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View Full Version : Can't install Windows on new PC

kennez
02-22-2008, 01:51 PM
I've just received my new PC, which is a custom built job, and I'm trying to install Vista Business 32-bit onto it. The problem is, I keep getting a message saying "Disk Boot Failure. Insert System Disk and Press Enter"

I've tried the DVD on another computer, and I can boot from it, so there isn't a problem with the DVD. I've also looked in the BIOS, and made sure that the DVD drive is first in the boot order. There is nothing other than my PS/2 mouse and keyboard, and my monitor plugged in. There is no floppy drive installed.

Any help would really be appreciated! I'm really stuck here...I have no idea what to do. Searching on Google for a solution doesn't come up with anything that looks useful to me - everybody just advises making sure that the DVD drive is at the top of the boot order.

The motherboard is an ASUS P5N-MX. Processor is Q6600 2.4GHz, 4GB RAM, 512MB 8800GT, 500GB SATA HDD.


As an aside, my girlfriend's computer keeps bluescreening with a message mentioning something about dumping physical memory. I've reinstalled XP, but it's still doing the same thing, although it was alright for a while. Any ideas with this one? Bad memory perhaps?
gamedeveloper
02-22-2008, 02:16 PM
Um. Have you doublechecked the physical cabling between the DVD drive and the motherboard? Is the DVD spinning up?
Szos
02-22-2008, 04:01 PM
Do any other self-booting CDs work on your machine? How about one of them self-booting Linux distros?

It does indeed sound like something is wrong with your DVD drive - be it cabling related or other.

I almost want to say it might be HDD related, but even if that was the case, you would be still able to boot off the Vista DVD.

My recomendation is to take the DVD drive out of your GF's machine, and see how that works on your PC. Then run a RAM scanner on her machine - some hardware component on that machine is on it's way out.
redneck9380
02-23-2008, 11:14 PM
I had exactly this same problem trying to install XP on my home built system about a week ago, an athlon x2 5000 w/ a gigabyte motherboard. I took it to a fire dog tech at circuit city. He ran a diagnostics test which showed all of my hardware to be ok, then tried his OS disk and it worked right off the bat. He said that the only thing that might be wrong was that I was using an illegit XP disk (I was). I wound up having to dowload the 3.5 floppy boot drives (it's 6 disks total), then use a usb disk reader (I only had a dvd drive) that a friend had to install them. After that was done, I just put the cd in and everything went ok.

My suggestion, aside from the above, would be to get a linux live disk and see if that'll boot. That should help you isolate any dvd drive issues.

-A
dontgvadamn
02-25-2008, 02:40 AM
How much RAM do you have installed on the PC....Vista will not boot with over 2GB installed unless you have the FIX installed. If you have over 2gb you need to pull some RAM untill you are below 2gb. Then install vista. Then download and unstill the ram fix. Then you can reinstall your ram.
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02-25-2008, 02:40 AM
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