Install XP: Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer

443 Responses to “Install XP: Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer”

• wonders May 23, 2012 at 9:46 pm

  am having a sata hard drive used on a mini laptop but when a trying to install windows it says it cannot be formatted please help me. when am using windows vista it says hardware may not work with this hard disk
• bart k May 23, 2012 at 2:24 pm

  thanks so much! was going mad! so sick of PC,s get a mac guys
• Jimp May 22, 2012 at 6:28 pm

  Worked a treat, thank you very much!
• Eoin May 22, 2012 at 8:38 am

  Hey, thx worked a treat on my friends laptop and anothers(fujitsu siemens amilo li 2727) had vista pre installed. The HDD failed so I swaped an old 20g Gig HDD from old Xbox(connected it to dekstop to unlock it and make it health partition) then downloaded nlite and used it make a workable XP SP3 adding the sata/raid file I also downloaded and placed in a folder in root directory of my current desktop i.e. (c:\XPSETUP) Extra stuff you need to download: 32bit Intel MSM AHCI & RAID driver v8.9.8.1005 mod by Fernando(collection of sata drivers in it) so check you manafactures website on which to use not hard. Using nlite you will add the xp cd service packs if you wish and the sata/driver as no floppy(wake up micro$oft). Use imgburn then to burn it to disc and you need a (setup.ibb) which tells imgburn what to do so no config on our part. Finally you need to add a wxpboot.bin file to imgburn(NB. the setup.ibb file adds a W2k file so change it in imgburn under Advanced/Bootable Disc tab to your wxpboot.bin file you download.
  So google Imgburn, setup.ibb, wxpboot.bin, 32bit Intel MSM AHCI & RAID driver v8.9.8.1005 mod by Fernando, all legit and free and all work with xp home/pro or any service pack. I dont have windows sorry.
  BTW I didnt click S for Floppy I just clicked ‘Enter’ for setup, and it just installed.
  Could have nearly done a blog on this lol but not taking the light from the author of this post!
  Hope this helps :p
• tim May 19, 2012 at 9:05 pm

  Vaio pcn-7z1L f6 and s did mot work for me blank flashing cursor. No disk will load im sure its the ide and sada or whatever its called need help installing win xp pro.
• tim May 19, 2012 at 9:02 pm

  I have a vaio pcn-7z1L

  the drives were wiped clean. I have tried any possible ways to get xp pro to load but no results no hard drive recognized. I tried doing the “s” snd f6 still nothing or no list appeared. Any suggestions. Please contact me this was a gift for a returning soldier.
• Gene May 18, 2012 at 6:27 am

  Worked on a Dell Dimension 8400. Copied R82876.exe to a floppy and when the installation asked for it I put it in and all went without problem. Thanks a lot!!!
• abhi May 13, 2012 at 11:38 am

  thanks buddy
• Marcus/FrozzCreep May 9, 2012 at 12:22 am

  THAKN YOU SO MUCH LOVE YOU KISS ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
  HUGS MANY MANY HUGS FOR YOU

  THANK YOU SOOO MUCH!!!!!!!!

  THIS WORKED I LOVE YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU
  *HUG*HUG*

  THANKS!!!!!!!
• Genius May 8, 2012 at 10:49 am

  Thanks for this, absolutely fantastic and ridiculous that Windows set up doesn’t manage to do this by itself. Great work.
• Cyber April 28, 2012 at 6:12 pm

  i spent two days trying to get this Compaq C700 series laptop to work, found this post, disabled the SATA support in BIOS setup and it worked straight away. thank you.
• Marc April 25, 2012 at 11:27 pm

  Thanks for this, saved me some hassle when trying to install Windows XP on a HP nw8440.
  Here’s how I disabled SATA in the BIOS to get XP to recognize the hard drive:
  h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=120&prodSeriesId=1839152&prodTypeId=321957&objectID=c00758841
• Jazz Douglas April 25, 2012 at 4:20 am

  Thanks. I had this dusty laptop on the shelf for 1 year. I decided something had to be done or trash it. Until I come to this site and has fix the problem. Thank you.
• xcpo April 10, 2012 at 4:17 am

  Excellent advice. Worked like a dream. Many thanks.
• Bmcduffy March 16, 2012 at 10:49 am

  Thank you for the great solution to my problem. I was ready to throw this little Netbook in the trash and you totally solved this for me!
• Numanmi February 28, 2012 at 4:26 pm

  During installation of WinXP profession in Toshiba Satellite L200 notebook, it is showing the following error,
  “Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer. Make sure any hard disk drives are powered on and properly connected to your computer, and that any disk-related hardware configuration is correct. This may involve running a manufacturer-supplied diagnostic or setup program. Setup cannot continue. To quit Setup, press F3.”

  I do not have the Floppy Drive with my Toshiba Satellite L200 notebook.
  can anyone give me suggestion.
• Hackattacks100 February 27, 2012 at 12:15 am

  For lappy whr vl u find floppy drive……….hehehehehhh………..
• Ferhatos February 20, 2012 at 2:05 am

  You can create your customized “WinXP install CD” with your SATA drivers ;-)
  pcastuces.com/pratique/windows/creer_cd_windows_xp/page10.htm

  Hope that help u
• Allan Jørgensen February 3, 2012 at 9:27 pm

  Darn my BIOS settings do not allow me to change the specified settings. And i see no possibility of getting a floppy drive attatched to my laptop ! =S
• Allan Jørgensen February 3, 2012 at 9:26 pm

  This seemed helpfull. Unfortunatly my BIOS settings does not allow me to change those settings and there is no floppy on this laptop =S 
• fie January 26, 2012 at 10:30 am

  thank u very much…my problem solved
• Wakoko January 11, 2012 at 3:46 pm

  Where can i get the SATA RAID Driver, Please help me Thanks GODBLESS!
• Cleo Lee December 12, 2011 at 1:25 am

  Thanks man! I solved this by disabling the SATA. I hate the earlier hdd + mobo cos always have this ide sata issue. Thanks for your tips anyway! Very useful! I can finally install windows now as it eventually detected the hard drives. Thank god!
• Anonymous December 9, 2011 at 1:31 am

  My problem, and I suspect many others, diverges from your explanations at your very first sentence “you have SATA hard drive and you have RAID/SATA mode configured in BIOS”.  I have a HP xw6400, which supports SAS, and has a SAS hard drive connected to a “LSI SAS3041e-HP” card.  I am trying to install XP, which does not support SAS.  I have no problem with SATA drives, and drivers for the LSI card are readily available, from the HP website and elsewhere.  The problem is in trying to load drivers when XP says you have no hard drive, and cannot continue loading.
• jeff October 11, 2011 at 1:03 pm

  hey so i keep trying to do it with the floppy disk and everything seems to be going okay i load up two of the files i need but in the end it still says no hard disk drives were detected can anyone help
  oh its an nvidia if it helps to know
• Karl October 7, 2011 at 3:09 pm

  Ayars, they talk about this problem here -> delltechcenter.com/thread/4749520/OptiPlex+390+Mass+Storage+Driver
• Ayars September 30, 2011 at 1:56 pm

  Hi, I had the same problem when installing Windows Xp to Dell Optiplex 390 Series . It doesn’t find hard disk driver to install windows.Can anybody please tell me a place to download it? Or a solution to this.
• David September 24, 2011 at 1:10 am

  YOU ROCK !!!!!!!! I spent hours trying to fix this stupid thing. THANK YOU SOOOOOOOOOO MUCH
• JOhn September 23, 2011 at 6:20 am

  Wow been trying to re install XP for hours with trial and error methods in a world of pain as I’m not good with hardware stuff (I’m a video editor). My windows install drive got corrupted -google redirect virus is to blame I believe) and I just want to get some very important files off of a RAID 0. I am currently formatting my system HDD and hopefully I can get XP on there and then copy of my data from the RAID – here’s hoping! Thanks
• Jonah August 12, 2011 at 5:40 am

  Hello,

  Gateway does provide the SATA driver you’re talking about, but what if the laptop doesn’t have a built-in floppy drive? Will a generic external USB plug-in floppy drive be automatically recognized by Setup? Don’t they usually need drivers themselves? Can a flash drive be used instead?

  Thank you!
• subash August 5, 2011 at 1:30 am

  Hi, I had the same problem when installing Windows 7 to Aspire L320 ACER PC 2007. It doesn’t find any hard disk to install windows. Instead it says to provide hard disk drivers from an external device. Can anybody please tell me a place to download it? Or a solution to this.
• tillu July 22, 2011 at 10:34 pm

  thnks for this valuable info
• RmT July 13, 2011 at 11:04 pm

  I dont have a floppy, but it says the same error to me,once i’ve installed XP perfectly,but it was somekind of different Copy of it,what has some drivers on it,so the installion can go one.
  Can some1 help me with that problem or tell me where can i find that special XP ?
  Thank you
• bug July 12, 2011 at 6:41 pm

  it works…thanks
• Roi July 4, 2011 at 8:50 am

  tnx dude…i’ve been looking all over the net for this solution for the past two days but to no avail… thanks for posting this…

  ps:tnx also to google chrome that I used. because when I used FF4, I couldn’t search for this blog…

  more pwer
• Aggrey June 26, 2011 at 12:44 am

  my acer inspiron 5310 does not have a set up for peripherals, and it does not read a floppy disk, what can i do to install xp
• Charlie Shaaby June 20, 2011 at 1:16 pm

  woooowwww

  it realy works thanks alot ,

  you are genius

  i was able to setup windows now and repair it
  and all the files and system were back agian
  like nothing happen.
• apollo June 15, 2011 at 5:58 pm

  i cannot see the SATA DEVICE Config. on my sony vaio VPCEB11FX or VPCEB11FM..pls help me
• josh June 10, 2011 at 2:26 pm

  thanks for sharing buddy…your no. 1!!!!!!
• Bleso June 3, 2011 at 6:57 am

  Dude, u’r the best!
• Mary June 2, 2011 at 12:44 pm

  How can I change the sat a mode in My HP laptop
  I installed a new hard drive and get the exact messages
  Thanks
• Leo June 1, 2011 at 9:44 am

  it worked perfectly! thanks!
• mtl May 30, 2011 at 3:01 am

  grate the first option helps.thank you
• Kaewes May 24, 2011 at 5:07 am

  Thanks man, I just disable the sata support in the BIOS and there you Gooo!!!!!!!!!!
• ippili vishnu chandar May 22, 2011 at 2:06 am

  what is the meaning of the system has detected a problem with one or more installation of IDE /SATA hard disks in dell vostro 1400 laptop ?

  please help me out fast dude…
• ippili vishnu chandar May 22, 2011 at 2:03 am

  what is the meaning of the system has detected a problem with one or more installation of IDE /SATA hard disks in dell vostro 1400 laptop ?
• Noize May 1, 2011 at 8:21 am

  DUDE THANKS ALOT THIS SAVED MY DAY, wasted so freaking many hours tyring so many diferent stuff till i came to your post. thanks alot!
• Takong April 30, 2011 at 10:20 pm

  In fact, your proposal of modifying the BIOS SATA setting worked well on My Compaq nc6400.
  That is after formating my windows partition (Given that i have two OS on my laptop) i had the above mentioned problem (setup did not find hard disk …. though i could still boot to Linux without problem.)each time i tried to install the Os. so after reading your instruction i just started the machine and went into the BIOS and Disabled SATA from the device configure menu.Immediately i did this ,the set up could now find the hard disk so i proceeded with the installation. Thanks very much

  There is one think i noticed, when installing Linux,i did not have such problems of hard disk not found persisting inspite of the fact that the SATA was not yet disabled. So i think, this problem should be related to Windows
• chandu April 11, 2011 at 4:25 pm

  Thought this would save me, but I can’t figure out how to load the sata driver during setup. Can’t get the computer to recognize anything. I don’t have a actual floppy drive on my HP Compaq NX9420? Says to insert into drive A, but I don’t know what Drive A is since I don’t have a floppy drive. I have tried with a flash stick and a external USB HD? I can’t excess my BIOS to switch settings. I bought the laptop through Ebay and it is password protected. I can not figure out how to bypass the password on the BIOs? Thought I could just F6 through setup and supply the sata driver, but again I can’t get it to find it’s location? Was working fine for the past year and then: Disk Read Error Occurred, Press Clt, Alt, Dlte to restart===repeat. Tried to repair with XP disc==No HD found message. Bought new HD==can’t find HD still. So I’m sure your fix will work if I can figure out how to make it read sata drivers prior to setup of XP??
• robe April 10, 2011 at 4:21 pm

  it’ worked it worked it worked many thanks to ya baby!
• Drew April 9, 2011 at 2:35 am

