>Date:    Sun, 11 Mar 2001 08:43:10 -0500
>From:    Charles Mims <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Clean Win2K Install 40 Gig WD Caviar
>
>Greetings.  I purchased a new 40 Gig WD hard drive, and a new HP 9500i CDRW
>to replace an existing HD and CDRW.  I have the system (400mhz AMD, 128 M
>RAM, AOpen MX59Pro motherboard) recognized both drives, and the DVD.  (HD is
>Primary Master, CDRW is Secondary Master, DVD is Secondary Slave)
>
>I was able to fdisk and format the drive with no problems.  The problem came
>when installing Win2K.  It gets to the format in NTFS portion and says the
>drive cannot be formatted.  If I tell it to leave the current file system it
>says setup cannot created folder WINNT.  Thinking it was a bad drive, I
>reformatted in FAT32 again, then installed Win98.  It installed completely
>with no problems.  So I thought I'd try installing Win2K from inside Win98.
>Got through the first portion of the installation just fine.  Rebooted
>automatically, and it hung up again at the reformat/convert/leave as is
>section of the install.  The message is now "Drive C is corrupted and cannot
>be repaired".
>
>I was running Win2K on this machine on the previous hard drive.  The only
>thing that changed was the size (and brand) of the HD, and the CDRW is the
>same brand, but a newer model.  All other settings are the same as they were
>previously.
>
>I'm about to pull my hair out with this one.  I spent all day yesterday
>trying to force Win2k to install.  The only anomaly I can think of is that I
>had a power surge Friday afternoon that caused the computer to reboot.  Is
>it possible that there is damage to the IDE controller on the motherboard?
>What other ideas do you folks have.  I wouldn't mind upgrading to a new
>motherboard with a faster chip, but I don't want to go to the expense if
>there are other problems.  In other words, I'm not keen on spending the
>money if it still isn't going to work!
>
>Thanks in advance,
>Charles Mims
>Daytona Beach, FL

        Yes, I've stumbled over the same problem. The board isn't in the WIN2000
Hardware Compatibility List. I've checked any possible combination of
hardware to solve the problem. There were 2 solutions for me:
        1. The only disk which unlocks the problem is Maxtor 40GB ATA-100. Any
other disk(W.D., Quantum, Seagate) simply doesn't work(whatever IDE channel
they occupy).
        2. Exchange the board for something else from another manufacturer(first
check the win2000 HCL), Gigabyte series are fine.
        BIOS updates didn't work. The only reasonable possible thing I haven't
check is to update the bios of the hard disks.

        Albert Levy
        Aladin Computers, Israel
        www.aladincom.com

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