Windows Vista help plz

Brian Boston

I got myself banned.
I realize 99% of this forum will have no idea what im talking about, but im giving it a shot.

Heres the deal. My friend had some nasty virus on his Vista (i know, yuck) PC that would make it shut down after about 5 minutes. This didn't happen in safe mode. After 4 hours of searching and trying different things I said fuck it and ill just format the drive tomorrow and start fresh.

So, the next day i pop in the windows vista CD. This isn't what im used to already with XPs install stuff where i usually goto the recovery command prompt and stuff. So the disk loads, i hit "recovery" or something like that. Theres a list of things i can do, the last one in Command Prompt, so im like sweet ill format the drive there than install...

I goto the command prompt and pop in
format c: /fs:ntfs
no go
so i pop in
format c:
Are you sure you want to format drive (y/n)
y
now some message pops up about the drive is in use by something else, do you want to force a dissconnect, so i said yeah and it formats
100%
Volume Label:
i typed C

Now heres the problem. I type in C: to goto the drive. It says C: is not ready, sweet. So i restart, and just try to install Vista. When i get to the part when i wanna choose where to install Vista, there is no drives on the list. Im fucking stumped, i hope i didn't kill this kids harddrive. Anybody have any ideas? I would try popping a XP cd in and see if that will see it but i need to slip SATA drivers in the xp cd and stuff.... please help.
 

Brian Boston

I got myself banned.
ryanbehlau said:
I have Vista, but I have no clue what your talking about.
That sucks, don't try to get rid of it because your going to have this problem lol.

gonna fux with some standalone harddrive software when i get home to try to fix it, i also never checked the bios to see if it can see the harddrive.
 

GoGzS

Bronze member
Hmmm....can't remember well the instalation process of Vista...did it few times but o well...

Get the SATA drivers on a floppy disk (hopefully the computer had a floppy drive)...and start an XP installation...and get to the part when you choose on wich partition to install...delete every of them, and set them up as you want..format the C: one as NTFS and then restart and try Vista again...

Also...there might be a option to make the SATA disks appear as IDE disks (have that on on my Abit...)
Helps alot when you're to lazy to slip the SATA drivers on a CD and you don't have a floppy drive...

But well...I'm 99% sure you didn't screw the disk...it's either couse Vista doesn't recognize the SATA controller (so it doesn't see the disk either), or the formatting went wrong...

You can also try to set up the partitions using Hirens Boot CD...

Nothing else comes to my mind...would be alot easyer if the PC was next to me...
 

Hep Greg

Administrator
heres what you do:


step 1: insert Vista install disk into computer.

step 2: pick up computer.

step 3: violently throw computer out the window.

step 4: buy a Mac.

step 5: enjoy how much simpler life is now that you have a mac.
 
Step 6: Sit at home and cry after you just realize that you could have just treated your PC right instead of spending $2000 extra on a mac.
 
GoGzS said:
Hmmm....can't remember well the instalation process of Vista...did it few times but o well...

Get the SATA drivers on a floppy disk (hopefully the computer had a floppy drive)...and start an XP installation...and get to the part when you choose on wich partition to install...delete every of them, and set them up as you want..format the C: one as NTFS and then restart and try Vista again...

Also...there might be a option to make the SATA disks appear as IDE disks (have that on on my Abit...)
Helps alot when you're to lazy to slip the SATA drivers on a CD and you don't have a floppy drive...

But well...I'm 99% sure you didn't screw the disk...it's either couse Vista doesn't recognize the SATA controller (so it doesn't see the disk either), or the formatting went wrong...

You can also try to set up the partitions using Hirens Boot CD...

Nothing else comes to my mind...would be alot easyer if the PC was next to me...

thats what i was thinking, but vista doesnt seem to have problems with sata drives, hopefully your vista install disk is fine.
probbly a formating problem giving it a bad superblock. try reformating it again, if that doesnt work then try this http://downloads.sourceforge.net/gparted/gparted-live-0.3.9-13.iso?modtime=1227915767&big_mirror=0

open gparted, erase all partitions and format as ntfs, hopfully that will work.
sorry, but i've been using gentoo/freebsd for years and forgot most windows specific problems which this seems to be.
will update if i think of something
 

Brian Boston

I got myself banned.
kolby crouch said:
GoGzS said:
Hmmm....can't remember well the instalation process of Vista...did it few times but o well...