  NICE!!!!
  Had to downgrade a Compaq/HP Presario from Vista to XP. Was as simple as disabling sata support in the bios!
• hudo April 8, 2011 at 6:09 am

  aaaaaaaaaaaaa yeeeeeeeee
  thank you, worked like a charm
• john rodriges April 8, 2011 at 5:32 am

  shit man!! your a genuis!!! what a relief coz i messed up my dad’s notebook!! you saved my life!! a million thanks!!!
• Jupiter April 2, 2011 at 11:05 pm

  have same problem here, i will try it tom if it works for my baby..thanks for the blog….
• Shawn March 25, 2011 at 7:20 am

  Thought this would save me, but I can’t figure out how to load the sata driver during setup. Can’t get the computer to recognize anything. I don’t have a actual floppy drive on my HP Compaq NX9420? Says to insert into drive A, but I don’t know what Drive A is since I don’t have a floppy drive. I have tried with a flash stick and a external USB HD? I can’t excess my BIOS to switch settings. I bought the laptop through Ebay and it is password protected. I can not figure out how to bypass the password on the BIOs? Thought I could just F6 through setup and supply the sata driver, but again I can’t get it to find it’s location? Was working fine for the past year and then: Disk Read Error Occurred, Press Clt, Alt, Dlte to restart===repeat. Tried to repair with XP disc==No HD found message. Bought new HD==can’t find HD still. So I’m sure your fix will work if I can figure out how to make it read sata drivers prior to setup of XP??
• eric March 17, 2011 at 10:33 pm

  bonjour
  c’est bon pour les ordinateurs préhistorique car plus de lecteur de disquettes depuis longtemps et après les petits portables de 2011 on n’a même plus le lecteur cd!c’est pour dire (encore une page de commentaire pour rien dire) comme d’ab on trouve tout sur internet!
• Matty032 March 16, 2011 at 3:19 am

  Thanks! I had been having to install windows 7 whether I wanted to or not, because of this. you are a life saver.
• dutt March 15, 2011 at 1:07 am

  Thank you… XP will install only on IDE..
• Fajri March 13, 2011 at 11:50 pm

  I truly want to express my million thanks to the solving maker. I got 2 days annoyed by undetected hdd! Now i’ve changed the bios setting to IDE. How miracle it did work..! Wish u a great day in ur life! Thanks in a million! :)
• siraj March 13, 2011 at 3:22 pm

  thanx brother….am braked err
• Gee March 11, 2011 at 11:21 pm

  Many Thanks, worked a treat!!
• akash March 9, 2011 at 2:51 am

  Dude!!! You have made me a happy happy man! Thanks so much for this solution! It worked!!! What a relief! Thanks a ton! Wherever you are, I wish you good. Cheers!
• Blink March 6, 2011 at 1:05 pm

  Many Thanks this page just enabled me to install xp on my thinkpad x60, i have had an evening of Total frustration with it. Tried all sorts, linux worked, vista worked, hdd present in bios & tested fine.Took out drive reformatted etc NO JOY! Find your article & change hdd setting from AHCI to Compatibility in bios & all is fine now.
  Many Thanks
• Amila Pallegedara March 4, 2011 at 12:22 am

  I’m using Dell VOSTRO 1400 notebook and I had the same problem(HARD DISK NOT FOUND)

  Go to BIOS and Change
  SATA OPERATION AHCI to ATA

  before that you have to change settings

  Flash Cache Module -Disable
• Amila Pallegedara March 3, 2011 at 11:00 pm

  Thanks. This worked for me…great work
• Zubair Khalid March 2, 2011 at 3:53 am

  i need to know how i can get into
  Integrated Peripherals > SATA Devices Configuration > SATA Mode [RAID] and change to [IDE]
• Ad March 1, 2011 at 10:26 pm

  Brillant thank you.

  As a note to toshiba laptop owners: You have to hold escape then press F1 when you get to the check system settings. You have to switch the hard-drive to ‘Compatible’ to disable SATA.
• Yafet Gettiye February 24, 2011 at 9:33 am

  This problem was going to make me really mad. The thing is that I had reinstalled my laptop a lot of time before I don’t know how I passed this silly problem before. Now with the help of this site I fixed it. I am so thank full!!!
  I just came out of a comma and it may be the problem of not remembering things. Thank you so much!!!!
• trust February 22, 2011 at 7:34 pm

  tanks men u saved my ass
• carlo February 21, 2011 at 5:42 pm

  how about for laptop…
• Jalal February 20, 2011 at 2:57 pm

  Just to say Thank you man you are great

  some times we lost and the solution there but need to mentioned..

  Thank you 100000000000
• john February 17, 2011 at 4:08 am

  Thanx…….worked perfect
• Neil February 15, 2011 at 1:40 am

  Thanks!
• Doc February 13, 2011 at 4:12 am

  …but also don’t forget to change your battery!
• abaabab February 12, 2011 at 11:11 am

  TY so much :)
• Doc February 11, 2011 at 4:43 pm

  WIN!
• Ladi February 9, 2011 at 1:48 pm

  Thank you very much it worked.
• Manish Khurana February 6, 2011 at 2:03 pm

  Great Article and it works. Thanks a lot.
• Xay February 6, 2011 at 9:53 am

  Thank you so much for posting the result. It took me 5 days to find you solution and it woks.
• Tom February 6, 2011 at 1:43 am

  Thanks, this helped a lot.

  What causes this to happen? I have had this issue more than once.
• John February 3, 2011 at 11:05 pm

  I got the same problem with my laptop. I’ve no Floppy drive in Laptop. What should i do?
• Alexander February 3, 2011 at 10:18 am

  Hi
  I am getting same error while installing XP-cd to my Acer laptop…I dont hav floppy drive so second method is not possible..
  If i have to do with the 1st method..i need to know how i can get into
  Integrated Peripherals > SATA Devices Configuration > SATA Mode [RAID] and change to [IDE]
  this path..only F2 screen which is setup i am able to use…am not able to login…please help me
• zaid January 28, 2011 at 5:44 am

  thanks for 1st solu.
• skilltek January 27, 2011 at 11:27 am

  What about a laptop without a floppy drive?
• Jami January 23, 2011 at 4:36 pm

  It was night mare for me to fined out the solution but this article made my problem solved. Tanku chooo much. :-)
• Lou G January 22, 2011 at 11:48 am

  I can’t believe it was that easy, Disabled SATA support in bios & she boots right up, HP pavilion notebook dv2015nr, been messing with this thing for a couple of days. Thanks sooo much.
• shael kumar January 18, 2011 at 10:42 pm

  thanx thanx thanx a lot…
• unnie January 13, 2011 at 9:40 pm

  OMG NICE1 found Disabled everything i saw with SATA in bios and now it recognices my hard drive, great thanks!
• Temps January 12, 2011 at 11:18 am

  Great article, saved me so much time, THANK-YOU
• kamal January 11, 2011 at 7:37 am

  thankx It was a great help to me
• Rahul Sharma December 28, 2010 at 6:32 pm

  Thank you. It is working. Thank you so much..
• kenneth lolarga December 19, 2010 at 11:25 am

  I’ve got this question posted in forum many times so I thought I should write an article on this problem. When they try to install Windows XP, they got the problem of not able to find any hard disk drives installed. The hard drive is detected in BIOS and also start up POST but not in Windows setup. Here is the exact error message.
  how to do that in board of asrock775i65g
• Steven Jacques December 12, 2010 at 5:10 am

  I have been fighting with my son’s computer for the last eight days battling the exact problem described above. I have spent days reading BLOGS, visiting Microsoft support pages, and talking to Dell. I have tried nearly every possibility without success.

  I wish I found your explanation a week ago.

  THANK YOU!!!!
• Stefano Aguiar December 10, 2010 at 10:00 pm

  Hi. Thanks for the tip. It helped a lot.
  In HP notebooks, you go for the function SATA [disable]
• tony December 8, 2010 at 2:02 am

  When I hit “S”, I get taken to a screen that says “Setup could not find a floppy drive on your machine to load OEM drivers from floppy disk.”

  I haven’t had a computer with a floppy drive in ages – now what?
• goldenboy November 29, 2010 at 10:32 pm

  oooooooooooooooooooooo je vous remercie infiniment ,je vais m’éjaculer de joie(desolé pour l’expression mais c un plaisir pour moi de trouver une solution) hhhhhhhhh ,merci encore une fois
• joey nutsaqio November 29, 2010 at 11:33 am

  u prolly blew out ur bootloaders with a virus
  now u need to reinstalll ur mobo
  call ur mobo manufacturer and get the drivers
  peace bro
  rock on
• Mustapha November 27, 2010 at 6:36 pm

  Many thanks for your precious help ;)
• white-sky November 24, 2010 at 7:08 pm

  Thank you…
  I did disable SATA and I was able after that to install a fresh xp but the SATA is still disable because when trying to able it again the windows don’t start. And when is disable the Network controller is not working.. any help please..
  I have got Compaq 6710b
  Thanks
• jaybird November 24, 2010 at 5:47 pm

  Thanks so much for this blog, you have saved my computer :)
• Chris November 21, 2010 at 8:32 pm

  very good, this helped a lot. I was really stumped when XP setup said it couldn’t find a hard drive when I knew I’d just formatted it.

  On the bios on the laptop I had the problem with I had to change the SATA mode to “Compatible”.
• ben November 21, 2010 at 4:19 am

  I never ever (^100) would have figured that out in a million skillion years. Thanks.
• Curt November 18, 2010 at 8:31 am

  My solution was to change from a separate to combined IDE for Sata. I don’t understand these terms but based on a few other comments, that was the solution that was most similar to what I read. It worked. Rejoice!

  XP had already been installed. I just ran into an issue where after the computer told me it had to restart, it couldn’t restart because it could find no hard drive.
• Pete Gee November 17, 2010 at 8:10 pm

  Went into SATA where could not choose any option except ‘compatible’ (AHCI was there) which selected, rebooted and up popped Wondows as if I had never been away :-)
• mario November 10, 2010 at 2:16 am

  u save my day ! thank you
• Dopamine November 4, 2010 at 4:59 am

  If you need to run this on a laptop that doesnt have a floppy drive, you will have to aquire a USB floppy drive.
• mmm October 25, 2010 at 5:11 am

  had the same problem. actually its the problem with win xp service pack 2. try installing xp service pack 3. it solved my problem.
  best of luck :)
• sahil October 15, 2010 at 12:59 am

  i have formatted my c drive with win 7 and installed win 7
  now ihave to reinstall win xp sp2 it shows
  setup-did-not-find-any-hard-disk-drives-installed-in-your-computer
  my computer didnt have any floppy slot
  plz help mail me at coolguy772158@gmail.com.
• Don October 14, 2010 at 5:09 pm

  I have a gateway and there’s no floppy drive only a usb. is there a way out? thanks
• faiz October 11, 2010 at 11:19 pm

  if notebook acer travelmate 2304NLCi…how i can got disk for floppy drive?
• Aditya October 8, 2010 at 4:10 am

  You r simply Great…boss its work smoothly thx dude
• OriginalDane September 30, 2010 at 2:30 pm

  Thank You!!!! 3 days of misery and anguish solved in 2 minutes!
• doki September 18, 2010 at 11:07 pm

  reaalllly big help man! what would i do if there where no articles like this in the web. ^_^
• sugi September 17, 2010 at 10:33 pm

  can i get flash memory as floppy??pls><
• mfranco702 September 15, 2010 at 3:11 am

  Is interesting how windows XP wont recognize the Hard drive but windows Vista or Win 7 do!!, I tried to install both and i could see the drive and even the partitions.
  I had exactly the same problem, but i didnt have the sata option in my bios so heres what i did (very easy and works).
  You need a Windows Vista or Windows 7 DVD to do this, if you dont have either dont proceed to the tutorial.
  First download the sata drivers for your motherboard from the manufactures webstite (ie dell, HP, Gateway, Toshiba etc etc).
  Copy the extracted content (iaahci.sys and iaStor.sys) which are regullary the sata drivers into a USB Drive.
  Connect your USB Drive and Boot your computer using either vista or Win 7 dvd and get to the installation part where you can see the hard drive and partitions, select load driver from the below option and browse for the content in the USB drive.
  you will see the sata driver in the list, select it and continue, it takes like 3 minutes to install it and then will take you back to the installation window, is very important not to make any changes to the partitions here, just leave it as it is, now click on the big X to close the installation windows and cancel, you no need to install windows again, all you had to do is just install the sata drivers, remove the dvd and the USB drive and restart your computer
  Now should be booting normally to WINDOWS XP.

  Post a reply if works for you!! cheers geeks.
• Kamarudin September 14, 2010 at 11:34 am

  Thanx a lot. A good and benificial article.
• Trung Tran September 12, 2010 at 1:52 pm

  OM Buddha!
  You’re providing such of useful information. Thanks so so much…. You save me a lot of time.
• pradip September 5, 2010 at 9:15 pm

  thanks a lot. very usefull info for me
• Clint September 2, 2010 at 2:42 am

  I cannot edit Sata settings and I have no floppy drive (laptop).
• Densel August 30, 2010 at 6:56 pm

  Thanks for the great help. just a pointer. on HP compaq laptop there is no RAID/IDE mode.
  there is only NATIVE or disabled.

