XP Install Stalls

Question

Greetings, I've got a Dell Dimension 2400 2.2GHz P4 system... I guess I was doing too much at one time and the system crashed hard... screen froze and mouse & keyboard commands were unresponsive so I had to turn it off and restart. On restart, I'd get the Win XP splash screen and then I'd get a Blue Screen of Death... I mostly got the PAGE FAULT IN NONPAGED AREA message, but after some troubleshooting, including plugging in a previous hard drive backup (which booted XP successfully) I finally knew it was an XP problem and not a hardware problem. I've been doing a WinXP reinstall over my existing install and I can't get beyond the 35 minutes notice... the various last entries in 3 of the log files are as follows: SETUPLOG.TXT indicates Entering InstallEnumeratedDevices SETUPAPI.LOG indicates #I121 Device install of 'USB\ROOT_HUB20\4&57AC5A1&0' finished successfully SETUPACT.LOG indicates OEMBIOS.CAT was copied Now I've been messing with this for several days and haven't made any progress... it pretty much hangs up after a half hour, and gets nowhere if I leave it overnight. I did so much troubleshooting as to re-install my stock RAM; disable everything in the BIOS; update the BIOS from A03 to A05; revert the BIOS to A00; re-install my stock CD drive; copy the CD to the hard drive and continue the Setup from there; install a PCI video card and disable everything in the BIOS including the Mouse. I've Googled until the cows have come home, tried everything I can think of, and I'm really getting tired. Any ideas? (edited to add model number) Message Edited by Jim D. on 01-17-200711:50 AM

mombodog · Answer

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/828267/en-us   maybe this?

Jim D. · Answer

Unfortunately, I spent about 2 days trying those and similar things... I did learn something there, but none of the troubleshooting tips helped me get beyond my stall point.

jmwills · Answer

Wipe everything and start over.

simpswr · Answer

Did you disconnect all external peripherals except the monitor, keyboard and mouse, and be sure those are not USB, or wireless.  Any internal USB card should also be removed.

Jim D. · Answer

As explained above, at one point I disconnected/unplugged/disabled (in the BIOS) everything but the PS/2 keyboard and monitor... I even disabled the internal video and tried a PCI video card... no dice.

I was hoping to avoid a complete wipe-out, of course.

mombodog · Answer

When all else fails, flash the bios.

Jim D. · Answer

I did. I'm beginning to think there's something corrupt with an XP file that won't over-write or append to something related to hardware.

mombodog · Answer

I would disconnect All non essential hardware, add in cards, extra cd/dvd drives ect, see if it will install.

Jim D. · Answer

I went through all currently available BIOS versions to no avail.

Jim D. · Answer

Sorry I did that typo thing and neglected to include that little tidbit (I've edited my original post)... it's a Dimension 2400. Not the most flexible BIOS I've ever seen, but I went through it several times disabling this and that, as well as setting it back to defaults by shorting the jumper at the battery.

mombodog · Answer

What model Dell?

mombodog · Answer

Yeah, the 2400 bios has little to be desired, If it is hyperthreading CPU, turn it to off, and turn off USB emulation too, in fact turn any hardware to off in the bios that can be.     The only other thing I can suggest is to try another hard drive..See if the install stops at the same place.

Jim D. · Answer

Thanks, I may try that on a new drive for nothing else other than a sanity check.

I ended-up using a drive that I retired 3 months ago when I upgraded to the 500GB that crashed. It runs fine and after the simple task of copying over my User folders and my e-mail and browser Application Data, it's been running solid for the last few days. Since about the only programs changes I've made in that time are online updates, it just made sense to me.

My hesitation to re-install Windows from scratch is because I've got a gazillion programs related to Web and graphic design, databases, FTPing to various sites, and whatnot... passwords every which way... so starting from scratch wasn't something I really wanted to spend the time doing right now

So I'm running now, and going to be able to take my time to migrate to a new Windows system I'm building. Eventually I'm making the move over to the Mac that I'm not yet quite comfortable enough with using for all of my work... but that's the long-term goal towards the end of summer.

mombodog · Answer

Great News.

Windows General

Was this post helpful?