Can't Install Vista

Whyner

Hi,

I bought a new Dell XPS 720 Desktop and got a blue screen when I turned it on for the first time.

I've since formatted it and now wish to install a clean version. I was hoping the new install would get rid of the blue screen error (details of which I never recorded).

When I boot up from CD and run Install windows my only option is

Disk 1 Partition 1 465.gb Primary

I have 2 500gb drives yet only 1 is displaying.

When I select this only drive as my chosen drive I get the below error

"Windows is unable to find a system volume that meets it's criteria for installation"

I'm calling Dell tonight but if it's something I can fix myself then better still.

Thanks...

Spear

Whyner wrote: »

I have 2 500gb drives yet only 1 is displaying.

Are those drives in a mirrored RAID array?

Whyner

Hi Spear,

I don't know. This below is taken from the build setup and I haven't changed anything.

There is an option to install drivers when I'm on the Install Windows screen. Would the hard drive require a driver? I tried to install some drivers from the Drivers and Diagnostics CD but can access the Diagnostics part.

1TB Serial ATA RAID 0 Stripe (2x500GB 7200rpm drives with DataBurst™ cache) [Included in Price]

Is that any help to you?

Whyner...

Spear

Whyner wrote: »

Hi Spear,

I don't know. This below is taken from the build setup and I haven't changed anything.

There is an option to install drivers when I'm on the Install Windows screen. Would the hard drive require a driver? I tried to install some drivers from the Drivers and Diagnostics CD but can access the Diagnostics part.

1TB Serial ATA RAID 0 Stripe (2x500GB 7200rpm drives with DataBurst™ cache) [Included in Price]

Is that any help to you?

Whyner...

The two drives should be appearing a single 1TB drive in that RAID mode (striped rather than mirrored). So you're either missing a driver, or one of them died in transit.

Whyner

If I was missing a driver I wouldn't expect to see any drives appear.

I did do a diagnosic test and all passed

Drive 0 WDC WD500AAKS - 75YGA0 - Pass
Drive 1 ST35500630AS - Pass

I presume the above 2 are my hard drives and I do see them in the BIOS also.

If I don't get it fixed tonight I'll be getting a new machine. Such a bummer though, €1,800 out of the box and blue screen...

Whyner...

Spear

Whyner wrote: »

If I was missing a driver I wouldn't expect to see any drives appear.

I did do a diagnosic test and all passed

Drive 0 WDC WD500AAKS - 75YGA0 - Pass
Drive 1 ST35500630AS - Pass

I presume the above 2 are my hard drives and I do see them in the BIOS also.

If I don't get it fixed tonight I'll be getting a new machine. Such a bummer though, €1,800 out of the box and blue screen...

Whyner...

What motherboard chipset is it? There may be a separate prompt for the RAID setup.

BostonB

I would say you need to install a driver to see the raid.

Try asking on Dell Talk.

Whyner

Spear wrote: »

What motherboard chipset is it? There may be a separate prompt for the RAID setup.

Again, I don't know. This is the basic model

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?b=&c=ie&cs=iedhs1&kc=DRS72003&l=en&oc=D047207&rbc=D047207&s=dhs

BostonB

There should be a driver on the CD's that came with it. The utilities disk

dubmick

tbh If I bought a brand new PC and it blue screened on the first boot, I send it straight back to where it came from. It's simply not good enough.

Whyner

BostonB wrote: »

There should be a driver on the CD's that came with it. The utilities disk

Hi Boston - I have a drivers cd although my machine XPS 720 is not listed on the Cd. I would assume it is compatible with my machine though since they sent it out.

However, when I insert the cd and boot it up it only give me options to run diagnostics or quit and enter dos. No option to install the drivers and when I select this Load Driver from the "Install Windows" screen it scans but does pick up anything.

Spear

It's an nVidia 680i based chipset so Vista doesn't need a separate driver. I'd check that one of the cables hasn't fallen out of the drive.

Whyner

dubmick wrote: »

tbh If I bought a brand new PC and it blue screened on the first boot, I send it straight back to where it came from. It's simply not good enough.

You're dead right. Just going to check if there is a simple solution as packaging it up and waiting on another delivery is a burden I could do without.

lynchie

Whyner wrote: »

If I was missing a driver I wouldn't expect to see any drives appear.