  I ran Disabled and everything looks good.

  wicked thanks for the help.
• Jeremy August 29, 2010 at 10:26 pm

  Thanks so much. I wasn’t able to change ours to IDE but changed from RAID to SATA and it worked. Thanks again for posting. My wife & I were are our wits end.
• junji August 25, 2010 at 1:11 am

  now i read this,,,,,,,,,,,ill try bro
• Mohsin August 24, 2010 at 9:51 pm

  OMG, you’re a genius. Thanks alot and God bless!!!
• rajesh August 24, 2010 at 2:27 pm

  thanks a lot dude..
  ur a life saver
• Vinod August 24, 2010 at 12:02 am

  tHANKS A LOTT
• Hayden August 19, 2010 at 11:47 pm

  First option worked like a charm, thanks!!
• PhilMc August 17, 2010 at 11:00 pm

  Had the same problem, got infected with a few virus’s
  Namely downloader.nsis.agent & trojan.win32.cosmu

  It disabled all anti-virus products, they wouldn’t run
  At start-up, it kept re-booting
  Tried to run in safe mode, last known configuration etc etc. and none worked

  Tried installing windows xp, then using the repair tool, but it couldn’t find the hard drive

  Did what you said, changed the bios – disabled sata

  Rebooted with the xp installation disk and hey presto, was able to repair the laptop, keep all my files (thank god)

  When it finished repairing, the machine also ran a chkdsk, loads of problems automatically fixed

  Running spybot now to remove the trojans, the future is bright

  Looks like my laptop is alive again, thank you sooo much for the advice, I’ve spent days trying to fix this. Ran kaspersky’s boot cd 2010 and even it couldn’t get the machine going.

  Thanks again
• JiTh August 16, 2010 at 2:51 pm

  Thanks Boss.. It did the trick.. it saved my lots of time.. Thanks again for your much appreciated help and post :)
• Jonathan August 12, 2010 at 4:11 pm

  Thanks for the great help. just a pointer. on HP compaq laptops 6720 and 6820 there is no RAID/IDE mode.
  there is only NATIVE or disabled.

  I ran Disabled and everything looks good.
  Thanks again.
• abhimanyu singh August 10, 2010 at 7:23 am

  i had installed bios due to which my os was corrupted. so xp was not installing. ichanged sata to ide and now its working. thankyou very much.
• DavidFromGeorgia August 8, 2010 at 9:56 pm

  I WANT TO TELL YOU 2 things:
  1. I tried the things written here but it didn’t work in the same way: I changed my HDD configuration on SATA from RAID.I did it because in my BIOS it was only SATA,RAID or disable(no IDE).when I disabled sata option it gave me same error and i still couldn’t reinstall windows, but after I changed it to SATA it allowed me to install new windows.
  2. THANK YOU so much for this tips! It realy helped me as I looked for sata options on my motherboard and did it my way.
• Kevin July 30, 2010 at 2:35 am

  Thanks, Dude!!!!!!!!
• Sadaf July 27, 2010 at 8:01 pm

  thank you thank you soooooooooooooooo much…:-)
• Novice July 25, 2010 at 1:34 am

  After many attempts I finally got this to work. I was unable to change from SATA mode to IDE, so I followed the second solution.
  I have 2 tips:
  In order to get the F6 key to respond I had to press F6 much earlier than indicated. I pressed F6 repeatedly when the PC was first switched on until the line “Press F6 if you need to install a third party SCSI or RAID driver…” appeared.
  Secondly I found that if I did this with a USB keyboard when I got to the screen that says
  “Setup could not determine the type of one or more mass storage devices installed in your system, or you have chosen to manually specify an adapter. Currently, Setup will load support for the following mass storage devices(s)”
  the keyboard didn’t work whichever key I pressed. My solution – use a PS/2 connected keyboard.
  Success!
• jerome July 24, 2010 at 6:48 pm

  worked like a charm….thank you !!!!
• Lakaz July 20, 2010 at 2:48 pm

  Thanks so much for the solution. I am now able to install Win XP after I changed the SATA configuration in BIOS.

  God Bless you.
• wes July 14, 2010 at 1:04 am

  Thank you so much Raymond, was a big help, couldnt install windows, read your notes and managed to put it to good use and Windows is now installing fine.

  Thanks again
• though i was in the doo doo July 10, 2010 at 11:04 pm

  though i was in the doo doo, have been trawling the internet for hours. this was perfect and solved the problem in less than 120 seconds.
• Tiby July 7, 2010 at 3:42 pm

  i have disabled the SATA mode for my compaq laptop and now i am able to install winxp…..thanks a ton!!
• Jonathan Williams July 6, 2010 at 3:05 am

  Its kind of wasted forum help when the bios has no way to disable the bios and the 2nd option tells you that windows setup was: UNABLE TO FIND A FLOPPY DRIVE ON YOUR MACHINE TO LOAD OEM DRIVERS FROM FLOPPY DISK.
  this is after floppy drive will be recognized in bios.
  using a usb floppy drive in a sony vaio cpu. why setup cannot recognize the floppy drive is BEYOND ME. what gives? such ridiculous software.
• david June 3, 2010 at 5:02 pm

  gave me a bit of headache but i found it. went to system configurations and disabled the sata option on the list of enable disable.
• James June 3, 2010 at 12:56 am

  just felt like throwing in my experience and thanks a TON Ray. at start up i tried EVERYTHING BUT disabling sata….once i found and disabled it i can install windows xp again. had my laptop sitting around for about 8 months now wondering weather i was going to just office space it out the window one day or let it sit and collect dust..but now well…woot woot. MWCL
• Jerry May 26, 2010 at 5:10 am

  Thanks! Thanks! Thanks! After fiddling with my friends computer for 6HRS, this post hit on my problem most succintly! I was trying, on an HP dv6000, to reinstall Windows XP from Windows 7. (My co-worker didn’t like 7!) I was doing it without any recovery discs.I formatted and partioned MANY times, but the darn computer wouldn’t recognized the hard drive. i visited Microsofts’ website all day, and none of their advice was as lucid and simple as yours. Thanks again!
  PS I am regarded as ‘tech savvy’ by my friends so you saved the day and my tech cred!
• Feeoroz Mirdhe May 25, 2010 at 3:23 pm

  Read all the comments felt nice. i wish i could be a good hardware engineer so that i could repiar my HDD On my own. i lost my most Imp data from it. as it is crashed, n th system is ynable to detect it
• qwerty May 23, 2010 at 12:24 am

  THANKS!!!! YOU SOLVED MY PROBLEM!!
• Abdu May 13, 2010 at 9:45 pm

  This article was very, very helpful. Thank you so much for taking your time to provide us this.

  Abdu
• Prince May 12, 2010 at 4:00 pm

  Good solution. Thank you.
• ANkit May 8, 2010 at 3:31 pm

  and if i change the SATA mode of operation different from AHCI then win 7 cant be loaded on it….
• ANkit May 8, 2010 at 3:15 pm

  anybdy plz solve my problem…i bought a DELL 1440 which came preloaded with WIN 7…i want to install XP on it also..both the operating system simultaneously….bt wen XP is about to load setup files blue screaan apperas which prevent it from installing it…plz help
• Belal April 29, 2010 at 2:18 am

  Thank you very much. really it did work, I only disabled SATA on the bios.
• Praveem April 22, 2010 at 7:04 pm

  thank uuuuuuuu……………………………..
• satheesh April 17, 2010 at 2:44 am

  i’m realy happy from your guiding bcoz i had same proplem after that it was clear
• Jess April 17, 2010 at 1:03 am

  Go to the BIOS setting –> Sata –> change to ATA
  Worked on My Dell 9100 Thanks…
• xolani April 15, 2010 at 6:25 pm

  guys i’m using an acer extensa 5220 how do i desable the sata mode
• Phill April 9, 2010 at 12:07 am

  Thank you very much!!!! You saved me a lot of time and headache!
• Ray April 4, 2010 at 11:31 am

  it works, i have a fujitsu t4210
  ata enable
  ahci disable
  ide enable
  don’t forget to press any key to boot from disk,

  but the problem now, some of my driver do not works…
  (wireless, card reader) can someone help me…?
• UVGomez March 30, 2010 at 12:23 am

  it works thanks for the post!
• sammy March 14, 2010 at 9:11 am

  Hi, same problem – no hard disk detected during Xp instatllation>
  in bios mode, i can see only 2 options,
  1. AHCI
  2. COMPATIBILITY
  there is no option for ATA mode
  help !!!!
• foxfxx March 14, 2010 at 1:58 am

  thanks man !!! you saved my day!!
• khaled March 7, 2010 at 6:45 pm

  mannnnnnnnnnn woooowww changing tha SATA MOOD works work works:D:D thank u:D
• Jay shah March 7, 2010 at 5:57 pm

  i am having hp presario c700 n not able to boot xp cd and last i am getting that no hardisk found..then what to do…??
• parvez February 27, 2010 at 2:59 am

  Ok
  I was a using my ide 2.5 inc external Toshiba 80 Gb Hdd and was working till i reinstalled my os, Xp is not able to dectect the hard drive , like after a minute or so the hard will not get dectected, when i check the device manager it gives a Bang for Mass storage device,
  also once it got dectected and then asked me to format the drive and hence i formatted the drive and lost all the data and still the issue is the same
  where can i get the mass storage drivers for the hard drive, also the same works fine on my latop
• syed musthafa February 26, 2010 at 8:08 pm

  dear raymond please arrange as soon as possible and usb raid driver…. floppy not good ……

  please please please send me a olution of usb raid driver…

  by raymond fans

  syed musthafa
• syed musthafa February 26, 2010 at 8:03 pm

  its good sir but need external floppy drive…. loptop we can add floppy drive not good …. have sata raid driver in usb flash driver and extract possible…..

  please arrange solution in usb raid boot
• Jojo February 26, 2010 at 4:16 pm

  Thank you all for your suggestions.
  I was using pavilion dv5000 with a Win XP version preventing usage of any legacy OS. Disabling SATA (in BIOS) did indeed allow me to format my drives the way I wanted to!! :D
  Cheers.
  Jojo
• Rich February 26, 2010 at 10:39 am

  tnx for the info.

  found this thread after googling.

  i’m working on a friend’s Dell XPS400 who’s having h/w errors so i tried a different sata in his computer as a test and was receiving that info.

  adjusted that RAID setting in the BIOS and is now installing perfectly.

  tnx again for the help.
• Qwerty February 26, 2010 at 12:05 am

  i just bought a new compaq laptop and there is no bios option for ide mode or compatability mode any sugestions
• devashish uniyal February 22, 2010 at 2:13 am

  hello Mr Ramond…
  u don’t know how much your article has helped me…… thanks a ton….. really
  i love u….. :)
• Tony February 21, 2010 at 7:31 pm

  Thanks after reading this sorted out install XP on my Laptop. I don’t have a floppy on the at laptop so just turn off the sata setting in my bios and now XP is installing.
• simon February 13, 2010 at 3:20 pm

  my laptop is facing the same problem
  but i dun have a floppy drive
  can i use a usb???
  in usb i will save the setup of drivers
  and then i will press f6 and so on
• JT February 12, 2010 at 6:45 am

  srry for typos lol
• JT February 12, 2010 at 6:44 am

  Hey, i downgraded to xp on my acer 5100 laptop that had vista on Toshiba MK1234GSX hard drive.strangely it didnt require me to install sata drivers nor did i had to go in bios to change bios seeting and also not getting a warning that the hd couldn’t be detected duing xp’s installation.

  The installation went smooth.

  This is wierd, can someone explain or have i been lucky…because i’m sure i would’nt know what to do because i didnot know that xp requires sata drivers to be installed lol
• Rick Trejo February 9, 2010 at 6:00 am

  How can I use nlite on my machine when it won’t boot up?
• Andy February 3, 2010 at 6:59 pm

  I did not know that little changes can cause such big problems. I was on the verge of taking my laptop in for $100 to repair this error. Thanks to you I can install an OS in my laptop again.
• Best February 3, 2010 at 3:01 pm

  Thanks all
  this help
  i have inspiron 1525 , i have vista , now it’s xp my love .
  need drivers
  10x again
• Anthony Dickinson February 1, 2010 at 6:22 am

  That worked perfect. Thanks
• Kiriyama January 31, 2010 at 12:54 am

  Thanks op, changed the SATA to compatability mode and it worked like a charm.
• Steven Chandler January 28, 2010 at 7:20 am

  Reinstalling on an old Compaq, this post was spot on. Changed the sata option and it detected the drive ASAP. Great stuff.
• Dave January 28, 2010 at 12:18 am

  Dude, U Rock!!!
• Haami January 27, 2010 at 5:09 am

  Thanks for helping me troubleshoot problem. You da man bro.
• Babak January 24, 2010 at 5:56 am

  I have been looking for the solution since 6 months ago and now………………..
  Thanks man great job
• Babak January 24, 2010 at 5:54 am

  well done dude!
• dvdmike January 23, 2010 at 6:05 am

  help working on gateway laptop m-256m i want to install new os when in get ready to format it it say NO HDD FOUND so i dont have a floppy for the raid drivers so what do i do how can i get the drivers so i can install windows again help help

  mike
• devaraj B.lore January 22, 2010 at 9:38 pm

  installing winxp not decting hdd, In bios shows harddisk
  what was the problem please send full detail for me pls
• John January 22, 2010 at 11:36 am

  Im having the same problem here as you see on the top blue screen. when i try to install windows xp i get that error. i tried to go into the bios i cannot make any changes where the Hard Disks are for some odd reason. I dont have a floppy drive so im kinda stuck here.. any ideas on how to fix this? I was thinking about making a boot disk to fix the hard drive error but im wanting to format the C drive and start fresh. Any ideas?