Get the SATA drivers on a floppy disk (hopefully the computer had a floppy drive)...and start an XP installation...and get to the part when you choose on wich partition to install...delete every of them, and set them up as you want..format the C: one as NTFS and then restart and try Vista again...

Also...there might be a option to make the SATA disks appear as IDE disks (have that on on my Abit...)
Helps alot when you're to lazy to slip the SATA drivers on a CD and you don't have a floppy drive...

But well...I'm 99% sure you didn't screw the disk...it's either couse Vista doesn't recognize the SATA controller (so it doesn't see the disk either), or the formatting went wrong...

You can also try to set up the partitions using Hirens Boot CD...

Nothing else comes to my mind...would be alot easyer if the PC was next to me...

thats what i was thinking, but vista doesnt seem to have problems with sata drives, hopefully your vista install disk is fine.
probbly a formating problem giving it a bad superblock. try reformating it again, if that doesnt work then try this []

open gparted, erase all partitions and format as ntfs, hopfully that will work.
sorry, but i've been using gentoo/freebsd for years and forgot most windows specific problems which this seems to be.
will update if i think of something
I installed Vista on this same hard drive before with the same installation disk, so i know its not the install disk. IM gonna try out the gparted thing you linked, hopefully that works. The problme is i can't reformat it with the Vista CD because it doesn't see the drive. I was going to try a linux live cd and see if that sees it, but i'm going to try your program first. Thanks, i didn't think anyone on here was gonna know what i was talking about

Joe don't post if you don't know what I'm talking about. Im looking for help not ignorant people.
 
your welcome, when it comes to partitioning compatibility linux is much better than windows

EDIT: ironicly i had to reinstall vista on my laptop, my hardrive is broken so i get filesystem problems all the time,
so for the time being i have to keep reinstalling vista, anyways, it would not detect my hardrive this time, which i figured out
was due to a filesystem error, gparted worked just fine for me, and windows continued to install, apparently, windows
doesnt like to read filesystems with errors, although i don't know why because i dont believe it has any real way of checking it.
hopefully your problem is like mine and gparted works, let me know if it does.
 

Rob.

Admin
Staff member
Hep greg, NO.

Step 1: Buy new computer.
-sub step 1: Format new computer

Step 2: Buy ubuntu CD

Step 3: Download/install firewall/anti viruses.

step 4: Come to the realization that you've made a totally kick ass computer compared to any MAC or PC.
 

idk47

Steel Member
Hep Greg said:
heres what you do:


step 1: insert Vista install disk into computer.

step 2: pick up computer.

step 3: violently throw computer out the window.

step 4: buy a Mac.


step 5: enjoy how much simpler life is now that you have a mac.
 
Robert Regad said:
Hep greg, NO.

Step 1: Buy new computer.
-sub step 1: Format new computer

Step 2: Buy ubuntu CD

Step 3: Download/install firewall/anti viruses.

step 4: Come to the realization that you've made a totally kick ass computer compared to any MAC or PC.
Step 5: Play no compatible games, use no compatible software, design nothing without adobe creative suite. sounds pretty kickass to me...
 

Brian Boston

I got myself banned.
Conor Davidson said:
Robert Regad said:
Hep greg, NO.

Step 1: Buy new computer.
-sub step 1: Format new computer

Step 2: Buy ubuntu CD

Step 3: Download/install firewall/anti viruses.

step 4: Come to the realization that you've made a totally kick ass computer compared to any MAC or PC.
Step 5: Play no compatible games, use no compatible software, design nothing without adobe creative suite. sounds pretty kickass to me...
Theres a little program called Wine...



Fuckk you guys with these Mac comments, your no fuckinng help, get out of here.
 
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