Error with installing Windows XP: Plese help!

[Outrigger]

For whatever reasons, I've been getting the BSOD constantly and for the life of me, can't figure out what is causing it but narrowed it down to a conflict between the video and audio codec IRQ conflict, because whenever I disable both, the pc is fine. Ok, last resort, reformat and reinstall.

Right when I get to the screen where it asks which drive I want to install the os on (I have 2 x 74gb raptors), I pick C, format using NTFS route and when its 100% complete, I get an error message saying setup cannot continue because the disk seems to be bad. I was told by WD that these drives have a 1% failure rate. Tried a couple of more times and same thing, even changed the SATA cable as well, ok fine, bad drive. took one out and leave just one in there. Now when its booting from CD, I get the message that it can't boot, os loading error, so I can't even get INTO the setup screen! WTF? tried it a couple of more times, finally got in, SAME MESSAGE! now I'm really pissed. there's NO WAY that I can get 2 bad drives at the same time when it was working perfectly before. The windows install CD I purchased a few months ago and only used ONE time to install when I built my comp in my sig. ANYBODY have any clues? I feel like this kinda things only happens to me. Please help!

 

[djnes]

1) Change your title if possible...the mods hate it when you scream in a title.
2) Did you test either drive using the WD diag tools?
3) Have you run memtest yet? Always a necessary step if you BSOD during setup.
4) What are the BSOD codes....and have you looked them up?
5) Have you verified that your BIOS is up to date and configured correctly?
6) If all else seems okay, have you used someething like gdisk to completely clear the drives, including the MBR?

 

[Outrigger]

1) Change your title if possible...the mods hate it when you scream in a title.
2) Did you test either drive using the WD diag tools?
3) Have you run memtest yet? Always a necessary step if you BSOD during setup.
4) What are the BSOD codes....and have you looked them up?
5) Have you verified that your BIOS is up to date and configured correctly?
6) If all else seems okay, have you used someething like gdisk to completely clear the drives, including the MBR?

Thanks, it won't let me edit the thread title, didn't realized I had the caps on.

memtest was fine, even ran prime95 overnight without a hiccup. BSOD would always show a fraction of a second before the computer reboot itself. Initially thought it was a bad mobo because I tried swapping ram, doing one at a time, same result. got a new one from evga, same thing but this time, it happens right away and instead of rebooting, the bsod would just hang giving me a read on the error which is something to do with the IRQ. Like I said before, when I disable the audio and video codec, windows is fine. but what I don't understand is why won't the OS install? and why sometimes I can't even boot into the windows setup screen? everything in BIOS is stock, nothing changed except the boot device priority, so I'm lost.

 

[djnes]

Try reflashing the BIOS for the fun of it...and/or resetting the CMOS.

 

[Outrigger]

cleared the cmos, used a different cd drive, and it finally installed. HOWEVER upon after installation with just the mobo driver installed, I got 2 BSODs back to back! how is that possible? the ONLY thing at this point I can think of after a full reinstallation is the ram, what else could cause it? and oh, when I click on windows update, it gets me to the page where it states express or custom, either one clicked I get an error message and no updates installed? has anyone ever had this issue before? or am I alone?