I did do a diagnosic test and all passed

Drive 0 WDC WD500AAKS - 75YGA0 - Pass
Drive 1 ST35500630AS - Pass

I presume the above 2 are my hard drives and I do see them in the BIOS also.

If I don't get it fixed tonight I'll be getting a new machine. Such a bummer though, €1,800 out of the box and blue screen...

Whyner...

Strange.. if you bought this machine from dell, then why are the two drives from different manufacturers? Drive 0 is Western Digital, Drive 1 is Seagate. Generally, dells always have identical drives in them

Also, why dont you use the recovery cd that came with your computer to install Vista? Would be quicker than doing it manually. Either way, you would need to load the Raid driver during Vista setup to pick up array.

Overheal

yep, its a write off. Be sure to convey your distress and milk their error for all its worth. Maybe they'll give you a free memory key or something

BostonB

Spear wrote: »

It's an nVidia 680i based chipset so Vista doesn't need a separate driver. I'd check that one of the cables hasn't fallen out of the drive.

That would explain why he only sees one drive all right.

Whyner

spent an hour on the phone to dell last night. In fairness I got a sound Indian lad who was very useful. I needed to reseat the cables, delete the old array and create a new one. I got my full TB to show up and wa able to install windows. While installing I let the lad go as I too had to run off. I came back restarted the machine and loaded the nvidia geforce driver, there's 2 drivers on the cd, I started by loading the smaller of the two. Loaded successfully. Restarted my machine = The initial blue screen appears that caused the whole problem in the first place...!!!

nvlddmkm.sys - Address 8D6F26CO base 8d6EE000 DataStamp 45DF

I then tried to install the second driver and it wouldn't, saying that they couldn't find any hardware to match the drivers on the cd...

I'm getting on to them but just thought I'd post anyway.

BostonB

nvlddmkm.sys appears to be an issue with the graphics card driver. Google for it. Its all over the web.

http://forums.hexus.net/operating-systems-applications/85252-howto-fix-nvidia-bsod-during-vista-rc1-setup.html

Whyner

Wowsers, this error is all over the web. There's threads discussing it everywhere. If I send my machine back and request an identical machine will it happen again?

Surely dell wouldn't ship a product in that state. I'm still pi$$ed they allowed 4gb of RAM with a 32 bit OS. I know I should have researched it better but come on'....that was quite sly of them and they knew what they were doing.

There doesn't seem to be a simple fix for it. I might have to call down to my mum's and take my old laptop back off her...

I'll play around with it tonight but it's future looks bleak.

BostonB

Human error. It happens.

You need to use a different driver. This seems like a good approach.

After installing and getting the BSOD, I booted to the DVD and ran the Command Prompt from the repair utilities window, I browsed to c:\windows\system32\drivers\ and "Deleted" the nvlddmkm.sys file and rebooted, upon reboot I was able to finish the installation since Vista didnt find this file so it used a generic driver.

Which Nvdia driver version you need to avoid this problem I have no idea.

Capt'n Midnight

Whyner wrote:

Surely dell wouldn't ship a product in that state. I'm still pi$$ed they allowed 4gb of RAM with a 32 bit OS. I know I should have researched it better but come on'....that was quite sly of them and they knew what they were doing.

All PC makers have DOA's (dead on arrivals) always been like that.
Some stuff they can't predict sh*t happens,
a lot of stuff is because the config is rushed / because they lock the config and don't change it early enough in response to feedback - part of the cheapo price really.

As for the 4GB RAM, if your machine only has 2 Slot then the only other choice was 3GB and if your system is a 64 bit system you can upgrade to 64 bit windows or get any number of Linux / BSD / Solaris etc. OS's to use it. And it's a software issue, as microsoft have released 32 Bit windows that sees more than 4GB , but it's not worth their while going through all the work of retro fitting it into a 32 bit desktop OS since they'd rather sell/support the 64 bit one

Whyner

I gave in. Have a dell technician calling out today. Said I couldn't return it after 7 days.

I tried installing the latest driver from nvidia and still got the BSOD. This was after a fresh reinstall.