  Thanks,
  John
• Cyph January 20, 2010 at 4:54 am

  Thanks raymond.cc!

  This solved my NO HARD DISK DRIVE INSTALLED error after running Active Killdisk.

  Problem solved– thank you for this fix– And THANK YOU Google for sending me here! lol
• Spanki December 30, 2009 at 4:31 pm

  Excellent post mate…I installed windows 7 which includes sata drivers and everything is working perfect..thanks
• Terence December 30, 2009 at 3:41 pm

  l got it. it was a loose connection of the Hard Disk. Did not even have to reload XP.
• Terence December 30, 2009 at 3:09 pm

  The same error message is being displayed when l try to load XP on my acer laptop TravelMate 250. It was working perfectly, then suddenly it started displaying an error message ‘no operating system found’, when l power it on. How do l go about it on my laptop.
• teacherdan December 28, 2009 at 7:16 am

  I was having trouble with XP setup not recognizing my SATA drive. Your first tip did the trick! Thank you very much.
• Adam December 25, 2009 at 11:54 pm

  I needed help with getting my laptop to show my HDD during installation. I found it right at the top, and it was nice to find what I needed to know so fast and easily.

  Thanks.
• Mike December 20, 2009 at 6:56 am

  I am reloading XP on a neighbors laptop that crashed, SP3. Disabling SATA in Bios worked for an old HP C700. Thanks!
• Hardus December 19, 2009 at 6:12 pm

  Thanks A million – first page I opened and solution worked….

  Great man!
• thugzine December 14, 2009 at 12:52 pm

  hi thanks for the big big big help. =) it works.. btw. i have a aspire5310.
• used computers December 9, 2009 at 4:10 pm

  its like a miracle for me as I tried so many things but didnt worked. But this tips helped me in re-solving the issue.
• ali December 5, 2009 at 1:29 pm

  hi my dear!
  how are your?
  i have hp pavilion dv5-1002nr nootbook!
  but like install windows xp!
  but no find drive sata !!!!!!!!!!!
  please help me very soon.
  thanks for help
• Cinos December 1, 2009 at 1:30 pm

  Hi,

  I have the same problem, Iam trying to install XP from my laptop curretly installed Vista on it. My laptop is HP Pavillion 6700, upon Installing XP I always receive this error

  Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer. Make sure any hard disk drives are powered on and properly connected to your computer, and that any disk-related hardware configuration is correct. This may involve running a manufacturer-supplied diagnostic or setup program. Setup cannot continue. To quit Setup, press F3.

  I have no floopy on my loptop. pls help me resolve this problem I need to change my OS to XP badly.

  thank you
• abiku November 28, 2009 at 11:33 am

  thanks it works
• Srinivas November 24, 2009 at 8:03 am

  Thank you man!! it worked for me!! Great help !!

  Regards,
  Srinivas
• armando November 22, 2009 at 12:36 pm

  wow it helped me,love u man!!!!
• Yash November 20, 2009 at 2:58 pm

  solved my problem dude.. thanks a ton
• jackob November 19, 2009 at 5:06 am

  Hi

  Thanksssssssssssss
  Thanksssssssssssssss

  100000000000000000000000000000000000000 kiss and thanks for you
• Vinodh November 16, 2009 at 12:16 pm

  Hi Raymond,

  I was struggling for two days to fix this issue.. finally changing the drive mode in bios worked.. THANKS A MILLION…. and KEEP UP UR GOOD WORK…

  Cheers Mate…
• ALFREDO November 10, 2009 at 2:10 pm

  GRACIAS POR AVER RESUELTO MI PROBLEMA SOLO DESHABILITE EL SATA Y PUDE REFORMATEAR MI COMPUTADORA XP PRACIAS POR AYUDARME
• rediet November 5, 2009 at 4:07 pm

  i really dont get dis kind of prblem b4 here is my BIOS configuration .
  Boot Sequence
  1.onboard usb or usb Floppy drive.
  2.onboard SATA Hard drive not presenet.
  3.onboard or USB CD ROM drive
  SATA Operation
  RAID Autodetect/AHCI
  and my pc is DELL Optplex 755 & it has 4 SATA DRIVES but only one(SATA 1) is working
  pls,pls help me how to fix it
• Eric October 30, 2009 at 10:59 am

  Thanks for the quick tutorial on this. I was scared my system was all messed up. :)
• eric October 26, 2009 at 1:42 pm

  disableing sata support in the bios helped. Thanks a million I was dealing with this issue for hours.
• newbietek October 20, 2009 at 12:41 pm

  Hi raymond,

  can you help with this problem, i’m cucrrently setting up an acer travelmate 6291, i upgraded to 250GB HDD.
  i’m installang windowsXp when this problem occur.
  i tried to google the raid sata driver for this laptop but i haven’t found any even in acer website there is no such driver.

  please send advice, my job is at stake.

  Thank you n advance.
• Giorilio October 15, 2009 at 11:50 pm

  i have Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21M. i tried to install windows XP but had no luck. i read all posts and i also tried to use nlite but had no luck. I cant either disable SATA from bios cause there is no such option(or at least i cant find it).

  Plz help me if u may.

  Thank u all in advance.
• Brian MacNeil October 15, 2009 at 12:05 pm

  To all those that have had the same error I encountered about WinXP Setup not finding the hard drive on a Sony Vaio VGN-NR385E laptop:

  1 – This was the site I used to power thru that issue!!!
  2 – Thanks to all those who left useful comments for the rest of us to use Nlite!!!!
  3 – Using Nlite allowed me to specify the correct SATA driver support I needed to FINALLY get XP to install on this machine!!!!
  4 – If there is anyone out there who ran into or is still struggling to get XP installed on a Sony Vaio VGN-NR385E laptop……..Use Nlite!!!!!!!!
  5 – If you can’t figure it out email me direct @ brian.macneil@gmail.com and I will gladly help you and post any pertinent info to this site (as this site was the resource I needed to power thru my issue as well)
  6 – Thanks to all for helping get this issue resolved for me!!!

  Cheers,
  Brian MacNeil
  Brian MacNeil
• timmmy October 7, 2009 at 9:40 am

  i have a compaq nc6400; took the first suggestion and disabled sata in bios – worked just fine – nothing like the path of least resistance… :)
• ray September 13, 2009 at 7:18 pm

  WOW!

  i JUST FOLLOWED YOUR ADVICE TO FIX THE bios BECAUSE MY BROKEN LAPTOP WAS NOT READING THE HARD DRIVE- AND HEY PRESTO! IT WORKS AGAIN AND HAS NOW LOADED WINDOWS XP!

  yOU SHOULD THINK ABOUT A CAREER IN THIS STUFF COS YOU HAVE A TALENT FOR EXPLAINING CLEARLY TO US TECHNOPHOBES!

  tHANKS AGAIN, MAN!
• Nathan September 13, 2009 at 7:31 am

  Thanks so much Raymond after trying to install Windows xp on my Acer 6920g Numerous times and it not detecting the hard drive i searched the internet for help and found this article keep up the good work!
• ray September 12, 2009 at 7:22 am

  100000000000000000000000000000000000000 kiss and thanks for you.
• Andrew September 10, 2009 at 12:01 am

  Just a question:

  Will the HDD run slower now that it’s set from RAID to IDE?
  Considering it’s a SATA drive?
• Andy September 9, 2009 at 7:01 pm

  I am or was running xp on a Hp compaq NX6310, I had a problem so backed up my drives as it recommends when opting to press f11 to restore to fact settings. Problem is when I re-booted NTLD error I tried to install Xp again only to get the set up did not find any hard drives installed!

  I tried doing what was suggested here only to be prompted for a password which I’m unsuccessful with plus it doesn’t allow me to type any password regardless of me not knowing it. Can anyone help please? Thank you
• K.Narender Goud September 8, 2009 at 6:53 pm

  ) I’m currently using another laptop, and I want to reformat my main laptop.

  It is a Sony VGN-FJ57GP.

  Anyway, when I insert the Windows XP disk into the drive, it says to ‘Press any key to boot from CD..’ but it doesn’t work. I’ve pressed every key available to press but nothing happens. What should I do?

  UPDATE: Now it is loading if I don’t press any key, so it means my keyboard is working and it hangs at ‘Press any key to boot from CD’. Someone please help.
• Shahir September 7, 2009 at 5:30 am

  THANKS A LOT FOR EVERYTHING. Just a simple step of disabling my SATA drive in BIOS on a COMPAQ V3000 NOTEBOOK detected the HD… And thanks for the Blogs..Cheers
• Chazara September 6, 2009 at 6:20 pm

  “with” SP3, whoops
• Chazara September 6, 2009 at 6:20 pm

  That was perfect, very helpfull, short, specific guide. I was just installing Win XP SP3 onto my mums Linux PC (I installed Linux on it because she seems prone to downloading a lot of viruses unknowingly, so Linux was my solution :D). Installation couldn’t find a Hard Disk, very simple answer.

  Thank you very much Raymond, I owe you one
• omicron August 30, 2009 at 6:52 am

  I had the same problem on a T60. After attempting to install iDeneb 1.4, ran into problems reinstalling xp pro. hdd wasn’t recognised – “Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer”. I had to set to compatibility mode under the hdd settings in the bios. worked fine after that.
• Jose Rodriguez August 25, 2009 at 10:01 pm

  Any word on this with this model of computer????

  I’ll try some of the steps but if you have the solucion for this specific model please let me know…
• Thor Young August 21, 2009 at 8:15 pm

  Thank you very much for this information. I encountered this issue on my IBM Thinkpad R60 after I had installed a copy of Vista Home and wanted to step back to XP Pro. This was an instant fix but for clarification on my system you need to choose to put the (SATA) Controller into Compatibility Mode as there is no (IDE) mode option in the BIOS. I would strongly suggest everyone try this setting solution first. You can certainly use nLite or vLite to create an ISO disc but that takes 30min just to get going and this was done in less than 5.
• Jonathan Canales August 19, 2009 at 12:18 am

  Hey man… thank you very much…. i disable the sata mode and the problem was resolved…..
• Raj August 12, 2009 at 1:58 pm

  Hey thanks it worked for me on my VAIO…………cheers
• alanaz7984 August 10, 2009 at 5:19 pm

  thanks dude!! i can install win xp in my sata hard disk acer aspire 4315.. just changing achi to ide from bios …thank so much.
• tolana July 31, 2009 at 6:55 am

  So glad I found your site! I ended up trying what one comment said, changing the HD in the bios, turning off the RAID thing which it turns out was replying on SP1. Now I’m installing XP Pro on a fresh hard drive. Woohoo!
• Simon de Almeida July 20, 2009 at 6:31 am

  OMG MAN. You saved my ass. I have an acer Aspire 6920G laptop and I was on vista. I had problems with the internet connection. I couldnt find any wireless internet signal. I also couldnt open any usb or burn disk’s. So I poped it my windows xp cd and when it said. Press “r” to begin installing Windows xp. Nothing happened. I pressed R and still nothing. So I took my cd out and restared my laptop. It would boot to windows Vista. I was so scared because he laptop is not even mine ( well is my brothers). Thnx to this now I can install Windows again! Im installing it right now.
• Parag July 12, 2009 at 12:59 pm

  Thanks Raymond, this was a “Life saver”.

  Was trying to install a copy of Win MCE 2005, and disk would fail to detect HDD, changing to IDE worked.

  Thanks again !!
• Midna June 20, 2009 at 11:36 am

  I got my laptop in February 2008 and it came with Vista. I had downloaded nLite and made a copy of the OS but included the extra drivers and stuff so it would install. Last night I got a new HDD and in XP, I’m using nlite again and seem to add all the drivers but get the same screen that I got before caused by the raid thingie. My BIOS is Phoenix TrustedCore and theres no way to disable RAID. How do I know which driver to download and where do I get it! I have literally been trying to install Windows XP on my new HDD for about 24 hours. I bought it last night at FutureShop. There’s no OS on it.
• petey June 13, 2009 at 5:37 pm

  Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

  Disabling the SATA setting in BIOS worked a treat. All this to get rid of Vista (rot in hell) and install XP and Ubuntu (which installed without all this Microsoft malarky).

