Unable to Install Windows 98 SE

Hello,

I have a Shuttle Spacewalker AV11S835 motherboard, fitted with 128MB RAM and
an Intel PIII-800EB processor.

My problem is that every time I try to reinstall Windows 98 SE, the AGP
graphics card seems to get damaged. Looks like I already damaged two
graphics cards this way.

The symptom I end up with is always that upon the next reinstall, after
running SCANDISK and the "registry check" in DOS mode, Setup locks up and
tells me to restart my system (endless loop), or just returns to the command
prompt.

When I try a different graphics card, Setup runs just fine, but a after
installing the VIA 4in1 driver and DirectX 9.0b, the same symptom occurs
again.

I tried repartitioning and reformatting the hard disk drive (no bad
sectors), but this doesn't help.

Two cards are already suspected to be damaged:
1. ATi Rage Pro Mobility-P
2. Albatron MX480EL-2.0 (nVidia GeForce MX440) - newly purchased

Before I start damaging further graphics cards, what should I do?

Thanks for any useful suggestions,

Ossama

Are you sure there is not a problem with compatibility between the motherboard AGP
slot voltage, and the voltage of the AGP cards themselves? Some slots have no key
and are considered universal. Other AGP slots are keyed to fit compatible cards,
but there are some caveats.

AGP Compatibility:
http://www.ertyu.org/~steven_nikkel/...atibility.html

Will my 8X AGP video card work in my 4X AGP slot?:
http://www.neoseeker.com/Hardware/faqs/kb/10,63.html
--
Glen Ventura, MS MVP Shell/User, A+
http://dts-l.org/goodpost.htm
http://www.microsoft.com/communities...t/default.mspx


"Ossama Elkadi" wrote in message
...
Hello,

I have a Shuttle Spacewalker AV11S835 motherboard, fitted with 128MB RAM and
an Intel PIII-800EB processor.

My problem is that every time I try to reinstall Windows 98 SE, the AGP
graphics card seems to get damaged. Looks like I already damaged two
graphics cards this way.

The symptom I end up with is always that upon the next reinstall, after
running SCANDISK and the "registry check" in DOS mode, Setup locks up and
tells me to restart my system (endless loop), or just returns to the command
prompt.

When I try a different graphics card, Setup runs just fine, but a after
installing the VIA 4in1 driver and DirectX 9.0b, the same symptom occurs
again.

I tried repartitioning and reformatting the hard disk drive (no bad
sectors), but this doesn't help.

Two cards are already suspected to be damaged:
1. ATi Rage Pro Mobility-P
2. Albatron MX480EL-2.0 (nVidia GeForce MX440) - newly purchased

Before I start damaging further graphics cards, what should I do?

Thanks for any useful suggestions,

Ossama

Why do you think the graphics cards are damaged? From your description I
can't see that the graphics cards are part of the problem at all, so I think
there must be something else you haven't mentioned.

Look through SETUP.TXT and make sure there's nothing listed there that
applies to you. Remove or disable (in BIOS setup) as much extra hardware as
possible. Try the installation again.

Did this motherboard work with W98 in the past? If so, what prompted you to
re-install?
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"Ossama Elkadi" wrote in message
...
Hello,

I have a Shuttle Spacewalker AV11S835 motherboard, fitted with 128MB RAM
and an Intel PIII-800EB processor.

My problem is that every time I try to reinstall Windows 98 SE, the AGP
graphics card seems to get damaged. Looks like I already damaged two
graphics cards this way.

The symptom I end up with is always that upon the next reinstall, after
running SCANDISK and the "registry check" in DOS mode, Setup locks up and
tells me to restart my system (endless loop), or just returns to the
command prompt.

When I try a different graphics card, Setup runs just fine, but a after
installing the VIA 4in1 driver and DirectX 9.0b, the same symptom occurs
again.

I tried repartitioning and reformatting the hard disk drive (no bad
sectors), but this doesn't help.

Two cards are already suspected to be damaged:
1. ATi Rage Pro Mobility-P
2. Albatron MX480EL-2.0 (nVidia GeForce MX440) - newly purchased

Before I start damaging further graphics cards, what should I do?

Thanks for any useful suggestions,

Ossama

Hello Jeff, Glen and all others,

referring to your suggestions, I noticed the following during my trials:

The two cards I tried out (the ATi is 2X AGP and the nVidia is 8X AGP) are
both compatible with my motherboard. Especially the 8X AGP card I bought was
confirmed to be compatible; I checked this out with the vendor after the
first failure.

There is no extra hardware to disable, and it doesn't influence the failure
either. Even clearing the CMOS (using the mobo jumper) does not help.
However, I noticed that reflashing the BIOS (with the same version, as there
is no newer version available) causes the DMI pool of the motherboard to be
rebuilt, and after that, I occasionally manage to get further through the
Windows installation process. But in the two trials I made, the first
Windows restart failed, and SCANDISK reported a damaged FAT table copy,
crosslinked files, and misreported file sizes.