Formatted again and installed the nvidia driver from the dell site, computer booted up with a blank screen.....and then in safe mode.........

Does anyone have a GeForce 8800 GTX 768 running with Vista? I'd like to know that it's possible.........My machine is a Dell XPS 720 (which they have actually stopped selling, weird!!)

Hoefully this mess will be over this evening.

BostonB

If you say its faulty then they can repair it. if you say you've changed your mind you can return it under the distance selling act etc. That said you wanted the machine originally, so that hasn't changed. See how the Dell guy gets on/.

Overheal

Whyner wrote: »

I gave in. Have a dell technician calling out today. Said I couldn't return it after 7 days.

I tried installing the latest driver from nvidia and still got the BSOD. This was after a fresh reinstall.

Formatted again and installed the nvidia driver from the dell site, computer booted up with a blank screen.....and then in safe mode.........

Does anyone have a GeForce 8800 GTX 768 running with Vista? I'd like to know that it's possible.........My machine is a Dell XPS 720 (which they have actually stopped selling, weird!!)

Hoefully this mess will be over this evening.

This goes for anyone: call immediately if you have issues with new hardware or software. Don't wait to try and fix it yourself. Else little things like this happen.

Whyner

Unfortunately you're right! I had a guy call out yesterday and he said my graphics card needs to be replaced. Typical the way he didn't have one with him, he's there again right now so let's hope it get's fixed.

I did ask for a replacement straight away but they made me go through technical support. I went along with it as I thought it could be fixed easily enough.......

Now to try and get something free off them........I'm thinking a TV Tuner Card or Wall Mount...

BostonB

..a Mac?

Overheal

Whyner wrote: »

Unfortunately you're right! I had a guy call out yesterday and he said my graphics card needs to be replaced. Typical the way he didn't have one with him, he's there again right now so let's hope it get's fixed.

I did ask for a replacement straight away but they made me go through technical support. I went along with it as I thought it could be fixed easily enough.......

Now to try and get something free off them........I'm thinking a TV Tuner Card or Wall Mount...

So wait... you're saying they made you go through technical support? And then they are also saying you cannot return it after 7 days?


.....wtf?

Whyner

The engineer just called there and I'm finally up and running.

Yes, I had very little time to call from home between the hours I come home from work and 8pm, when the support closes. I tried to fix it and then just wanted it replaced as it was turning into too much hassle. I was then told they couldn't replace it as 7 days had passed.

A few days ago I demanded to speak to someone in Customer Service yet they still forced me through to Tech Support. Ended up hanging up.

BostonB

Overheal wrote: »

So wait... you're saying they made you go through technical support? And then they are also saying you cannot return it after 7 days?


.....wtf?

They are allowed to repair a fault if thats what you report. However you can just return it if you don't report a fault within 14days (I think). I've done this before myself, till I got a machine that I was happy with.

Whyner

Whyner wrote: »

Does anyone have a GeForce 8800 GTX 768 running with Vista? I'd like to know that it's possible.........My machine is a Dell XPS 720 (which they have actually stopped selling, weird!!)

I'm running a single 8800GTX with Vista Home Premium on a Dell Dimension 9200. I've had the PC for near 10 months now without a problem and now I've been getting this nvlddmkm error for a week now.

I've tried everything to get rid of it but no luck, rang Dell up about it on Thursday and the guy I was talking to at Tech support had never heard of this problem so I told him to google it and check out Dell's forum, said he couldn't. Was told to ring back on Monday (tomorrow) :mad:

nc6000

Whyner wrote: »

Hi,

I bought a new Dell XPS 720 Desktop and got a blue screen when I turned it on for the first time.

I've since formatted it and now wish to install a clean version. I was hoping the new install would get rid of the blue screen error (details of which I never recorded).

When I boot up from CD and run Install windows my only option is

Disk 1 Partition 1 465.gb Primary

I have 2 500gb drives yet only 1 is displaying.

When I select this only drive as my chosen drive I get the below error

"Windows is unable to find a system volume that meets it's criteria for installation"

I'm calling Dell tonight but if it's something I can fix myself then better still.

Thanks...

I saw the thread title and thought lucky you. I wish I couldn't install it and had stuck with XP!