  Thanks again.
• Prince FsL HmD June 9, 2009 at 3:04 am

  Turning off Native SATA option in HP NX7400 worked for me perfectly
• Matt June 6, 2009 at 5:49 pm

  Hello All,

  I am not sure at all which controller to choose when in the f6 floppy stage?? there is a list of different controllers but i have no idea which is for me??

  please email me a possibility
• fudzis7 June 5, 2009 at 3:58 am

  “First method is to change the SATA Mode to IDE in BIOS. My computer BIOS is Phoenix AwardBIOS 6.00PG and I can change the SATA Mode to IDE by going to Integrated Peripherals > SATA Devices Configuration > SATA Mode [RAID] and change to [IDE].”

  THANK YOU :)
• Azgalan June 4, 2009 at 12:52 pm

  Where can i download the SATA Driver for my laptop? Model: BenQ JoyBook R45. I can’t find it anywhere.
• rajwinder singh May 30, 2009 at 8:44 am

  oh man….thanx a lot …u saved my money and time both…..u changed my life with ths method…i m very thankfull 2 u for this act……
• DW May 27, 2009 at 4:07 am

  Method 1 worked like a charm…thx!
• Harold May 19, 2009 at 7:07 pm

  Very helpful article.
  Thanks for your help.
• erik May 19, 2009 at 2:11 am

  YOU ARE MY HERO!
• ANDY May 4, 2009 at 6:48 am

  Muchas gracias, mi disco es SATA y no podia instalar XP porque no reconocia el disco, la solucion como lo indican fue cambiar la configuracion en BIOS a SATA-IDE.
• SandRo May 4, 2009 at 12:17 am

  thank you, you are my brother
• Mohammed April 29, 2009 at 1:21 am

  Thank u so much !!

  I have IBM lenovo thinkpad . I changed the SATA mode from ACHI to Compatibilty and it worked successfuly.
• B.K. DUBEY April 26, 2009 at 6:12 pm

  thanks alot ! Great work.
• Ben Shotter April 18, 2009 at 5:10 pm

  Thankyou so much! Finally a site with the correct info! Prob sorted. Thanks again.
• NewMacUser April 16, 2009 at 6:48 am

  THANK YOU for this Guide!!!! Now, I’m able to skip that irritating part! Thanks… I’m installing Win XP Prof now on my PC.
• Nadav April 15, 2009 at 4:06 am

  Thanks Ray.
  Changing the BIOS setting to “ATA” did the trick!
• Foo April 12, 2009 at 8:23 pm

  My BIOS (HP/Compaq nx6320) does not let me turn off SATA, but disabling “SATA native mode” was adequate to install Windows XP.

  Your info was invaluable in leading to this solution.
• Aman April 10, 2009 at 3:54 pm

  Its working.. good one .. Thanks
• Aamir shahzad April 7, 2009 at 6:08 pm

  can any one solve my problem , when i install windows xp after i take first reboot after copying windows files it generates error of insert boot media. i tried it with 2-3 hard disks.
• David April 7, 2009 at 9:38 am

  i forgot to say thanks :)
• David April 7, 2009 at 9:37 am

  First choice was the right choice for me, awsome was that simple and fast to fix this issue on my HP Pavilion dv2000 notebook
• Bill Campbell April 6, 2009 at 6:32 am

  Hey, Thanks for your help. I always wondered what a third-party raid driver was. Anyway, I made the changes in BIOS and am installing XP on my son\\\’s laptop. Here\\\’s the senario: I safe booted Vista and lo and behold it\\\’s giving me a DOS window. (Iwas already suspicious) Like an idiot, I formatted C:. Great. Got the above message, can\\\’t find the hdd. Well damage done. I got KillDisk and really crapped it out. Same prob. until I found your article. A year ago, my step-son was going to throw this laptop away. (the one I\\\’m on now kids are dumd sh*ts, everything\\\’s disposable) It\\\’s a Dell and had XP on it. No prob. I formatted with XP and got drivers through my driveragent subsc. and got a brand new laptop. My son\\\’s is a presario. Good God!, I\\\’ve wiped and re-installed lots of drives and never had this headache before. Thanks again. – Bill
• Rick April 6, 2009 at 4:22 am

  Thank you Raymond. you rock!
• Scott March 29, 2009 at 9:43 am

  Thank you very much… This was very helpful.
• Phill March 27, 2009 at 4:36 am

  I have accomplished the inevitable by installing the xp sp3 on a dell inspirion. Its super duper fast. Please message me to get some info on how to downgrade vista(any versions) to xp pro or home. I have played around with my computer to understand a bit about the Dell Inspirion 1525. Please let me know if you need any assistance. I have done this on my own with a few help of other posters on the net.
• ABDULAZIZ March 16, 2009 at 9:38 pm

  thinx man !!

  i will think you for all of my life !!
• sagar March 11, 2009 at 6:22 pm

  :)
• ancianoman March 8, 2009 at 11:00 pm

  Thank You…this really helped me out and am now able to install XP…this is a lesson well learned,thanks again.
• miguel March 2, 2009 at 11:02 pm

  thanks, this really helped me!
• gogo February 26, 2009 at 11:10 pm

  thanks for your help :D
• deon mark February 26, 2009 at 2:27 am

  thanks your a life saver!
• Harsha February 22, 2009 at 3:38 am

  Hey !!!

  Thanx a LOT …. i thought i killed my comp when i upgraded the Phoenix bios from F.11 to F.24 … This post helped me :)

  Thanx again !!
• rajesh patidar February 19, 2009 at 8:35 pm

  satup did not find any harddisc
• Scott February 19, 2009 at 6:51 pm

  Hi all
  just wondering if anyone can help me,
  Trying to get rid of horrid vista on a gateway ML6226b laptop, in the bios there is no option of changing the ACHI or IDE?
  and also have not got a floppy drive is there any other way of installing the drivers without or altering the ACHI before i do the install??
  Thanks
  Scott
• richardt February 18, 2009 at 5:22 am

  Hi All

  Dont know whos who really , but i had same prob with not finding SATA , i disabled it in the bios and xp is on

  thankyou so much , if not for this site i would have no hair

  thanks where can i donate

  richard
• claudio February 16, 2009 at 4:16 am

  muchas gracias me sirbio demaciado tu informcion estoy en mi maquina con xp sin el maldito vista gracias
• grethel February 14, 2009 at 3:13 am

  thanks a lot… the first solution works perfectly fine
• Death Stryke February 11, 2009 at 8:15 pm

  but how yo go to Integrated Peripherals and change the bios where where just in Integrated Peripherals but where it is please edit it and put more inforomation about this i really need it
• John February 10, 2009 at 11:32 am

  Thank you!!! I have had this problem and always thought it was an issue with my motherboard or something else … you rock. This worked like a charm.

  I have a Dell Dimension 8400 – for those with Dell computers, go to SATA Operation in the drive list in the BIOS and choose “Combination”, which is a SATA/PATA combination and disables RAID. Works like a charm, installing XP Pro right now! Sweet!
• Dastan February 8, 2009 at 2:00 am

  Thanks very .. very much my friend.

  It really works for my HP 530 Laptop, and I think the HD model is Hitachi, so it works for anyone who has the same model…

  Regards
• mohanarangam.p February 5, 2009 at 6:58 pm

  I recently bought Toshiba 320 GB external USB Hard disk. but when it connect through USB to my laptop which has WIndows Xp Home Edition OS. It is not detecting. Please solve this problem.
• floviano January 28, 2009 at 12:49 pm

  hello, I have Hp workstation xw 8200, my hard disk is 73 GB SCSI, i dont know were to find my disket drivers for setup windos xp profesional. Pleas can some one help me . were to finde and what driver i need for extract in a floppy.
• John Aaku January 28, 2009 at 3:18 am

  Thanks very much. changing the BIOS settings did the trick…
• ace January 24, 2009 at 4:10 pm

  Thanks a lot bro…it really works!!!
• Visan January 22, 2009 at 7:50 pm

  i have a problem instaling a win xp on a hp pavilion DV 6700, it says no hard drive found on ur pc. the weird thing is that it doesnt have any raid or sata option to desable in bios( the bios is Phoenix , but dont think its a problem..) pls help me . mesage me on email…on how to solve this problem.
• kitty January 19, 2009 at 8:19 am

  I have toshiba satelilite p305 with an ati mobility radeon driver. I read the forums but dont have an option in bios to change the settings. I dont have a floppy drive either but usb drives. Can someone walk me through the changes if they have the same laptop. Im fixing it for a friend and even though I do this all the time. This laptop is just different.
• Chris January 18, 2009 at 9:50 pm

  NLITE asks the driver file to be in .inf form. Though I found the SATA controller drivers on my system to be in .sys form.
  This is big problem as the new Win XP Install disk cannot thus be made.
  Any suggestions?
  Thanks,
  Chris.
  ===
• akil January 10, 2009 at 7:37 pm

  hai guys
  thanks for ur information about dell insperon 1525 . it realy helped me to do wind xp . just keep n ur sujestion ,
• Thomas Cameron January 9, 2009 at 10:16 pm

  Thanks mate, worked a treat on a Lenovo X60! Changed the BIOS so that the SATA device was “compatible” instead of SATA.
• 200hit January 7, 2009 at 10:18 am

  Thanks it worked!
• tobylevel9 January 6, 2009 at 9:43 am

  Thanks man! Just knowing that changing the SATA mode helps the startup helped me out a ton! Thanks again for a great article.
• tobylevel9 January 6, 2009 at 9:41 am

  Hey, thanks for the help, just changing the SATA mode helped me so much!!!! Thanks for the help man.
• Ajay pandey January 5, 2009 at 1:31 pm

  I have same issue with my compaq laptop and win XP .Only disaling SATA is worked for me .
• saalim January 1, 2009 at 10:50 pm

  hi, im using toshiba u300 13u satellite im getting same problem and i don’t find any option in BIOS to change SATA to IDE please help me out
• Jonny H (UK) December 30, 2008 at 9:03 pm

  I have a Presario v6000 and was actually adivsed by HP support to reinstall a new version of XP as i got this message when I was trying to use the \\\’R\\\’ recovery console to recover my XP system.
  So I managed to get all my data off the drive using an external SATA enclosure then attempted to do a fresh install using the supplied XP Home edition cd they provide on purchase. I once again got the \\\’unable to find hard drive etc\\\’ !
  However using someone suggestion on here to change SATA Native Support to \\\’Disabled\\\’ from the BIOS
  (pf10 at powerup > System Configuration > SATA Native Support > enter and up cursor to change to Disabled > pf10 > enter for yes save )
  and the install proceeded to the \\\’accept rightsd etc\\\’ page

  XP came up ok – however i am now running with SATA disabled. I tried to reset the SATA setting in BIOS but everytime I try to start XP i get a BSOD.

  Now looking around to see how to get around this other than creating the new XP disc.
• quy7 December 30, 2008 at 6:17 am

  thanks all of u `cheers
• Ravi December 20, 2008 at 12:43 pm

  Thank you very much. its like a miracle for me as I tried so many things but didnt worked. But this tips helped me in re-solving the issue.
• Ogie December 14, 2008 at 7:48 pm

  Bro, thank you very much you solved my problems..in Qatar all computer technician in qatar are selfish in a small information about basic trouble shooting of pc/laptop…thanks and more power!
• Brett December 12, 2008 at 11:51 am

  Thanks dude, raid setting worked like a charm!
• 44n5h December 12, 2008 at 7:08 am

  ***The 1st time, I woluld like to say thanks for The owner of this Blog and i want to say Hello to All Peoples who join in this forum.
  I like this forum. \”For Give Me For My Bad Eglishs\” but I want to shares my experienced about :

  ** \”How to Reinstallation Windows-XP along with other Additional Programs if MORE THAN 10 Units of Desktop or Laptops with different hardwares in one day\”.

  ** All in One and One in All
  ** Without:
  # NO Problems With IDE or Serial-ATA.
  # NO Need Original Drivers.
  # NO CD-Rom Drive and CDs.
  # NO LOSING Of DATAS.
  # NO Bloue Screen.
  ** Support Using USB Cable\’s, IDE Cables, or S-ATA Cables.
  _______________________________________________________________________________________________

  ## Before You are starting this experince, you have to preparing a few the equipments :

  Requirement for Instaling Source :
  ———————————-

  For HardWares :
  ———-
  1. 1 Unit Desktop or Laptop
  Requitments:
  HardDisk Port : Sata/ IDE
  HardDisk Size : Min 2 Gb for Windows XP only or More Depend of your addition programs
  USB Port : Support 2.0 Speeds
  CD-Rom Drive : CD R/W or DVD R/W

  For SoftWares :
  ————–
  Only Need 4 SoftWares

  #### WARNING ####
  ———————

  *** Because of by activity which can yield Product of Ilegal hence I do not explain process work this at this forum.
  become to which wish knowing about it, Please.. request to send e-mail to my address. conveniently I will reciprocate it.
  My E-Mail is : aansh_1234@hotmail.com

  *** I will not be in control of mistake of usage, because me only sharing Science to be everybody in the world can enjoy using Technology.
  specially to People Moslem,disabled persons, impecunious Persons, war victim, and oppressed society by technology.
  and me only noticing \” Please .. Do not looking for money to find something but you have to looking for sciences and the money will be come by self.
  Like the waters falling down in to lower places\’s.