Now I'm suspecting that the hard disk drive may be damaged, since this is
the same message I got from a repair centre (but I didn't believe him at
that time, because he removed from the hard disk the jumper that causes it
to be recognized by the BIOS, and reported to me that the BIOS does not
recognize the hard disk because it is apparently damaged).
Problem is, I don't find hard disks less than 80 GB in the market, and I
doubt whether they will be recognized by the BIOS at all (no BIOS updates
available for this purpose). But I'll have to try it out.

Thank you anyway very much for your help.

Ossama


================================================== ======
"Jeff Richards" wrote in message
...
Why do you think the graphics cards are damaged? From your description I
can't see that the graphics cards are part of the problem at all, so I
think there must be something else you haven't mentioned.

Look through SETUP.TXT and make sure there's nothing listed there that
applies to you. Remove or disable (in BIOS setup) as much extra hardware
as possible. Try the installation again.

Did this motherboard work with W98 in the past? If so, what prompted you
to re-install?
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

What does the BIOS report for the disk drive characteristics? If the BIOS
correctly identifies the drive layout and capacity then this is an
indication (although not conclusive) that the drive should be accessed
correctly.

The disk drive manufacturer should have drive diagnostics available for
download from their www site. If there is a compatibility problem the
diagnostics should reveal it. For that type motherboard and that size drive,
any problem with compatibility should be manageable by limiting the
partition size.

Are you sure you are using the latest version of FDISK?
http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;263044
Fdisk Does Not Recognize Full Size of Hard Disks Larger than 64 GB

Flashing the BIOS will remove the existing DMI data, forcing it to be
re-built on the next startup.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"Ossama Elkadi" wrote in message
...
Hello Jeff, Glen and all others,

referring to your suggestions, I noticed the following during my trials:

The two cards I tried out (the ATi is 2X AGP and the nVidia is 8X AGP) are
both compatible with my motherboard. Especially the 8X AGP card I bought
was confirmed to be compatible; I checked this out with the vendor after
the first failure.

There is no extra hardware to disable, and it doesn't influence the
failure either. Even clearing the CMOS (using the mobo jumper) does not
help.
However, I noticed that reflashing the BIOS (with the same version, as
there is no newer version available) causes the DMI pool of the
motherboard to be rebuilt, and after that, I occasionally manage to get
further through the Windows installation process. But in the two trials I
made, the first Windows restart failed, and SCANDISK reported a damaged
FAT table copy, crosslinked files, and misreported file sizes.

Now I'm suspecting that the hard disk drive may be damaged, since this is
the same message I got from a repair centre (but I didn't believe him at
that time, because he removed from the hard disk the jumper that causes it
to be recognized by the BIOS, and reported to me that the BIOS does not
recognize the hard disk because it is apparently damaged).
Problem is, I don't find hard disks less than 80 GB in the market, and I
doubt whether they will be recognized by the BIOS at all (no BIOS updates
available for this purpose). But I'll have to try it out.

Thank you anyway very much for your help.

Ossama

Tried to install a new Samsung 120GB drive. To my good luck, it was
correctly identified by the BIOS, and I had a third-party tool to partition
it.
After that, Windows 98SE setup went just fine.

I also installed the updated FDISK version, but it still misreports the
drive size. However, this does not matter for me, since the logical drives
are already properly configured and formatted.

Thank you all for your helpful suggestions :-)

Regards,

Ossama


================================================== =======
"Jeff Richards" wrote in message
...
What does the BIOS report for the disk drive characteristics? If the BIOS
correctly identifies the drive layout and capacity then this is an
indication (although not conclusive) that the drive should be accessed
correctly.

The disk drive manufacturer should have drive diagnostics available for
download from their www site. If there is a compatibility problem the
diagnostics should reveal it. For that type motherboard and that size
drive, any problem with compatibility should be manageable by limiting the
partition size.

Are you sure you are using the latest version of FDISK?
http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;263044
Fdisk Does Not Recognize Full Size of Hard Disks Larger than 64 GB

Flashing the BIOS will remove the existing DMI data, forcing it to be
re-built on the next startup.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

Thanks for letting us know that you got it sorted out. The updated FDISK
has some issues with displaying very large numbers, but it should get the
actual partitioning right. However, a good third-party partitioning tool is
probably the better option.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"Ossama Elkadi" wrote in message
...
Tried to install a new Samsung 120GB drive. To my good luck, it was
correctly identified by the BIOS, and I had a third-party tool to
partition it.
After that, Windows 98SE setup went just fine.

I also installed the updated FDISK version, but it still misreports the
drive size. However, this does not matter for me, since the logical drives
are already properly configured and formatted.

Thank you all for your helpful suggestions :-)

Regards,

Ossama


================================================== =======
"Jeff Richards" wrote in message
...
What does the BIOS report for the disk drive characteristics? If the
BIOS correctly identifies the drive layout and capacity then this is an
indication (although not conclusive) that the drive should be accessed
correctly.

The disk drive manufacturer should have drive diagnostics available for
download from their www site. If there is a compatibility problem the
diagnostics should reveal it. For that type motherboard and that size
drive, any problem with compatibility should be manageable by limiting
the partition size.

Are you sure you are using the latest version of FDISK?
http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;263044
Fdisk Does Not Recognize Full Size of Hard Disks Larger than 64 GB

Flashing the BIOS will remove the existing DMI data, forcing it to be
re-built on the next startup.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)