[SOLVED] Installing WinXP after Win7.

Axen

So here is the deal. My Brother got himself a new laptop. It's nothing fancy. It just meets the requirements to run Win7. He wants to install XP on it so his games will run better. However when I go to install XP it gives me the BSOD when it gets to the (starting windows) portion of the setup. This is before we select our partition and before the actual install.

I did create a second partition on his HDD using the Disk Management thing, but with the damn thing crashing before we even get to that part it ain't exactly useful at the moment.

I checked Tom's Hardware and they did have a guide on installing XP with Win7 installed. Unfortunately they do not mention anything about blue screening before selecting your partition. So I turn to you guys.

Anyone have some thoughts?


Oh, I should mention that I did already formated the HDD completely and tried installing XP, but we still got BSOD. So I ended up putting Win7 back on and partitioning the HDD. Which is what the guide said. Though I think that is more for Dual booting and my Bro doesn't care if he has Win7 or not.

Skye

What model of laptop is it? More specifically, is it a Dell?

I've had this problem several times, all of which were on Dell computers. The solution was to go into the BIOS and to toggle a particular hard drive setting (can't really remember what the actual option was called; think it started with an "A" on some computers and on others it was some sort of legacy mode).

I don't remember if I ever had this problem on a Dell laptop though.

Axen

It is an Acer Aspire 5532.

I got the feeling the problem is something simple I am just not seeing. Kind of annoying really.

edit- I should also mention that Win7 installs just fine. So I don't think it is faulty hardware.

edit 2- Since you mentioned BIOS I went in a changed the HDD setting from ACHI (or some such) to IDE. Going to see if that does anything.

Spudge

Maybe it's an issue with SATA?

There are a lot of SATA drivers that aren't included with WinXP. You may need to make a disc/USB drive with the SATA drivers loaded, then slipstream them at the beginning of the WinXP install (It says something along the lines of "press <key here> to install 3rd party driver)

Skye

Are you using a retail XP CD? It sounds like XP install is having problems when detecting the hard drive, so you might have to find the appropriate SATA drivers and slipstream them into the disc using nlite. I've done this for an HP laptop (with similar symptoms), so this could be a good place to start.

Axen

Yeah that thought crossed my mind too.

I am just not sure what drivers I need or where to get them.

edit- Yeah it is a retail copy of XP. Had it for years and it still works fine. I will look in to the SATA driver thing.


edit 3- Oh hey! Changing the SATA BIOS setting from ACHI to IDE did the trick! Thanks for mentioning it!

Skye

Google tells me that some aspire owners have switched from achi to ide (which was what I was thinking of but couldn't remember the name of) have had success with getting past the blue screen problem. Since you did that, you should be ok now (hopefully).

Axen

Yep it sure did the trick.

Annoying problem solved and I learned something new.

Thanks for the speedy help guys!