  _________________________________________________________________________________________________

  Please Do not Worry:
  * NO MOney
  * NO SPAM
  * NO VIRUS
  * NO Lie
  ** Only Say Thanks for My Masters, My Leader but NOT for ME.
  ** Link For downloads was included.

  ************* If you have any Problems about computer HardWare, Please…. Send E-Mail to me or Chatting with me in Windows Live Messenger (I am Online Every Times )me and I will reply as soon as posible.

  Thanks For All.
  Sciences Never Died…
  World Peace\’s Will Be Coming True……
• George December 10, 2008 at 7:08 am

  Hi Raymond,
  My laptop has Vista. I created a partition to install Windows XP, where I can run my engineering softwares (ie: CATIA) which are not supported by Vista.

  Should I follow your above steps eventhough I will be keeping Vista on my other drive?
  I need to run both operating systems.

  Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

  Thank you
  George
• vladcarama December 7, 2008 at 6:22 pm

  Tzeluiu noci mucelsea s problemoi, poka ne nashol atu statiu. Pomog pervai metod, sposibo avtoru…
• Myagaa December 4, 2008 at 2:41 pm

  please can u tell me how to load my laptop using window xp. my laptop has no floppy drive. thanks.waiting for ur reply lot
• nabi from mongolia November 29, 2008 at 8:54 pm

  thank’s frend. i do it
• Brett November 29, 2008 at 12:57 pm

  I have a question and this is driving me crazy! Please help. On your directions up top, it says to copy my sata/raid driver onto a floppy drive, Unfortunately, for me, My driver from Acer\\\\\\\’s website is 19MB. A floppy on holds 1.44. I tried spreading it out between 10 floppys, that didnt work. Im sooo stuck. I have the Acer Extensa 5620, downloaded the Intel AHCI Driver v7.0.0.1020 from this website: acerpanam.com/synapse/forms/AcerDrivers/Extensa%205620.pdf?CFID=2197550&CFTOKEN=79185469
  Any help woudl save my life. Thanks.
• pankaj kumar singh November 28, 2008 at 2:19 pm

  I have installed xp on DELL Inspiron 1525laptop.but cd+dvd drive not working properly .can you people let me know the actual graphic driver for Inspiron 1525laptop.i need help for same if any have solution pls help me on that.
• Tom November 25, 2008 at 11:49 am

  I tried a lot of queries from Google – tried nLITE as many of you might have after getting this error. Saw that this might be a BIOS problem after reading this thread. Though I don’t have the same options as stated above, I simply went into my BIOS – where ever it said “BIOS – balh blah blah blah” + enabled – I simply disabled it. One only place where I could do it. Didn’t even know what it meant to do it, but it did work. Now XP can install. Simply disable/or enable – whatever your computer is set to in SATA – just do the opposite. It works!!!! I’m very drunk to. If I can do it right now – then you can too! DUH!!!!! I love vodka…..
• pankajkumar singh November 22, 2008 at 9:27 pm

  I am trying to install windows xp on DELL Inspiron 1525laptop. I have taken dos o/s, when I am going to install windows xp its not finding hard disk and always my system automatically restarting .I don’t know why it’s happening.
• CupChampz01 November 21, 2008 at 1:15 pm

  Hey Folks, just a little help in case you are trying to install XP Pro 64-bit on a Toshiba A305. The only difference is to change the sata controller mode from AHCI mode to Compatibility mode.
• Dave November 3, 2008 at 10:53 pm

  hopefully this works, been totally crazy for the past few days…..well here goes nothing…..
• simoncpu November 3, 2008 at 4:25 pm

  Bonjour,

  I’ve copied your SATA mode screenshot. I hope you don’t mind. Merci dude… =)
• romel November 3, 2008 at 10:01 am

  thanks for this…this helps a lot
• Steve K November 3, 2008 at 5:55 am

  Brilliant…suspected at the outset that XP was lacking some drivers…this guide helped a great deal..cheers

  Steve
• inoh October 30, 2008 at 6:52 pm

  cant find audio driver after disabling sata and installing xp.
  help me guys..thx
• madforit October 21, 2008 at 7:41 pm

  I thought vista doesnt support xp,something to do with the drivers-not certain
• sanjay October 21, 2008 at 5:10 pm

  I have sony laptop it comes with windows vista when i try to download win xp on it it shows a message setup did not find any hard disk in your computer. i down load sata dirve software on the net but still i am facing same problem.
• Adrian Fedog October 20, 2008 at 4:29 pm

  Thank you! Though I changed from IDE to RAID, and it worked. :) Thank you!

  Adrian
• jose Armando October 20, 2008 at 9:40 am

  Hola , Instale en mi portatil windows xp, tenia windows vista , por fin me libre baje los drivers y todo parece estar bien instalado solo que cuando tratao de regresar en el bios la configuracion a SATA, me marca error y no entra windows, como despues de haber instalado win xp restablesco el la funcionalidad SATA de antemano muchas grcias a quien me oriente o me diga donde, como consigo usar la funcianalidad SATA en mi equipo
• Steve October 14, 2008 at 7:45 am

  Wowza! Racked my brain for almost an hour trying to figure out why XP PRO couldn’t see my Hard Disk on my Persario C700 until I found this…

  I went into the BIOS and disabled SATA and it worked fine!

  Thanks guys
• Junior RJ October 11, 2008 at 8:18 pm

  Fiz o procedimento so q usando um pen drive de 1gb ele recohese numa boa e mostra os drives do sata q ta dentro do pen so que depois tento aperta o s pra ele usar o drive e simplismente não vai, e + pra fente aparece o pen drive como opção de instalação e o sata continua não aparesendo, algem pode me ajudar???
• Pandiyan October 7, 2008 at 1:46 am

  thank youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
• brandon September 24, 2008 at 2:24 am

  setting the “Native SATA” option to “disable” in the CMOS worked for me….THANKS!
• mohit bansal kalanwali sirsa September 20, 2008 at 7:14 pm

  thanks yaar i just change bios setting from ahci to ata
  and it works now i can setup window xp
  without any change in original harddisk file(already coppied) setting
• qUERIDO September 14, 2008 at 5:16 am

  POXA TO ATE EMOCIONADO SALVO MEU SABADO TE AMO FICA COM DEUS A VO TE MA
• Noreenog September 5, 2008 at 9:33 am

  This is silly, go into BIOS – Config – Scroll to SATA – Change to Compatibility – Save and try again.
  Super Simple
• JacobRagsdale August 25, 2008 at 2:42 pm

  hi, i recently installed xp on my inspiron 1525 and had to change the sata mode so that xp would see the hard drive. can i install the drivers so that i can change it back to where i can have my 250 gb back?
• ardy August 16, 2008 at 3:57 am

  thanks Ray, you\’re the best,you saved my job!
• edward August 12, 2008 at 5:51 am

  YA INSTALE WINDOWS XP PERO AHORA LA PC MUESTRA LA PRIMERA PARTE DE WINDOWS Y LUEGO SE REINICIA DE UNA VEZ QUIEN ME PUEDE AYUDAR MI PC ES UNA DELL DIMENSION 9100
• jkchavda August 10, 2008 at 5:28 pm

  hey man its working!! dude thanx!! thanx 2 all master mind of computer!! keep spreading knowledge. best wishes 4m me:)
• happy guy August 10, 2008 at 1:51 pm

  swithing to SATA to IDE worked perfectly. I\’ll just switch back to RAID after I\’ve installed XP.

  Demotis is a clown
• faisal August 3, 2008 at 8:57 pm

  ok…now the probs is in sata….so its simple.disable the sata native support in the bios settings and install the xp…thats all
• BASSIX July 30, 2008 at 3:55 pm

  Thank you!!!!
• Ocky July 25, 2008 at 4:43 am

  thank’s a lot…
  your description like cofee…
  make me power up again :D
• dvd July 24, 2008 at 7:50 pm

  man you saved me. i had no idea what was going until i read your description. thanks
• Ste July 15, 2008 at 4:31 pm

  Demotis – What garbage are you talking! Don\’t come on here bemoaning a work-a-round to install XP and not offer any help.

  If you know so much ,impart some knowledge and not your half baked opinions!
• Cat July 13, 2008 at 1:20 am

  I just bought an Acer Extensa 5620-4020 2 months ago. Long story short it restarted itself in my carrying case and fried. I had an error saying the operating system was not found. After calling Acer support they mailed me sytem and recovery disks. After excitedly reading the instructions I went to work at downloading them. After the system disk finished loading everything and error message popped up saying no hdd available. if you push ok it restarts again. PLEASE help me! Acer support is closed for the weekend and I’m going insane!
• frank July 12, 2008 at 2:09 pm

  Mostly time I found blog but I naver gain lots of information but this blog have lots of important information abt this and I got lots of imformation on it . Thanks
• Tunç Atakan July 10, 2008 at 10:31 pm

  Thanx for you help.
• Demotis July 2, 2008 at 11:38 am

  To everyone out there turrning off SATA just to install the OS, STOP!!!!

  It’s like buying a car with turbo and then bypassing it. Why would you do that.

  I know it’s terrible that MS doesn’t have the drivers on the CD, but there are thousands of drivers and MS only supports a few of the more common ones out of the box, don’t blame them, blame teh hardware manufacturer for not agreing on a standard and creating a unified driver set.

  We can blame MS for the Floppy driver requirement, but there are ways around that. There are boot loaders that load the drivers in a virtual Floppy for this exact use, or you can slip stream the drivers on to the CD. It’s not really that hard.

  Another option is to get OEM media from the manufacturer of the system. They may have already sliped the drivers in for you.

  If you don’t know how slip stream, or to lazy to look on the internet to learn how, you shouldn’t be installing the OS in the first place. And if you think turning off SATA or RAID to IDE mode is the answer.. well I hope you like the speed your getting out of your system, it would be a little over twice as fast if you did it right.
• alitam June 29, 2008 at 9:00 pm

  Thanks for all the help with my inspiron 1525… Thought I was screwed!
• Pardeep June 28, 2008 at 12:06 pm

  I\’m having same prob with my DELL Inspiron 1525.Thanks for the solution.
• Stephanie June 28, 2008 at 7:17 am

  I am not tech savvy….I do not know how to get to SATA settings on my computer, the steps listed do not tell me where to go once in the BIOS. I got this computer on ebay with no OS and do not have a box and do not know how to tell what manufacturer I have for the motherboard, please someone help me! The computer is a hp dv9260….
• Amon June 28, 2008 at 1:25 am

  Sweet guys!!!
  Disabling the SATA options in the BIOS, solved the issue!
• aamir June 25, 2008 at 5:45 pm

  Hi:
  i have bought new laptop Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21M, i want to install windowsXP but when i started the setup it says that:
  Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer. Make sure any hard disk drives are powered on and properly connected to your computer, and that any disk-related hardware configuration is correct. This may involve running a manufacturer-supplied diagnostic or setup program. Setup cannot continue. To quit Setup, press F3,

  tell me pls what is the solution, and i also dont have floppy drive, is there any possibility.

  aamir
  nicenicy@hotmail.com
• alberto June 24, 2008 at 4:01 pm

  i do not have sata option in my bios settings. i spent looking inside vista for some security option, but my god at the moment i want xp pro, not vista. heeeelp
• DrJones June 24, 2008 at 2:07 pm

  Thank you so much! The simplest way to fix this is turning off the SATA option in your BIOS settings. Worked right away.
  Thanks again.
• alberto June 24, 2008 at 10:48 am

  hello, i have a vaio vgn-ar71j with preinstalled vista, now i do not see the settings in the bios like you say and i can not install xp pro, how can i do this?? need urgent help. thanks to all
• Donal June 22, 2008 at 9:13 pm

  amazing, after wading through page after page, just gettin more n more confused, turns out to be as simple as 1 settin in BIOS. Thank You Very Much!
• Dave June 20, 2008 at 11:52 pm

  I just wanted to say thanks. Your bios settings were slightly different then my own; but that\’s just the way it goes.

