please please help me!!

zerothehero

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Nov 12, 2004
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ok heres my problem. i bought a new abit mobo, case and athlon xp3200
+
so i set it all up the other day using my existing hard drives, floppy, ram and cdroms from this computer. i get a message at boot saying missing operating system. i checked all the cables, hd jumpers over and over again. everything was in place and reading right in the bios. well i couldnt fix the problem no matter what i tried. i took the pc apart and put this one together again. i got some answers the most sensible being to reformatt because the hd's were conflicting. so i did. well i tried. i put the pc together again, put in my restore cd and it says now that, something like, this cd is not the right cd for this system. insert correct cd and try again....something along those lines. when i tried to boot without the cd i got the missing operating system again. the cd works fine because i tried it on this pc. the only way i can get help on this matter is to keep rebuilding my pc because its the only access i have to the internet. im going to try one last time. hopefully when i print out your kind replies, one of them is the right one so i dont have to rehbuild again. does anyone have any suggestions. thank you very much in advance
 

RichPLS

Champion
You need to reinstall Windows with bew cpu/mobo upgrade.

<pre><font color=red>°¤o,¸¸¸,o¤°`°¤o \\// o¤°`°¤o,¸¸¸,o¤°
And the sign says "You got to have a membership card to get inside" Huh
So I got me a pen and paper And I made up my own little sign</pre><p></font color=red>
 

_WW_

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Dec 8, 2002
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Not quite sure what it is your doing but if you are trying to install an OS supplied with your old computer such as a Dell etc. it probably won't work. These reinstall OS CDs that come with factory machines do some kind of "virtual handshake" to make sure they are being installed on a proprietary machine. You may need to buy a retail or OEM version of Windows to install on your new machine.

....WW (5.0)
 

zerothehero

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Nov 12, 2004
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well its a compaq. yeah i have a restore cd, a cd that says microsoft windows home edition, and a couple of supplemental software cds. you think that 2nd cd has all the files i need? could i access that cd somehow from a prompt?
btw, how would i access that drive. i mean how do i access the A drive? is there some kinda boot disk for xp?
 

_WW_

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i put the pc together again, put in my restore cd and it says now that, something like, this cd is not the right cd for this system. insert correct cd and try again....
This is the handshake that I'm referring to. The restore CD recognizes that you are trying to install on a non-Compaq machine and refuses to do so. When you install the OS while the HDD is in your Compaq everything is fine....but when you place that HDD into the new machine you have in essence replaced the mobo and CPU which is too radical of a hardware change for the OS and it fails.

I think your best bet and probably your only solution is to install a non-proprietary operating system, something that didn't come with a Compaq, Dell, HP, etc.) The bad part is this will cost you some money. The good part is you can install it on any future builds that you do. Check Pricewatch.com for prices on XP, but be careful and make sure you are purchasing a full install CD and not just another license. XP Home should run around $80 and Pro at about $125 USD.

....WW (5.0)
 

addiarmadar

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May 26, 2003
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You have to uninstall all the chipset drivers, all other drivers like sound cards and agp. Do this in safe mode if you can. Then delete folders in the C: with names like VIA, Sis, NVIDIA, ATI, ALI, Intell. Delete reg entries of such too and makre sure this is ALL done in safe mode.

Then reboot into normal mode and then should be ok and windows will install the standard get-you-by drivers.

<i><font color=red>Only an overclocker can make a computer into a convectional oven.</i></font color=red>
 
There's DMI info for your motherboard's BIOS. What restore CDs do is check this info to see who manufactured the BIOS/computer. If it comes back with anything other than Compaq... the restore CD will not work. You can get a DMI editor to change the manufacturer string to Compaq... but since the BIOS isn't manufactured by Compaq... it may or may not work.

I have to do this with the computers we sell when we replace the motherboard. Their restore CDs (which are basically XP OEM CDs) won't work unless the manufacturer string is set to what the CD expects.

<font color=red> If you design software that is fool-proof, only a fool will want to use it. </font color=red>