do any updates for that.

With the VIA RAID it would pick up and recoginize the HDD at boot up, but with the Promise FastTrack it wouldn't - until I created the new Array. I assume this is because I was running the VIA with the old HDD.

Either way, Windoze would not pick it up during the install process. So I did a little reading on "Driver Packs" and "nLite". I have downloaded the mass storage driver pack from Driver Packs and installed nLite. I copied my Win XP install disk to my other computer, ran nLite to put the drivers in there (for both Promise and VIA 32-bit) and created the ISO. Then used CDBurnerXP (freeware) to copy the ISO image to disk. So the next step will be to take it home and try again. I think I am going to move the SATA cable back to the VIA controller since that worked fine before and then try the install again.

Wish me luck...

[Dr Caleb]

Although the one does have a "Make Disk" function to it so you can make a Promise FastTrak 378 RAID controller driver disk.

That is the way to put these on floppy. It's the only way to get the drivers to load.

And yes, XP still requires the drivers to be on a floppy, 3.5" A: drive. Not to scare you off, but I have a couple ASUS boards which I never have been able to load windows onto, because of the exact problems you are describing.

The way I get around it, is to make a (ghost) copy of another, working system on the new drive, have it boot into 'safe mode' the first time, and load drivers from there. (and change key #s). Most of the time the boards are similar enough to load XP configured from another computer, but only in safe mode, but I have 1 system that still won't load with this process.

If you do manage to get the RAID driver to load, and boot, you may have a problem with the network. Windows will require you to activate on first boot, but it won't have the network drivers to do it over the internet. So, you have to do it manually - but the method to generate the activation numbers require a network driver - so the numbers are all blank. You cannot register it without the numbers, you can't do it over the internet without network, you can't install network drivers until you register it. Lather, rinse, repeat.

The difference between 'System Builder/OEM' and 'retail' support is this - if you call into Microsoft with install problems for a OEM version, they will tell you to talk to the computer Manufacturer "OEM" (ASUS). You will get nowhere with ASUS diagnosing problems like this. They will refer you to Microsoft. Lather, Rinse, repeat.

One other solution is to disable the RAID entirely, and run off a single drive. Sometimes that helps, depending on the board.

Now might be a good time to mention Unbuntu and Fedora Linux? (Which I've never had a problem loading on an ASUS board, but most of which also don't support the VIA RAID, but do suppor the Promise RAID)

[Eric91Z]

I have been running this setup for 5 years or so with the previous HDD running off of the VIA SATA RAID controller with no problems. But, again, I am not sure what all was done to get the previous install to work.

Anyway, I stopped home over lunch and tried the new CD I made from nLink with the VIA and Promise 32-bit XP drivers on it. It booted from the CD fine and this time when it got to the partition part of the install it actually had the new hard drive in there with about 476G of free space showing (500G HDD). It is currently working on formating that entire partition (I didn't create separate partitions).

So we will see how this goes. I am now further than I was last night...

[Dr Caleb]

I have been running this setup for 5 years or so with the previous HDD running off of the VIA SATA RAID controller with no problems. But, again, I am not sure what all was done to get the previous install to work.


'Slipstreaming' it is the only way. The drivers are needed in the setup process, and the only other way is to use a floppy disk. Most OEM's do this already.

I do it for the 300 odd servers I administer. It's relatively easy, but must be done correctly. Good to hear it's working for you.

[Aren Jay]

You only need a floppy for 5 minutes, so you really do not need to install it just hook it up and take it out when you are done.


Some SATA conections are not seen by XP home either they are treated like a raid array and need an A: FDD disk to load windows. Media Centre does not have this problem.

[Breadfan]

Glad to hear it is working!!

[Eric91Z]

The computer is back up and running - at least with the software I had around. I have some in storage that I will need to get out and reload.

And at this time, I can not get the old HDD to work. It is making bad noises any time it is connected. If it is connected with the machine off then the machine will not boot up at all. If it is connected with the machine running (which they say you can do with a SATA drive), then it will hang windows. Looks like I am SOL on anything I wanted off of there.

Luckily I still had some of the recent pictures of my daughter on the digital camera. Otherwise, pretty much all of the video and pictures I had of her are gone. I can live with the rest of what is lost on that drive, but it would have been nice to at least get the stuff involving her off of there...

[Dr Caleb]

Luckily I still had some of the recent pictures of my daughter on the digital camera. Otherwise, pretty much all of the video and pictures I had of her are gone. I can live with the rest of what is lost on that drive, but it would have been nice to at least get the stuff involving her off of there...

Old techie trick - try putting it in the freezer for a couple hours, and connect it while still real cold.

Sometimes it works, for a few minutes. Sometimes not, but what harm in trying?

[Aren Jay]

If you do take the HDD apart you can get some wicked fridge magnets. Do not put these on your computer case.

Had someone at Safeway Canada do that, he had more random computer problems than anyone else, ever.

[Breadfan]

You could also get a cheap SATA USB encolsure, try running the drive in that...it may allow the computer to boot and who knows maybe it will see the drive...you'd only be out $15 and could sell the SATA case online if you don't want it afterwards.

The freezer trick should be considered the last step before the trash heap. There's probably other things you'll try before that, as the freezer trick could be the last game for it.

Hopefully you get what you need off of it. Unfortunately reminders to backup are usually painful...

[MM2004]

I have saved many user's data with this -> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812232 002

Combined with 'freezing' the HDD (as needed), this adapter is an essential part of my tool bag.

Good luck!

Mike.