  Thanks again,

  Dave
• Xploit June 18, 2008 at 12:58 pm

  Thanks, you saved me a lot of time and chewed finger nails.
• asifali June 17, 2008 at 4:32 pm

  Thank you thanks a lot
• Joey June 17, 2008 at 6:15 am

  Absolutely Brilliant! works!! thanks
• Rosseloh - SDSU Residential Life June 11, 2008 at 4:52 am

  Thanks much for this! We just got 5 new machines in for the department with Vista pre-installed (Gateway) and I was about pulling my hair out because the XP setup disc couldn’t find the drive. This saved me the trouble of messing with Warranty and just finding the same problem!
• Sami-73 June 10, 2008 at 4:58 am

  Salut.. je souffre du meme probleme J’ai pc portabel HP Pavilion DV 6850 EK avec Windows Vista installe et j’ai voulu cohabiter Vista a vec XP sur les deux partitions existantes mais voila l’installation de XP ne detecte pas les dique durs.. Les solutions proposees sont presque claires mais 1- je ne sais pas comment changer dans le BIOS la SATA en IDE car le BIOS existant n’offre pas de F12 et pour les F qui presente j’ai minucieusemnt verifier mais il n y ucune indication sur la SATA alors cul-de-sac 2- je n’ai pas de lecteur disquette externe est ce que je peux utiliser meloire flash USB? 3- pour les pilites de la carte mere j’ai beau chercher mais je n’ai rien trouve j’ai un carte mere QUANTA 30CC 79.29 s’il vous plait si vous avez une petite idee je vous serai tres reconnaissant.. Merci
• Mark Kazak June 7, 2008 at 12:34 pm

  I would really appreciate some help.A friend has a Dell Dimension 4400 that never had a HD and did not come with any driver disks (He bought it used). We got a refurbished 60GB HD and installed it and BIOS sees the HD. Unfortunately we get this problem when we try to install XP Home. Here is the information from Dell on the motherboard:
  6P708 ASSEMBLY…, CARD (CIRCUIT)…, PLANAR (MOTHERBOARD)…, DIM4400, NO AUDIO…, REV1
  but we have had no luck finding a driver. It has a floppy drive and we also have a USB floppy and I can’t find any options in BIOS to do the first method. We would really appreciate anyones help.
  Thanks
• sync June 7, 2008 at 10:33 am

  never mind..

  i found the reason why…here’s how:

  i check the bios

  then go to advance, IDE configuration and change the SATA configuration mode from Enhanced to Compatible mode

  Compatible mode can will set serial ATA channel at IDE mode for OS not supporting Native SATA controller like WinXP and 2000 or it will turn into BSOD when installing windows.
• ?????? ????? - ???? 3 - IOPaneL June 6, 2008 at 8:36 pm

  [...] ???? ????? ? BIOS ???? ?? ??????? ???? ???? IDE ?? SATA ? ???? ??? ??? ? RAID ?? ??? ???? ?? ?? ???? ?????? ???? ???? ????? ??? ??? ???? ?????? ??? ???? ???? ????? ??? ???? ?????? ??? ??????? ??? BOTH __________________ – ?? ????? ????? [...]
• sync June 6, 2008 at 5:34 am

  hi everyone..

  im not sure if i have a sata or ata devices..but when i check device manager it says..

  ATA channel 0
  ATA channel 1
  ATA channel 2
  INtel ICH8M Sata AHCI Controller – 2829
  Intel ICH8M Ultra ATA Storage Controllers – 2850

  now, if i have ATA device, what will i do to install xp. please guys im not good in this stuff. i would really appreciate any help from you..

  hope to have your answers soon…thanks
• DominicanWarrior June 1, 2008 at 11:04 am

  Thankyou for this info if it was not for this I allmost bought other hd.. ;0)
• Jason May 30, 2008 at 1:47 pm

  I just got a brand new hp 520 laptop but with vista in chinese on it.. Trying to put xp on it but just cant.

  I tried changing The sata mode, but theres no way to do that in the BIOS!

  Tried searching SATA drivers online.. still no way..

  I just want to remove that vista and be able to run xp in and use my full RAM..

  Please help!
• aie May 30, 2008 at 1:35 am

  i used toshiba satellite m200. Cannot detect harddisk when i try to format. i use nlite to modify xp cd but the result is same. can u help me …please
• pin May 28, 2008 at 6:45 pm

  should i change back to sata after installed windows xp?

  what to do if i want to use sata?
• pakdi May 27, 2008 at 9:03 am

  thanks. you rocks!

  finally, xp at dell inspiron 1420.
• abnoysz May 25, 2008 at 3:29 pm

  I used the nlite and still no success,
  what driver do i need?

  Compaq HP v3000 / v3618
  Help.. thanks
• Ed May 22, 2008 at 11:03 pm

  Great information, thanks for you knowledge.
• querogz@gmail.com May 15, 2008 at 11:34 am

  entao eu tenho um lap HP Pavilion dv2535la e nao tem o drive para o xp n site do fabricante 6s tem nossao de onde podemos achar essa parada
• alessandro May 8, 2008 at 10:04 pm

  io il messaggio \”Ftdisk.sys è danneggiato\” lo rilevo cercando di installare XP (sp3 integrato con nlite) su macchina virtuale con Microsoft Virtual PC 2007. sapete se è un problema della virtual o devo per forza masterizzarlo, provare e magari buttar via il cd? è abbastanza urgente, grazie!!!
• Tracy Esau April 29, 2008 at 5:42 pm

  the blog to me till now is not so clear
• ahmed April 29, 2008 at 2:11 am

  i donot know to thank you
• DANNY April 23, 2008 at 3:46 pm

  dude this the shit
• Caleb April 23, 2008 at 3:01 am

  Can’t seem to edit original comment.

  As it turns out my MB comes with two optional BIOS – VIA and Fasttrack. I had been using the latter, but the VIA boot disk seems to work!

  HOoray!
• Caleb April 23, 2008 at 2:46 am

  I have an ASUS A8V Deluxe MB and have been having this problem with my SATA HD.

  My MB came with a CD that comes with the necessary files to create the proper RAID boot disk, however my HD is still not recognized – even after the proper RAID drivers are loaded and your instructions are followed.

  Any other ideas?
• Sajjad/Srilanka April 15, 2008 at 2:22 pm

  Thanks a million Raymond I’m a new to SATA drives brought a new laptop and was trying for 2 hours to install XP. after reding your aritical I could install it, Great work Thanks again
• Agent_DELIMAN April 11, 2008 at 10:40 am

  Thanks alot Raymond , you got me back on track. Its nice to see that someone has the answers. After 2 weeks and new hard drives for no reason I found your post especially the one about moving it to a cd instead of the floppy. Thanks Again!!!!!!!!!!
• TechGuy April 9, 2008 at 4:58 am

  For all who have flipped their systems into ATA compatibility mode in the BIOS. You have _severely_ degraded the performance of your disk. You need to either press F6 during installation and load the proper drivers from a floppy or build a new CD with the drivers already loaded. You DO NOT want to run your system in ATA mode.
• Tommybhoy April 8, 2008 at 6:55 pm

  Thanks for ths great tip. I have a DELL Inspiron 1525 and I was trying to get rid of Vista on the laptop and install XP.

  I followed the information above posted by Lightninghawk which involved going into the BIOS and changing the SATA settings:

  - Press F2 on startup to enter BIOS
  - arrow down to Onboard Devices and open
  - arrow down to SATA operation
  - change from AHCI to ATA
  - press Enter to Save and then Esc to Exit, Saving changes
  - I then rebooted with the Windows XP in the drive and it went through the install procedures no problem

  This was for a DELL inspiron 1525 and I did not require any SATA drivers.

  Slan,
  Tom
• shabeer April 7, 2008 at 4:47 pm

  thanks a lot
• cip April 5, 2008 at 5:31 pm

  hi, i have a 1525 also -> but i have a question – if i change from AHCI to ATA the performance will stay the same ? or will i be able to change back to AHCI after windows is installed ?
• B.J. April 2, 2008 at 5:20 pm

  i have a 30 gigabyte hdd and when i turn comp on it says 4th master s.m.a.r.t. failure so i put my win xp in and then it says xp didnt detect hdd checked all cables and power cords twice over and still have same problem what can i do?
• adriano April 2, 2008 at 11:03 am

  I did like you said in the first method and I want to thankyou for saving my life!!!!
• saravanan March 28, 2008 at 2:29 am

  this same problem my laptop,any os installation not support,setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer the error,plse clear the problem any ideas tell me urgent.
• viki March 27, 2008 at 10:18 pm

  Thanks a lot,
• Martin March 27, 2008 at 5:55 am

  HEEEELPPPPP ME

  Please I need drivers for HP 530 Notebook PC

  Please send me info to e-mail..

  Thank you ALL
• Gordan March 26, 2008 at 10:08 pm

  HEEEELPPPPP

  Please I need drivers for Toshiba X205-S9800

  Please send me info to e-mail..

  Thank you ALL
• punit March 26, 2008 at 8:25 pm

  i am having a ata hard disk for 20 gb..my cmos/bios shows that there is a hard disk attached ..but when i am trying to install or go to the coomand propmpt it says invalid drive specification…what do i do ? plz suggest me
• Dan March 19, 2008 at 10:09 pm

  Thank you so much disabling the SATA worked for me! :)
• Tom Marker March 18, 2008 at 4:34 am

  I made a bootable CD with my SATA drivers and it boots all the way until it says no hard drives found… I have a RAID 1 configuration on SATA ports 4 & 5 and I cannot get by this problem… the other ports are not available..driver and a video card blocking them. Any suggestions?
• Adrian March 18, 2008 at 1:24 am

  Could you guys please help me with this one?
  Firstly thank you all for the previous reply comments, I managed to install XP 64 on my Dell Dimension 9100 by disabling the SATA with the intension of reactivating it later.
  Its now later! and I have a problem! I down loaded the latest chip set driver from Dell and installed it, I then down loaded the latest Serial ATA: Intel Matrix Storage Manager driver and tried to install it so I could switch back to SATA but when I try to install it I get this error message! Incompatible hardware. This software is not supported on this chipset. I have double checked both drivers are the right ones for my PC, OS and chipset and downloaded them again and same problem!
  I do get an error message from the Dell site just before download of the Intel Matrix Storage Manager but it still downloads.
  Any suggestions would be gratefully received.
  Thanks
• whizzy March 17, 2008 at 10:39 pm

  as of wat i read somewhere on the internet,Windows XP black Edition is shipped with the RAID drivers inbuilt,any idea if my statement is rite raymond ? and i wanted to tell u.i m such a great fan of this blog amazing man ! my applauses to you.
• eme March 16, 2008 at 2:45 pm

  you are great.thanks a lot
• Jake March 16, 2008 at 7:53 am

  Thank you so much for your article! I really appreciate the time you put into it, because, being a moderate computer geek (not a nerd, mind you) I have the knowledge that I need…but unfortunately not much when it comes to BIOS.

  THANKS A MILLION! KUDOS! :)))
• jerry March 15, 2008 at 6:51 pm

  am also facing the same problem with cary, trying to install xp on hp pavilion dv 6700,i downloaded the SATA raid driver on link above i tried installing it but its telling me error code 32768 that file iaStor.sys could not be loaded, pls canm somebody help me out
• James March 13, 2008 at 12:42 pm

  Just found out motherboard, its
  Wistron 30D6 ver 81.49
  Where do I download the drivers, off their website? Any help will be great!
• James March 13, 2008 at 10:36 am

  I have a HP Pavilion dv2740se with AMD turion 64 x2 Mobile Technology, so the motherboard is made by AMD yeah? Are these the right drivers to download?
  amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResources/0,,30_182_871_14098,00.html
  However, these appear to be updates, no mention of Sata Raid drivers. Can you even get Sata Raid drivers for turion 64?
  Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
• Neon March 10, 2008 at 10:22 pm

  Great stuff,
  This post saved the day
• Ramesh March 9, 2008 at 7:12 pm

  Awesome ….
  Thanks a lot
• Cary March 8, 2008 at 9:47 am

  Please help me find my SATA drivers. I’m using a Intel Core Duo CPU T2250. processor and using Standard AHCI 1.0 Serial ATA Controller. I am unable to find a match on this website.
  global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=prodpage2&maincat_no=1&cat2_no=170

  nor on Intel’s. I thought I had the correct drivers but the installation failed. Can someone guide me to how to find the correct drivers for my chip.
  Thanks
  Cary
• san March 7, 2008 at 10:26 pm

  Raymond a big thanks,i was completely stuck,i just took the combination option in the bios for raid mode and hey it found the partitions!Cheers raymond
• Cary March 7, 2008 at 9:35 am

  HP Pavillion dv6000 laptop running Vista – trying to install XP

  current bios does not give me option to disable SATA. tried USB floppy with Intel manufactures serial ata drivers found at
  downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&ProductID=1666&DwnldID=7072

  but installation still failed “F3″
  What are my options now?
  am I using the correct Intel driver?
  thx
  cary
• çetin March 7, 2008 at 5:02 am

  plase
  norton internet securty 2008 request code=?
  help
• Mec March 7, 2008 at 3:49 am

  Thsnk you very much!!!!!!!!!!! :)
• azhar March 6, 2008 at 9:53 pm

  thanks for your advices it was of great help
  many many thanks

  keep up the good job :-)
• arif March 6, 2008 at 8:58 pm

  i have a sata hard disk and changing is disabled for this hard disk in bios.when i try to install xp,it cannot detect any hard disk.i attached usb hard disk and usb memory stick.still it cannot detect hard disk any thing to install xp.at one stage of installation it asks to install special drivers and try to search only floppy drive.

  i tried to buy floppy drive in pc world.they said it is out of date and they dont have any.

  is there any solution ?
• Planet Malaysia March 5, 2008 at 11:23 pm

  Hope Windows XP SP3 will have all the SATA drivers.
• NODOUBT March 5, 2008 at 5:27 am

  Awsewome page – question how did you get such a useful page so high in google – or is this truely a case of google being good – THNX FOR THE HELP
• Another xp 8400m March 3, 2008 at 9:07 am

  Unbelievable, I went through and updated drivers for everything on my computer, I downloaded new disks, completely wiped harddrive set everything to 0s then installed totally new label and linux OS then tried XP and vista, but neither would boot. So finally called Dell and of course stayed on the phone with them until they decided it was just that my hard drive was completely broken and sent me a new hard drive. Too bad they didn’t know this would have saved them the money of shipping out new parts.
• Chris Round March 1, 2008 at 1:07 pm

  brilliant – bought an acer aspire with Linux preinstalled – wiped to put xp on and will not detect!

  finally after hours of fdisking and 98 preinstall upgrade etc etc random crap this comes up and it works first time!

  thankyou so much :)
• Niq February 29, 2008 at 12:48 am

  It worked with nLite! Only problem for me was to extract Floppy-files without a floppy-drive! I had come to make a virtual drive a:\ , extracted the files / drivers, and then inserted them into nLite and then burned the XP-installation onto a CD-ROM!
• Niq February 28, 2008 at 9:30 pm

  Hi folks!

  I don\’t have a floppy-drive, and I can\’t disable SATA-mode in BIOS, I\’ll give nLite a go and hope for the best !!
• Swapnil February 28, 2008 at 4:53 pm

  First method is to change the SATA Mode to IDE in BIOS. IT WORKED ON MY LAPTOP. THANKS.
• Ayodele February 28, 2008 at 7:16 am

  hello i just got acer extensa 5220 and want to install windows xp on it and i got a message that their is no hard disk detected and i tried nlite but i am not to clear about how to use it to install windows xp and i cnt enter bios settings to change the SATA Mode to IDE in BIOS was unable to enter bios setup it was asking for password plz can anybody help me or put me thrue
  maxjohn98@yahoo
• xp on dell 8400 February 27, 2008 at 7:16 pm

  just want to share my case with everyone. I have dell 8400. Tried to install xp as i was not able to start window. I first received the error,
  \”ftdisk.sys is corrupted\”. well, cleaned the CD fixed this.
  Once it loaded all files i received the error,
  \”did not find any hard disk drives…\” whish lead me to this site. I changed,
  1. [F2] BIO setting to boot from CD-ROM to be first
  2. changed SATA specification from AHCI(manf. default) to ATA — will change back after successful installation
  This did it. I\’m now installing new XP…. Thanks a lot for your help!
• Gavin February 27, 2008 at 2:47 am

  i had a brand new Dell Inspirion with Vista Home installed, changed from AHCI to ATA in BIOS as mentioned, booted from cd and picked up hard drive …..cheers
• RealB February 25, 2008 at 5:40 am

  dear
  I got the same problem
  I don’t have floppy dick
  what should i do ?
  I don’t have USB flash driver too
  help me thanks
• gorillainthemist February 25, 2008 at 12:01 am

  excellent, wasted half the day trying to boot from a usb drive with different flavours of dos and windows to no avail to get around this issue, thinking I\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\’d just need to FDISK the disk…wish I\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\’d found this link yesterday…works a treat!
• Double 0 February 24, 2008 at 1:23 pm

  I have a Toshiba Satellite X205-S9800 laptop. It has a Phoenix Trusted Core BIOS and I do not see a way to change the SATA drive settings so that I can load XP on this Vista machine. I have removed the drive and attached it to another machine so that I could wipe and reformat the HD.

  Can someone help me get the BIOS to recognize the HD, please? I am desperately seeking a solution!!!!!

  Thx!
• dingus February 20, 2008 at 8:44 am

  Thank you very much!

  A big hurray from Norway!
• fr33mumia February 16, 2008 at 8:11 pm

  If you rapidly reinstall WINXP on the same machine, you could create pre-installed image using Ghost. Alternatively, you can create customizable WINXP CD with your SATA or RAID driver in it by using nLite for XP d-_-b
• Hank February 16, 2008 at 7:48 am

  Cheers Ray,

  Needed this, couldn’t figure it out ;)

  Gr
  Hank
• Cristina February 15, 2008 at 2:03 am

  Thank you! It came very in handy!
• Blade February 13, 2008 at 5:16 pm

  Can anyone please tell me what drivers are essential so that all components work in Dell Inspirion 1525 under Win XP?
  Thanks
• Jason February 13, 2008 at 5:04 am

  Brand new Dell Inspirion Vista Home installed when bought and wanted to run XP Pro instead. Drive was not detectable but chnaged the drive settings (a little different from post) and it worked! You are the man. thanks!
• James February 12, 2008 at 10:41 pm

  Thanks for everyone\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\’s help on this. I have an inspiron 1420 and changing the SATA settings from AHCI to ATA made it so that my xp pro cd would see the drive.

  Free at last…lord almighty I am free from Vista at last!
• Paul February 8, 2008 at 5:30 am

  I am currently installling XP on a Dell Insprion 1525.

  Her eis some info for you

  In BIOS Setup (hit F12 at startup), change SATA mode from AHCI to ATA and the WINDOWS XP Pro Installation CD wil detect the SATA drive no problem (I have the Dell XP flavour of XP startup CD).

  You may also have to change the Boot order of the laptop in BIOS so that the CD/DVD drive is top of the Boot order (accessible under boot sequence) to get the laptop to show the “Press any Key to Boot from CD” option. By default the HDD is top of the order so the laptop will tend to boot straight to Vista otherwise.
• Trevor February 6, 2008 at 5:42 pm

  Help! I have a Lenovo Laptop (3000 N200) where I flashed the BIOS with a wrong version. Now, the Laptop does not boot further than the bootup screen…if I try to reinstall winxp, it reaches the point until after formatting the hard drive…after that, “C” drive cannot be found (the usual strange message). How can I reinstall the BIOS available at Lenovo website, which cannot be run from DOS…is there some boot installer which could directly run thie bios file with a boot cd created for this?
• GOGO LOT ENENE February 4, 2008 at 7:12 pm

  please can u tell me how to load my laptop using window xp. my laptop has no floppy drive. thanks.waiting for ur reply lot
• sina February 2, 2008 at 12:48 pm

  THANKS guys,

  you saved my day!!!
• Daniel Carroll (Lightninghawk) February 2, 2008 at 9:24 am

  Side Note.

  If your xp installation isn’t recognizing the SATA drive with vista already installed.
  Go to the BIOS setting –> Sata –> change to ATA

  this was for a dell inspiron 1525.

  I don’t have the sata drivers. Never could find them.
  But this posting led me to where i needed to be.

  Thanks :)
• rstoplabe14 February 1, 2008 at 11:29 am

  On a Compaq for one of my customers all i had to do was diable SATA mode on Bios. It Worked! Thanks
• Leo January 31, 2008 at 3:31 am

  bharat

  you don’t have to write back to the original XP installation disk… when you use nlite, it will create a new disk image for you, with the driver integrated, so you can burn a new installation CD.

  Some BIOS have an option to emulate an USB Flash drive into a Floppy disk, but the windows installation may not support that.

  The best option is nLite.
• bharat January 27, 2008 at 12:45 pm

  hey hi ,
  i read the above procedure of yours ray
  i dont have a floppy drive and i have this nlite also wid me but the problem is my XP cd is wrte protected and the drivers cannot be integrated wid the setup
  can i copy the SATA drivers on to a USB drive and use it during installation ??
  i am stuck in the middle i need XP badly can u please help me out

  thanks
• tlipp January 26, 2008 at 9:44 pm

  Thanks for the support solving this issue. One question remains. How to switch back to SATA native support after followed the hint with the Bios settings? Can I do this without a reinstallation of windows xp?
  Thanks.
• marcial orcia January 25, 2008 at 10:09 am

  no comments………..obseverer………it’s hard to installed if you the begginer electrician?.but no man is perpect……always put in your mine that,no man in island………….
• Ralph January 25, 2008 at 9:52 am

  Leo. . .
  Are u the owner of ask-leo.com
  I’m a big ask-leo fan!
• CGpersia January 24, 2008 at 12:11 am

  i said before… :)
  before install windows xp go to bios setup and set hdd to IDE
  after that windows xp setup found that device :)
• trial January 23, 2008 at 7:02 pm

  Dear CGpersia, ‘m little bit confused as to how shall we install when hdd is not found in the system during winxp setup?
• webcadre January 23, 2008 at 12:45 am

  your always welcome ray,

  and we will wait for you to come up with that good idea of yours,
• CGpersia January 23, 2008 at 12:18 am

  if you haven’t floppy drive or have problem for installing that
  i have a solution … you can install sata driver after installing windows on ide…
  just after install go to
  device manager \ IDE ATA/ATAPI controller
  find your sata controller and right click on that and click Update Driver and select “don’t search i will choose the driver to install” after that click on have disk
  you need that driver of sata inside of floppy driver…
  you can download that from Internet
  and select that inf some like “iaahci.inf” or “iastor.inf”
  and install that…
  now restart your pc and go to bios and change your device mode from IDE to Sata AHCI
  enjoy Sata function :D
  note: this way not officially supported but any manufactures but work great :D
  if you have problem or doesn’t work
  you maybe select another device on Device manager \IDE atapi… \ sub list :)
  hope this way work for you
  i test this on my pc and after 1 year i haven’t any problem with that… i don’t have a floppy drive :)
  i have asus p5b-deluxe with JMicron controller on windows xp 64bit
• Planet Malaysia January 22, 2008 at 11:52 pm

  tullius, I’m very sure it’s worked with ext floppy drive as posted in my blog before.
• Maliti Solochi jnr January 22, 2008 at 10:25 pm

  Please I’ve a problem with my Laptop it stopped recognising other external drives or flash drives but only does so to two of my old seagate external and suncruz flash drive. And am using Vista on a Toshiba Satellite L45-S7423. What is the solution please?
• Rahul January 22, 2008 at 6:47 pm

  thanks a lot man….
• Leo January 22, 2008 at 2:08 am

  One other reason to avoid the first option is that you loose performance using the IDE mode, if you have a Sata II (300mb) mobo and Hard Drive, the best option is using AHCI or RAID for full performance, I hope microsoft add this drivers on the WinXP with SP3 CD.
• david January 22, 2008 at 12:48 am

  The reason why is, because Microsoft didn’t put in the the sata drivers in the XP installer, no?

  Tullius
  Yes USB floppy works perfectly BUT sometimes at a later stage in the installation XP will loose the driver for the floppy, then the only solution would be to slipstream the driver in the XP installer with nlite or something like that
• tullius January 22, 2008 at 12:36 am

  I didn’t know that an external USB floppy drive worked?
  Are you sure?
• Raymond January 22, 2008 at 12:11 am

  david, it worked on my computer but there are also cases that it didn’t work for some people and I don’t know why.

  Anyway, it’s still a good way to try when you don’t have a floppy drive and also if you do not use RAID.
• david January 22, 2008 at 12:07 am

  Raymond I’ll respectfully disagree with you about the first method, I already installed XP on more then 1 PC and changing the sata mode didn’t help the only real solution is an F6 driver

  Thank You for everything
• Raymond January 21, 2008 at 10:40 pm

  Good idea webcadre. Will do that.
• webcadre January 21, 2008 at 10:28 pm

  hi ray tell us more about combining it with the windows xp cd installation, (the driver) it is a option for some people that dont have a floppy drive or external floppy drive,
• Raymond January 21, 2008 at 10:14 pm

  Planet Malaysia, yeah it’s the same thing.

  Ed, it is weird. A lot of computer now don’t have floppy drive and had to use an external one because of this. Once I had to disable RAID just because I couldn’t find an external floppy disk to load up the driver.
• Ed January 21, 2008 at 9:35 pm

  No matter how you look at it, Microsoft sucks !

  SATA is out for many years now, and floppy drive are no longer on new machine several years now, and not everybody have external floppy drive (If it works for the install, I never tested)
• Planet Malaysia January 21, 2008 at 6:02 pm

  How about this
• Raymond January 21, 2008 at 4:25 pm

  Yeap, more advance users can use nlite or vlite. If you do a search on this site, you’ll find that I’ve already posted this two tools :)
• Rudy January 21, 2008 at 4:12 pm

  Or even better: You use Nlite (nliteos.com/) to add your needed drivers to your windows xp installation CD. For Windows Vista there is Vlite. (vlite.net/)